The Daily Poem

Today’s poem, reminiscent of yesterday’s “From a Railway Carriage,” was written by Auden for use in the 1936 documentary short film, Night Mail, and combines the powerful deep magics of locomotive travel and receiving letters. Bon voyage! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s poem grew out of an elaborate game of make-believe between the Brontë siblings, and gives some idea of the mature verse that might have been if Anne had not died young. Happy(?) reading.Anne Brontë (17 January 1820 – 28 May 1849) was an English novelist and poet, the youngest member of the Brontë literary family.Anne Brontë was the daughter of Maria (néeBranwell) and Patrick Brontë, a poor Irish clergyman in the Church of England. Anne lived most of her life with her family at the parish of Haworth on the Yorkshire Dales. Otherwise, she attended a boarding school in Mirfield between 1836 and 1837, and between 1839 and 1845 lived elsewhere working as a governess. In 1846, she published a book of poems with her sisters and later two novels, initially under the pen name Acton Bell. Her first novel, Agnes Grey, was published in 1847 at the same time as Wuthering Heights by her sister Emily Brontë. Anne's second novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, was published in 1848. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is often considered one of the first feminist novels.Anne died at 29, most likely of pulmonary tuberculosis. After her death, her sister Charlotte edited Agnes Grey to fix issues with its first edition, but prevented republication of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. As a result, Anne is not as well known as her sisters. Nonetheless, both of her novels are considered classics of English literature.-bio via Wikipedia This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s poem is the final stanza of Tennyson’s “Ulysses,” in which the hero of the Trojan war persuades his aging compatriots to wring out the last of their energies in a quest for the ends of the earth–“to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.” Happy reading. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Poet’s don’t typically compete for “coolest book cover,” and it’s probably because Zbigniew Herbert won years ago. Today’s poem is his tender look at poverty, pleasure, and irretrievable loss. Zbigniew Herbert was born on October 29, 1924, in Poland in the city of Lvov, which is now a part of the Ukraine. His grandfather was an Englishman who settled in Lvov to teach English. His father, a former member of the Legions that had fought for restoration of Poland’s independence, was a bank manager. Herbert’s formal education began in Lvov and continued under German occupation in the form of clandestine study at the underground King John Casimir University, where he majored in Polish literature. He was a member of the underground resistance movement. In 1944, he moved to Krakow, and three years later he graduated from the University of Krakow with a master’s degree in economics. He also received a law degree from Nicholas Copernicus University in Torun and studied philosophy at the University of Warsaw under Henryk Elzenberg.During the 1950s, Herbert worked at many low-paying jobs because he refused to write within the framework of official Communist guidelines. After widespread riots against Soviet control in 1956 brought about a political “thaw,” Herbert became an administrator at the Union of Polish Composers and published his first collection, Struna swiatla [The Chord of Light] (Czytelnik, 1956). The book immediately placed him among the most prominent representatives of the “Contemporaries” (young poets and writers associated with the weekly Contemporary Times).In 1957, Herbert published his second collection of verse, Hermes, pies i gwiazda [Hermes, the Dog and the Star] (Czytelnik). Four years later, he published his third book of poems, Studium przedmiotu [Study of the Object] (Czytelnik, 1961). In 1968, his Selected Poems, translated into English by Czeslaw Milosz and Peter Dale Scott, was released in both the United States and England, making Herbert one of the most popular contemporary poets in the English-speaking world. In 1971, he released the first Polish edition of Selected Poems.Herbert’s 1983 collection, Raport z oblezonego miasta i inne wiersze [Report from the Besieged City] (Instytut Literacki), dealt with the ethical problems Poland faced while under martial law. The book was issued simultaneously through an emigré publishing house and as an underground edition in Poland. He also published a number of essay collections and works of drama. In 1962, he released his famous work, Barbarzyńca wogrodzie [Barbarian in the Garden] (Czytelnik), which was eventually translated into numerous languages.Herbert’s numerous awards include the Kościelski Foundation Prize, the Austrian Lenau Prize, the Alfred Jurzykowski Prize, the Herder Prize, the Petrarch Prize, the Bruno Schulz Prize, and the Jerusalem Prize for the Freedom of the Individual in Society.Herbert was a coeditor of the poetry journal Poezja from 1965 to 1968 but resigned in protest of antisemitic policies. He traveled widely throughout the West and lived in Paris, Berlin, and the United States, where he taught briefly at the University of California, Los Angeles. He died in Warsaw on July 28, 1998.-bio via Academy of American Poets This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s poem glides, settles, dances, waves, and soars its way through the unassuming comforts of the familiar. Happy reading. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Phyllis McGinley (March 21, 1905 – February 22, 1978) was an American author of children's books and poetry. Her poetry was in the style of light verse, specializing in humor, satiric tone and the positive aspects of suburban life. She won a Pulitzer Prize in 1961.McGinley enjoyed a wide readership in her lifetime, publishing her work in newspapers and women's magazines such as the Ladies Home Journal, as well as in literary periodicals, including The New Yorker, The Saturday Review and The Atlantic. She also held nearly a dozen honorary degrees – "including one from the stronghold of strictly masculine pride, Dartmouth College" (from the dust jacket of Sixpence in Her Shoe (copy 1964)). Time Magazine featured McGinley on its cover on June 18, 1965.-bio via Wikipedia This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

As William Shakespeare was putting the final touchers on Hamlet, George Chapman was beginning (arguably) an even more momentous undertaking: introducing the English-speaking world to Homer’s epics. In a turn of historical irony, the fame of Chapman’s translation continues almost solely in and through today’s poem–but there are worse ways to be remembered. Happy reading. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s poem was too topical to pass up. Like so many of Oliver’s poems, it is an invitation to attend closely to life’s unexpected gifts. Happy reading. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s poem, whose full title is “Stilton and Milton; Or Literature in the 17th and 20th Centuries,” has something for book lovers and cheese lovers alike to dig in to. Chesterton once wrote that “poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese,” and he then set about rectifying that state of affairs through poems like these. Happy reading. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s poem, though written for the far more infrequent crowning of monarchs, contains plenty of sentiments fitting for a quadrennial presidential inauguration. Happy reading.On a pillar on the west wall of Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey is a white marble bust to poet and clergyman John Keble. The bust is signed and dated by Thomas Woolner, 1872 and is just inscribed 'JOHN KEBLE'. The memorial was originally much more elaborate and was in the south west tower chapel of the nave (now St George's chapel), placed between Dr Thomas Arnold and William Wordsworth. The bust, on a foliated corbel, was set within a decorated oval frame set with jewels with two small pillars either side of the bust. Above was a decorated cross and below a square tablet with the inscription:In memory of John Keble, author of the Christian Year. Born 1792. Died 1866. In quietness and in confidence shall be your strength. Isaiah xxx.15. He rests in peace at Hursley of which he was Vicar 30 years.When the chapel was redesigned in 1932 the memorials there were all moved - Arnold to the north west nave chapel and Wordsworth to Poets' Corner. Only the bust of Keble was retained and mounted on a new Purbeck marble bracket in the Corner.He was born at Fairford in Gloucestershire on 25th April 1792, son of the Reverend John Keble and his wife Sarah (Maule). After education at home he attended Oxford University. In 1827 he published his popular work The Christian Year. He was professor of poetry at Oxford and became rector of Hursley in Hampshire in 1836. With Newman and Pusey he instigated the Oxford Movement. He married Charlotte Clarke but there were no children. He died on 29th March 1866 and is buried at Hursley. Keble College in Oxford was founded in his memory.-bio via Westminster Abbey This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe