The Daily Poem

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

Though not yet the Dantesque hells that they are today, airports in 1954 were already places of union, separation, and general existential anxiety. This meditation comes from a serious and sphinx-like Winters at the height of his poetic development–though not yet at his own “terminal,” here he is a man who already has plenty to look back on. Happy reading.(Arthur) Yvor Winters was born in Chicago on October 17, 1900. While studying at the University of Chicago he was diagnosed with tuberculosis and decided to relocate to Santa Fe, New Mexico, for the sake of his health. His early poems, published in 1921 and 1922, were all written at a tuberculosis sanitarium. He enrolled at the University of Colorado in 1925, where he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. In 1926, he married the poet and novelist Janet Lewis. He spent two years teaching at the University of Idaho in Moscow before entering Stanford University as a graduate student, receiving his PhD in 1934. From 1928 until his death, he was a member of Stanford’s English department.Winters’s books of poetry include The Early Poems of Yvor Winters, 1920–1928(Swallow Press, 1966); Collected Poems (1952; revised edition, 1960), winner of the Bollingen Prize; Poems (Gyroscope Press, 1940); Before Disaster (Tryon Pamphlets, 1934); The Proof (Coward-McCann, Inc., 1930); and The Immobile Wind (M. Wheeler, 1921). In Defense of Reason (Swallow Press, 1947), Winters’s major critical work, is a collection of three earlier studies: The Anatomy of Nonsense (New Directions, 1943); Maule’s Curse (New Directions, 1938); and Primitivism and Decadence (Arrow Editions, 1937).Winters was also a prolific and controversial critic who believed that a work of art should be “an act of moral judgement” and attacked such literary icons as T. S. Eliot and Henry James. The chair of the Stanford English department notoriously denounced Winters as a “disgrace to the department.”Winters’s honors include a National Institute of Arts and Letters award as well as grants from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. He died on January 25, 1968, in Palo Alto, California.-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

Dive into the playful world of synonyms with a close examination of Billy Collins' poem 'Thesaurus.' Explore the intricate connections between words and their meanings. Discover the risks of misusing synonyms without a firm grasp of context. It's a delightful blend of literary insight and linguistic fun that'll have you looking at language in a whole new light.

Delve into the intriguing paradox of human knowledge, exploring how we can master the universe yet remain strangers to ourselves. The discussion highlights the irony of immense wisdom paired with profound self-ignorance. Biblical tales and classical writings weave together, painting a picture of humanity's nobility and its follies. With a focus on self-awareness, the podcast invites listeners to reflect on the complexities of understanding the human condition.

Today’s poems are selected from Ted Kooser’s The Blizzard Voices, a collection of informal verse commemorating the apocalyptic Great Plains blizzard of 1888. He mined histories and first-hand accounts to give “voice” to the men and women who lived through the unprecedented storm. 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

Dive into a whimsical exploration of Kingsley Amis's 'A Bookshop Idyll,' where themes of masculinity and vulnerability intertwine in a cozy bookstore setting. The discussion highlights the unique gender perspectives in poetry, particularly how men and women express love differently. Through humor and wit, the analysis emphasizes women’s strengths in poetry, while also reflecting on Amis's complex relationships with the opposite sex. It's a delightful examination of literary gender dynamics that encourages a deeper appreciation of poetic expression.

Today’s poem offers an incisive analogy for analogies. Happy reading.A.E. (Alicia) Stallings is the Oxford Professor of Poetry. She grew up in Decatur, Georgia, and studied classics at the University of Georgia and Oxford University. Her poetry collections include Like (2018), a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; Olives (2012), which was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award; Hapax (2006); and Archaic Smile(1999), winner of the Richard Wilbur Award and finalist for both the Yale Younger Poets Series and the Walt Whitman Award. Her poems have appeared in The Best American Poetry anthologies of 1994, 2000, 2015, 2016, and 2017, and she is a frequent contributor to Poetry and the Times Literary Supplement.Stallings’s poetry is known for its ingenuity, wit, and dexterous use of classical allusion and forms to illuminate contemporary life. In interviews, Stallings has spoken about the influence of classical authors on her own work: “The ancients taught me how to sound modern,” she told Forbes magazine. “They showed me that technique was not the enemy of urgency, but the instrument.”Stallings's latest verse translation is the pseudo-Homeric The Battle Between the Frogs and the Mice (2019), in an illustrated edition with Paul Dry Books, and her latest volume of poetry is a selected poems, This Afterlife (2023, FSG). She is the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. She lives in Athens, Greece, with her husband, the journalist John Psaropoulos.-bio via Poetry Foundation 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 draws together marriage and the blessing of water. 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

If you can see “a World in a Grain of Sand/And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,” what can you see in the trashcan at the curb? Apparently quite a bit, if you look closely. Today’s poem, a paean to the unsung heroes of the holidays, can help with that.Also in today’s episode: a look at what’s new for The Daily Poem in 2025. Happy reading!Philip Appleman (1926-2020) served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II and in the Merchant Marine after the war. He has degrees from Northwestern University, the University of Michigan, and the University of Lyon, France.His acclaimed books of poetry include Karma, Dharma, Pudding & Pie (W. W. Norton, 2009), New and Selected Poems, 1956-1996 (1996); Let There Be Light (1991); Darwin's Bestiary (1986); Open Doorways (1976); and Summer Love and Surf (1968). He is also the author of three novels, including Apes and Angels (Putnam, 1989); and six volumes of nonfiction, including the Norton Critical Edition, Darwin (1970).Appleman has taught at Columbia University, SUNY Purchase, and is currently Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Indiana University, Bloomington. He has also served on the Governing Board of the Poetry Society of America and the Poets Advisory Board of Poets House. His many awards include a Fellowship in Poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts, a Pushcart Prize, and both the Castagnola Award and the Morley Award from the Poetry Society of America.-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