Poets & Writers Theater

In this 2014 State of the Arts video, Brenda Shaughnessy speaks about the themes of her first three books, what motivates her to write, and her “Five Basic Rules” for aspiring poets. Shaughnessy’s essay “Air: Speak and Breathe” is featured in the January/February issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“I live in a hotel / with no rooms, just a lobby and lifts / leading to experiences.” In this video, Jon Sands reads Brenda Shaughnessy’s poem “Karaoke Realness at the Love Hotel” for the Ours Poetica series, sponsored by Complexly and the Poetry Foundation.

Brenda Shaughnessy reads her poem “I Have a Time Machine” and discusses the role that poetry can play in recovering from traumatic experiences for a TEDx event at Harvard University. Shaughnessy is the author of Our Andromeda (Copper Canyon Press, 2012) and So Much Synth (Copper Canyon Press, 2016).

“When a woman you love hits you / on the head with a book / you love, is that love?” At the New School, Brenda Shaughnessy reads from her poetry collection So Much Synth (Copper Canyon Press, 2016) for a Cave Canem event with poet Jamaal May.

"For each night is a long drink in a short glass." Listen to a reading by poet Brenda Shaughnessy at the Chicago Humanities Festival in 2013. Shaughnessy is featured in Ampersand: The Poets & Writers Podcast and her fourth poetry collection, So Much Synth (Copper Canyon Press, 2016), is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.