Shows
Breaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe Dating GameThe queens select some very poetic bachelors and decide where they'd read them on their date.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Poets and poems mentioned include:"blessing the boats" by Lucille CliftonJoe Wenderoth's book, Letters to Wendy, "June 3, 1997"Li-Young Lee, "This Room and Everything In It"F...
2025-10-0629 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastAaron and James Went to PittsburghThe queens descend upon Pittsburgh for a bittersweet (but dishy) tribute for Ed Ochester (1939-2023).Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:For more about the weekend events and about Ed Ochester's impact on American poetry, read here and here and here.The Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize carries a cash award of $5,000 and publication by the U...
2025-09-2932 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTossing off with TommyThe judgy Judies play Toss or Keep to help their friend Tommy downsize his poetry library.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Some of the poems/poets/people mentioned in this episode include:Robert Creeley, "I Know a Man" which you can read here and listen to Creeley read here. And here's a roundtable discussion of t...
2025-09-1544 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThat's What She SaidThe ladies get manifesto on that butt! (And mouth.) Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Read more about D.H. Lawrence here. Read William Carlos Williams's "Paterson" here and "Asphodel, That Greeny Flower" here.Jericho Brown writes about A.E. Housman in Mentor to Muse hereRead Dylan Thomas's poem "A Refusal to M...
2025-09-0832 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastI Myself Am HellThe queens summon lines designed to stop readers in their tracks. Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Sharon Olds says that early in her poetic career, when she'd send out her poems, "[t]hey came back often with very angry notes." Receipt here. W.H. Auden's "Funeral Blues", or "Stop all the clocks" appeared in his boo...
2025-09-0132 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastI Do Know Some Things (with Richard Siken)The queens are joined by poetry crush Richard Siken, & talk heroes, rabbits, robots, & healing.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:You can order I Do Know Some Things here. Visit Richard Siken's website here, and read work from the new book.Read Christopher Nelson's review of I Do Know Some Things here.Some interviews wit...
2025-08-251h 20Breaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastLocation! Location! Location!How do poets write about place, and how does place shape a poet? Play along as the queens place these poems!Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES: Poems/Poets mentioned in this week's show include:Traci Brimhall, "Shelter in Place." Visit Brimhall's website here. And you can watch her craft talk on revision he...
2025-08-1127 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTouchstone Poems (Part 2)Touchstones part 1 hit so good, we decided to go another round!Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Poems mentioned in this episode:Tomas Transtromer: "The Name" (translated by May Swenson with Leif Sjöberg)Cornelius Eady: "My Heart" Eady also turned Brutal Imagination into a play, too, and you can read the Variety review here....
2025-08-0431 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTouchstone PoemsThe gals talk foundational poems--and they might just surprise you!Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Quan Barry's "The 1986 Apple Super Bowl Commercial as Intervention" refers to this iconic 1984 Apple Computer commercial aired during the SuperBowl.The Brigit Pegeen Kelly poem we mention is "Three Cows and the Moon" was originally published in New England Review in 1993. You can hear K...
2025-07-2130 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastProse for PoetsThe library is open--to prose the queens find indispensable for poets!Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.You can find John Hollander's Rhyme's Reason here.Check out an excerpt in the NYT from Michael Schmidt Lives of the Poets. Here's an NPR review of Olivia Laing's Funny Weather: Art in an Emergency. For more about Agnes Martin by Olivia Laing, check out t...
2025-07-1432 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastA Pride Episode: Trans PoetryThe queens talk literary confidantes; then we discuss the pros and pitfalls of poetic friendships.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.NOTES:Read a bit more about Spencer Williams's Tranz, including from the poem "Laramie" in the book, here. Watch this reading celebrating the Transgender Day of Visibility, featuring some poets from our episode, including Amir Rab...
2025-06-3030 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThank You for Being a FriendThe queens talk literary confidantes; then we discuss the pros and pitfalls of poetic friendships.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.NOTES:Check out Toni Morrison's 1987 eulogy for James Baldwin in the New York Times.We read from Fran Lebowitz's remembrance of her friend Toni Morrison, printed in the Paris Review.If you haven't al...
2025-06-2331 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastReally?The queens boil down the essence of some favorite poems and poets in this game that decides what poetry is *really* about.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.NOTES:Read the NY Times review of Michael Schmidt's The Lives of the PoetsListen to James Merrill read his poem "For Proust" and while we're on the s...
2025-05-1226 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe Poems of Brad PittThe ladies ask AI to write poems about Brad Pitt's butt. It’s not so bad Brad, sad Brad, is it?Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.NOTES:Aaron's "Brad Pitt" appeared in his first book, Blue on Blue Ground. Read the poem here. Here's the official video for the Miley Cyrus song "End of the World" and here's a re...
2025-04-2830 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe Final CountdownThe queens discuss and revise a recent list of "best poetry," adding other tops (& bottoms & verses & sides, you get the point, miss thing).Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.NOTES:For a few lists of best 21st Century poetry: The Atlantic (which we read in the show). The New York TimesRead Mark Strand's titular poem "Man and Camel"Read Craig Morgan Teicher's review of Glück's Faithful and Vi...
2025-04-2138 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastJames Went to AWPThe queens dish this year’s AWP Conference!Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Notes: The Association of Writers and Writing Programs can be found online at www.awpwriter.org Marcela Fuentes is the author of the award-winning novel Malas and you can find her online at https://www.marcelafuentes.comCheck out t...
2025-04-1432 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastShortiesThe queens prove that it's not the size of the ship but the motion etc etc in this episode devoted to short poems.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Pretty Please with Aaron's cherry on top..... Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Poems we mention in the show include:A.R. Ammons's "Their Sex Life"Rae Armantrou...
2025-02-2429 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastSissyThe queens get sassy and sissify toxic cisheteronormative gender ideas about poetry.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Pretty Please.....Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.The site in such desperate need of sissification (and better poets) can be found here. Or just skip to a queer critique here and/or to Esther Wang's super smart deep-dive takedown "My Brief Hero's Journey into th...
2025-02-1031 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastWorld AIDS Day (Encore Presentation)A special encore presentation of our World AIDS Day episode from last year, featuring work by writers we've lost to AIDS.Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Pretty Please.....Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:According to the website for World AIDS Day, more than 38 million people are currently living with HIV. And, since 1984, more than 35 million people have died of HIV...
2024-12-0117 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastStep Your Poetry UpThe queens play a round of Step Your Poetry Up before poet-voicing porn dialogue. Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Pretty Please.....Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Here are links to some of the poems we mention:Amy Lowell, "Patterns"Robinson Jeffers, "Credo"H.D., "Sea Rose"Sara Teasdale, "Moonlight"An essa...
2024-11-2538 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastDarling Nicky ( w/ special guest Nicky Beer)The queens talk bisexual poetics and genius with Nicky Beer, before getting all dolled up in a game of real vs fake Dolly. Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Visit Nicky Beer’s website: http://www.nickybeer.comRead this conversation with Nicky Beer published in The Adroit Journal in 2022.Read this...
2024-11-0441 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastWhat Werk IsThe queens have one thing to say: you better werk!Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Click here to read Philip Levine's "What Work Is"Read more about Philip LevineRead Ada Límon's poem “How We Are Made” dedicated to Levine, who was her teacher. Límon talks about Levine in thi...
2024-10-2832 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastCherapy: Poet Casting CallSnap INTO it, girlarina! The queens re-cast Cher movies with poets.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTES:Read Patricia Smith's "Incendiary Art."Here's Cher's cover of “Shoop Shoop (It's in His Kiss)." And here's Merry Clayton's version.Cher starred in the movie Mask, which was released in 1985. Mask won the Academy A...
2024-10-2131 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastFollowing Orders (Occasional Poems)Your favorite bridesmaids are (drunk and dis)orderly in this episode about writing for special occasions. Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTESHere's a cinematic example of an epithalamion--an e.e. Cummings poem (from In Her Shoes).James’s poem “A Monument for This Morning” appears on p. 4 here. It’s not supposed to be centered...
2024-09-2330 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastJames Goes to Bread LoafGo tell it on the mountain, darlings! Join the queens for a special Breaking Form report on the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference.If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTESIf you don't know about Absolutely Fabulous, which first ran from 1992-95, you're missing out. Catch Edina and Patsy's best moments here. Mona van Duyn taught...
2024-09-0928 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastCommitments: A Revisit of Essex HemphillAaron and James revisit an iconic poem about queer duty and erasure by Essex Hemphill.If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTESRead Hemphill's biographical sketch on the Poetry Foundation.We reference Hemphill's canonical poem, which you can read: "American Wedding" (listen to Justin Smith read the poem here).Hemphill's Ceremonies was publish...
2024-07-2225 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastSecretsSpill all the tea but spill it slant with the Breaking Form queens in this episode dedicated to the art of secrets.If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTESMadonna's "Secret" was the lead single off of her sixth album, Bedtime Stories. Watch the video here. Read Sharon Olds's "Killing My Sister's Fish"Len...
2024-07-1529 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastFunnyKnock knock, darlings! Join the queens as we talk about funny poems.If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTESWatch Stacey Waite give a full reading here (at 38:00); here's Stacey reading one poem: "The Kind of Man I Am at the DMV." Watch Gary Jackson's poem "Tryouts" in Motionpoems (Button Poetry) here.Read Ti...
2024-07-0830 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastF*ck You PoemsCelebrating the art of the poetic punch & helping Form Breakers everywhere say "f*ck you" to their nemesissies. If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTESListen to Taylor Swift sing a mash-up of "thanK you aIMee" (about Kim Kardashian) and "Mean" on the Eras tour in London here. Read John Dryden's "MacFlecknoe"Visit...
2024-07-0127 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastGolden GirlsAre you a friend of Dorothy? This episode pays tribute to The Golden Girls, but in the most Breaking Form way possible!If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.SHOW NOTESChristian Wiman's book Zero at the Bone: Fifty Entries Against Despair. It's part memoir and part a collection of his poems and poems by others related to the bo...
2024-06-2428 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe Tortured Poets DepartmentWe're snatching wigs in this one! The queens get real about bad poetry. If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.NOTESWatch the official lyric video for "But Daddy I Love Him" and read this article about what the pub The Black Dog (the titular pub from the Taylor Swift Song) s like.Read Mona van Dun's...
2024-06-1027 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastLeading LadiesA leading ladies game leads to a tombstone-poetry pop quiz before Monica Farrell reads a poem by Michael Dumanis. Happy Pride Month!Watch Anne Sexton respond to a vile review (published in The Southern Review) of Live or Die. Read "Menstruation at Forty" from Live or Die. Read "Rapunzel" from Sexton's Transformations.On Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, appearing with Natalie Portman to promote May December, Julianne Moore names her performance in Far From Heaven as her "personal best performance." On another episode, Moore talks about being fired from CanYou Every Forgive Me? by...
2024-06-0330 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastEarly ReadsThe queens revisit some early, inspiring books of poetry that still slap! Come nerd out with us. If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Read Linda Gregg's "Part of Me Wanting Everything to Live"Read an interview with Wayne Koestenbaum, "Dirty Mind: An Interview with WK" which appeared in LA Review of Books Read "Boy at the Pa...
2024-05-2729 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastLetters to a StrangerThe queens blur the boundaries between Dylan Thomas James, then become shady ladies about Broetry.If you'd like to support Breaking Form:Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Read Dylan Thomas's incredible villanelle "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" or listen to Thomas read it here. We reference a few readings of this poem by actors: Here's Anthony Hopkins getting choked up reading...
2024-05-1329 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastLove at First HateThe queens love to love you--but it didn't always start out like that. Stick around for our game: "Pulitzer Prize Winning Titles from an Alternate Universe."Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.If you have library access, Ena Jung's 2015 article "The Breath of Emily Dickinson's Dashes" is worth the time.Watch Bill Murray read two of the more obscure Wallace Steven...
2024-04-0832 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastFan FicThe queens remake the endings of iconic poems, then play a round of "Gay or Homophobic?"Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Read William Wordsworth's "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud." Or hear it read by Dame Helen Mirren here. Read Emily Dickinson's Poem 479 ("Because I could not stop for death"). James makes a reference to Linda Gregg's iconic "The Poet Goes Abo...
2024-04-0127 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastOutside the LinesAaron spills the tea about recording a spoken word album, then the queens get on all fours for some Poet Sex Positions. Woof woof, darlings!Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. You can find Aaron's Outside the Lines album here on iTunes. You can listen here to Aaron Smith's "Outside the Lines," the title poem of his spoken word album.The...
2024-03-2527 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastSatan SaysGet ready to unlock your box with the Breaking Form queens as they discuss Sharon Olds's icon poem, "Satan Says"Read the text of "Satan Says" here.Check out the wild facts about Valerie Bertinelli on her IMDB page!Read Sharon Olds's poem, "I Go Back to May 1937"Here's a famous "Church Chat" sketch with Dana Carvey as Enid Strict, aka the Church Lady, with guests Jim and Tammy Faye Baker (played by Phil Hartman and Jan Hooks).And, lastly, check out Aaron Smith's short essay "The Very Act...
2024-03-1130 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastQueer Eye for the Str8 PoetJoin the gals for the queer makeover you secretly knew straight cis guy poetry needed.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. The word zhuzh is part of Polari, an argot used in Britain since perhaps the 18th century, primarily among gay theatrical and circus performers. Given the lack of a clear origin, it is impossible to tell if the verb has priority...
2024-03-0432 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastHanky CodeThe ladies reach into your back pocket to talk gay hanky codes and the poets they ASSociate with them.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Bob Damron's Address Book was actually published in 1964 and hand-sold by Bob Damron. Read more about the Damron Guide here.Read Ginsberg's poem "A Supermarket in California"Buy Stephanie Brown's Allegory of the Supermarket from Th...
2024-02-1929 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastGalentine's Day (with Guest Diane Seuss)The ladies are joined by the Queen herself, Diane Seuss, to spread some love for Galentine's Day. Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Diane Seuss's MODERN POETRY is available March 5, 2024 from Graywolf Press. Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.We discuss Aaron Smith's Book of Daniel , and you can check that book out here.Read Marianne Moore's "No Swan So Fine," first published in Poetry Magazine in October...
2024-02-1230 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastFranklyGet frankly franking frank with the queens this week--then let's talk about sex, baby! Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Read more about Frank O'Hara. And read here about Tim Dlugos. Frank O'Hara wrote "Personism: A Manifesto" that was both manifesto and send-up of manifestos. In it, he advocates for poems that sound like they've got a real person in mind as an au...
2024-01-0829 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastQueer-Ass PoemsThe queens help you start your new year off right: with some fierce, unapologetic, fabulous queer writers!Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.J Jennifer Espinoza's first full-length collection of poems, I Don't Want to Be Misunderstood, is available for pre-order at Alice James Books and will be released in 2024. You can read her poem "Birthday Suits" here.Read James L. White...
2024-01-0127 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastJames Does a PromptWrite with the Breaking Form queens before we play a game of poetry homonyms.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. You can read more about and poems by Thomas Centolella here. The poems we mention in "Homonyms" are:"Yellowjackets" by Kimiko Hahn"Nothing Gentle Will Remain" by CA Conrad "Disillusion" by Langston Hughes"Peach" b...
2023-12-1830 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTrue Crime Part 2The queens talk more True Crime poems in an episode so good, it'll feel like you're breaking the law!Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Read Natasha Trethewey's "Imperatives for Carrying on in the Aftermath." Listen to Trethewey interviewed by NPR here--it's a riveting and utterly heartbreaking story.You can read Sharon Olds's poem "Photographs Courtesy of the Fall River Histori...
2023-12-1129 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTrue Crime Part 1The queens play poetry detective in this episode devoted to true crime-inspired poems.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.You can check out the Killer Psyche podcast here, hosted by retired FBI agent Candice DeLong.You can read more about Kenneth Patchen as well as some of his poems here. It's worth taking a look at the poem Aaron reads ("The Murder...
2023-12-0430 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastKiss KissThe queens' Kissing Booth is now open! We talk poetic kisses and then read some recent poetry crushes.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Read more about Rimbaud here, and watch Patti Smith's video about preparing for "Rimbaud Month" here (5min).To really understand the life & times Akhmatova lived through, watch Semeon Aranovitch's film The Anna Akhmatova File (in Russian with subtit...
2023-11-2730 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe JanesThe queens play "Just Jane!" featuring a jackpot of J. Kenyon and J. Mead poems. James just can't jank a jackdaw but refuses to be jaded.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Kenyon published four volumes of poetry during her life: From Room to Room (1978), The Boat of Quiet Hours (1986), Let Evening Come (1990), and Constance (1993), and, as translator, Twenty Poems of Anna Akmatova (1985). A fift...
2023-11-1328 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastDoing LinesThe gorls chop up some gorgeous lines before playing Mean, Queen, or Blue Jean.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books."It was a time when they were afraid of him" is from Jimmy Santiago Baca's poem "Ancestor""An opening to a story should be / unremarkable" is from Catherine Chen's " My Poem Asks to Be Read Right to Left""Things...
2023-11-0628 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastPortals: a Tribute to Maureen SeatonAaron and James are joined by special guests to pay tribute to Maureen Seaton.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Please consider buying your books from Bluestockings Cooperative, a feminist and queer indie bookselling cooperative.Read Maureen Seaton's obituary to learn more about her life.You can read poems & conversations with Maureen in the South Florida Poetry Journal here.
2023-10-2327 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastEnjambmentThe queens leave you breathless in antici....pation with this crafty episode focused on enjambed lines.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Please consider buying your books from Bluestockings Cooperative, a feminist and queer indie bookselling cooperative.Read Susan Mitchell's poem "The Dead" which is indeed in her first book, The Water Inside the Water (Wesleyan, 1983 and reprinted by Harper Perennial, 1994).
2023-10-1630 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastF*CKSTICKThe queens hypothesize that erotic/love poems must always have one "f*ckstick." Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Buy our books: Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Please consider buying your books from Bluestockings Cooperative, a feminist and queer indie bookselling cooperative.We talk about the difficulty of language and words that “shouldn’t” be in poems in Crimes Against Diction, episode 95. Read “Dick Pics” by Sarah Tsiang.
2023-10-0230 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastDigging for PoemsOur intrepid pansies talk prompts--but first up it's a scandal of grave proportions.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. Publisher's Weekly calls the book "visceral, tender, and compassionate."James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Writing in Lit Hub, Rebecca Morgan Frank says the poems have "a gift for telling stories . . . in acts of queer survival." Please consider buying your books from Bluestockings Cooperative, a feminist and queer indie bookselling cooperative.
2023-08-2830 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastDeep Image PoetsOur intrepid hosts talk Deep Image poetics and nearly break into rosebud....er blossom.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. Publisher's Weekly calls the book "visceral, tender, and compassionate."James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Writing in Lit Hub, Rebecca Morgan Frank says the poems have "a gift for telling stories . . . in acts of queer survival." Please consider buying your books from Bluestockings Cooperative, a feminist and queer in...
2023-08-0729 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastA Little Bit AlexisThe ladies get a little bit Alexis in this episode that mixes poetry quotes with Alexis Rose quotes from Schitt's Creek.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. Publisher's Weekly calls the book "visceral, tender, and compassionate."James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Writing in Lit Hub, Rebecca Morgan Frank says the poems have "a gift for telling stories . . . in acts of queer survival." Please consider buying your books fr...
2023-07-3128 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastKeeping It 100The queens swear to tell the hole truth, and nothing butt the truth to commemorate the 100th episode of Breaking Form.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Read Carl Phillips's "As from a Quiver of Arrows." Or see Summit Chakraborty read it here (~3 min).If you want to know more about Bruce Weigl, check out the Breaking Form Episode "The I...
2023-07-2429 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTools vs. Weapons (with Terrance Hayes / pt. 1)The queens get between the covers with Terrance Hayes ahead of the release of new works of poetry and prose on July 18.Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. Publisher's Weekly calls the book "visceral, tender, and compassionate."James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Writing in Lit Hub, Rebecca Morgan Frank says the poems have "a gift for telling stories . . . in acts of queer survival." Pre-Order Terrance Hayes's new bo...
2023-07-1031 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastHereditaryThe queens bust out their microscopes and examine poetic DNA. Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. Publisher's Weekly calls the book "visceral, tender, and compassionate."James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. "Romantic Comedy," writes Diane Seuss in her judge's citation, "is a masterpiece of queer self-creation."Some of the writers discussed include:Terrance Hayes (who'll join us for the Breaking Form interview next week!), author of S...
2023-07-0330 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastCrimes Against DictionThe queens talk diction, the political history of language, and naked octogenarians.Support Breaking Form, if the spirit so moves you:Review Breaking Form on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Words that we identify as "forbidden" (in case you want to try to write poem/s with them!): verboten; beautiful; the body; dick; cicada; bougainvillea; filament; "Z was all X"; Dear Reader"; dead deer; soul; panties.You can hear P...
2023-06-1925 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastSummer FunThe queens get beachy, play f*ck marry kill with a Pulitzer winner, and fabricate some fab poets' drag names.Support Breaking Form, the spirit so moves you:Review Breaking Form on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Watch Carl Phillips read from Then the War: and Selected Poems, 2007-2020, winner of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for poetry, here (~1 hour).Poets we mention in this extravaganza include:Denise Duhamel, Queen f...
2023-06-0526 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe ImpossibleThe queens try to say it clearly and make it beautiful, no matter what, in this episode revisiting Bruce Weigl's poem "The Impossible." TW for sexual assault and pedophilia.If you need resources, for yourself or a loved one, regarding sexual assault and pedophilia/incest, please visit https://www.rainn.org.Support Breaking Form, the spirit so moves you:Review Breaking Form on Apple Podcasts here. Buy our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Born Jan...
2023-05-2929 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastFavorite Least FavoriteAll tea, no shade: the queens spill their favorite--and least favorite--books from beloved poets. As the great poet said, "If equal affection cannot be..." etc, etc.Please support Breaking Form by:Reviewing Breaking Form on Apple Podcasts here. Buying our books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.We mention the following poets and books:Sharon OldsBalladz The Gold CellThe Dead and the LivingBlood, Tin, StrawStag's LeapOde...
2023-05-2228 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastMercy Mercy: CherapyThe queens talk poetry through the lyrics of our diva & icon: Cher, who'll turn 77 on May 20.Review Breaking Form on Apple Podcasts here. Please support Breaking Form and buy Aaron's and James's books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Cher appeared twice on the show Will & Grace — once in 2000, when Jack mistook her for a drag-queen Cher impersonator, and again in an appearance in 2002's season 4 finale, where she advises Jack" "Follow your bliss."Matthew Dickman's poem...
2023-05-1529 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastHero RatioThese queens need a hero, not a zero in this episode of heroic percentages.Review Breaking Form on Apple Podcasts here. Please support Breaking Form and buy Aaron's and James's books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.In the Season 5 Finale of Game of Thrones, Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) was forced to walk naked through the city. The scene lasts for 6 minutes, not 8 as James says. The nun who follows behind Cersei, ringing a bell and calling out "Shame!" in in...
2023-05-0829 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastHot TakesThis episode's got Aaron sweating, then Miguel Murphy joins the queens for some flaming hot poetry takes.Review Breaking Form on Apple Podcasts here. Please support Breaking Form and buy Aaron's and James's books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Or, if you'd like to shop indie, we recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a DC-area Black-owned bookshop.Read a recent Beckian Fritz Goldberg poem. Or listen to her read at the University of Arizona Poetry Center (from In th...
2023-05-0129 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastIn BriefThe queens get quick (and dirty), summarizing a poet's oeuvre in one sentence.If you'd like to support Breaking Form, please consider buying Aaron's and James's books (both 2023):Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.When James says that Aaron makes a "Stuck the Landing" flourish, he means the kind of gesture made over and over in this montage of gymnasts sticking the landing!Watch an Elizabeth Bishop documentary here (including interviews with Bidart, Strand, Howard Moss, Mary McCarthy, and...
2023-04-2429 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastHaydenCarRuthStoneThe queens discuss how poetry uses us as they highlight the work of Ruth Stone and Hayden Carruth. Support Breaking Form and buy James's and Aaron's new books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Please consider supporting the poets we mention in today's show! If you need a good indie bookstore, we recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a DC-area Black-owned bookshop.Read Ruth Stone's obit in the NY Times. Phoebe Stone gave a recorded talk about her mother...
2023-04-1728 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastElegyAaron and James stop all the clocks with this episode exploring elegy.Support Breaking Form and buy James's and Aaron's new books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Watch the iconic scene from Four Weddings and a Funeral in which Auden's "Funeral Blues" is read. Listen to Dylan Thomas read "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night" here. A stirring and unforgettable performance of the poem by Michael Sheen is worth your time here. Listen...
2023-04-1031 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastSpin the BottleGet ready to spin the bottle! The queens cause some jeopardy in this trivia-filled episode.Support Breaking Form and buy James's and Aaron's new books:Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.And please consider supporting the poets we mention on today's show at your favorite independent bookseller. If you need a suggestion, we can recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a Black-owned indie in DC. Visit Brenda Hillman's website at http://www.brendahillman.net/index.htmlWatch this interview...
2023-04-0330 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastJohn CranberrymanThe queens return to the Poetry Gay Bar and talk mixers & pretty dicks.f you want to support Breaking Form, please consider buying James and Aaron's new books.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.See Spencer Reese read "The Upper Room" from The Road to Emmaus here (~3.5 min)Watch the poet Ai read "The Good Shepherd" here (~3.5 min).A terrific ee cummings documentary can be seen here (~40 min). Edward Estlin Cummings (October 14, 1894 – September 3, 1962), often written in al...
2023-03-2730 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe Consequences (with Guest Manuel Muñoz)The queens get fictional with Manuel Muñoz, who joins us to talk about boundaries: between poetry and fiction, between land and desire. If you want to support Breaking Form, please consider buying James and Aaron's new books.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series. James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books.Manuel Muñoz is the author most recently of The Consequences, a short story collection published in 2022 by Graywolf. Buy the book here!And watch to Manuel give a short (~3 min) talk about The Co...
2023-03-2027 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastRomantic ComedyThe ladies talk about James's new book, ROMANTIC COMEDY, and James reads the title poem and talks about sex, survival, and Chicago brides.Find us at AWP:Thursday: 10:35-11:50 Panel: Building Virtual Community. Rms 440-442, Level 4, Summit Building. 12-12:30 pm Aaron signs STOP LYING at the U of Pittsburgh Press booth # 301 in the book-fair7pm James reading at Seattle Beer Company1427 Western Avewith authors from Four Way Books, Autumn House, and Barrow StreetSaturday:10:30-11:30 James signs ROMANTIC COMEDY at the Four Way...
2023-03-0630 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastPop PoetsPop off, queen! If poets could be covered by musicians (instead of musicians covering poems), you'd get...POP POETSBuy STOP LYING, Aaron Smith's new book of poems, just out from the Pitt Poetry Series. Aaron will be signing copies of the book at AWP on Thursday, March 9 from 12:00-12:30 at the University of Pittsburgh Press (Booths 303, 301).Buy ROMANTIC COMEDY, James's new book of poems, which will be released on March 15. James will be signing copies of the book at AWP on Saturday, March 11 from 10:30-11:30 at the Four Way Books Booth # 803.Watch...
2023-02-2726 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastStop LyingSTOP LYING is Aaron's new book of poetry! We discuss its themes, then James gives Aaron the STOP pop quiz. Stop Lying is just out from the Pitt Poetry Series. Buy it here! You can watch Aaron read from previous work hereRead Aaron’s “My 1990s” online in Allium.Watch Phil Levine read the fabulous title poem from What Work Is here (~2 min)Here’s a video of Britney Spears as a child on Star Search.
2023-01-3029 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastEndingsThe queens show why it matters how you wrap it up.Support Breaking Form! Buy Aaron's new book, Stop Lying. And pre-order James's new book, Romantic Comedy, available from Four Way Books in March 2023. Read Robert Hayden's iconic “Those Winter Sundays” here.Read Sharon Olds’s “I Go Back to May 1937” hereYou can read Louise Glück’s poem “Vita Nova” here. TERF Adrienne Rich’s poem “Diving into the Wreck” can be read here. Read Lucille Clifton’s “why some people be mad at me sometimes” here. Marth...
2023-01-2328 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture Podcast69 (Anniversary)The Anniversary Episode has the queens recapping interviews and impact from a year of Breaking Form!Aaron's new book, STOP LYING, is available for pre-order (and arrives January 2023). Order STOP LYING from the Pitt Poetry Series here.James's new book, ROMANTIC COMEDY, is available for preorder (releasing March 2023). Order Romantic Comedy from Four Way Books here. Miguel Murphy's most recent book, Shoreditch, can be purchased through Barrow Street.Buy Denise Duhamel's books, including her most recent book, Second Story, here. Get David Trinidad's new book, Digging to Wonderland: Memory...
2022-12-1929 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastBefore You Were a StoryAaron and James talk about becoming storytellers -- and survivors.Marie Howe’s poem “Gretel, From a Sudden Clearing” was first published in Agni 1987, then in her first book, The Good Thief, selected by Margaret Atwood as a winner in the 1987 Open Competition of the National Poetry Series (Persea, 1988). The other poem that Aaron mentions from the book is "Isaac."Watch a reading and conversation with Marie Howe here (~30 min). Poet Sandra Beasley hosts the conversation, which is sponsored by the Howard County (MD) Poetry & Literature Society. Aaron's poem "After My Mother Apologized for My...
2022-12-1228 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastWorld AIDS Day: Listening for My NameAaron and James read work by writers we've lost to AIDS in this bonus episode.According to the website for World AIDS Day, more than 38 million people are currently living with HIV. And, since 1984, more than 35 million people have died of HIV or AIDS-related illnesses, making it one of the most destructive pandemics in history. Donate here. Please consider buying the books of the poets we honor! We recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a DC-area Black-owned bookshop. We dedicated a Breaking Form Episode ("The Invisible Embrace") to Paul Monette (October 16, 1945--February 10, 1995). Monette was the author...
2022-12-0116 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe Invisible EmbraceThe queens discuss breaking open the closet doors through the work of Paul Monette.Please consider supporting the poets we mention in today's show! If you need a good indie bookstore, we recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a DC-area Black-owned bookshop. Paul Monette (October 16, 1945--February 10, 1995) was the author of at least 4 novels: Taking Care of Mrs. Carroll (1978), The Gold Diggers (1979), Afterlife (1990), and Halfway Home (1991). He also wrote Sanctuary, a fable, which was illustrated by Vivienne Flesher and published posthumously in 1997. His first nonfiction book, Borrowed Time: An AIDS Memoir (1988) received a National Book Critic's Circle Aw...
2022-10-1729 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastGrief Motel (Pt. 2)We all have to check in some time to the Grief Motel. The queens talk about grief and how poetry helps us cope.Please support indie bookshops, like Loyalty Bookstores. Aaron Smith’s new book, Stop Lying, is out on January 31, 2023 and is available for pre-order here.You can buy James’s book of personal essays, I Liked You Better Before I Knew You So Well, here.Watch Thom L. Higgins throw a pie in Anita Bryant's face here. He was one of four activists who disrupted the press confe...
2022-09-2627 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastGrief Motel (Pt. 1)The queens discuss the craft of coping with grief.James misattributes to Coleridge the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads, which defines poetry as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings." The real author is, of course, Wordsworth, who also writes: "I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquillity: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species of reaction, the tranquillity gradually disappears, and an emotion, kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is gradually produced, and does itself actually exist in th...
2022-09-1929 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastOn Thin Ice (with Jacques J. Rancourt)The queens spin into a frosty finish with poet and figure-skating stan Jacques J. Rancourt! What a way to celebrate our 50th episode!Please support the poets mentioned in today's episode by buying their books. Shop indie if you can; we recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a Black-owned bookseller in DC. You can buy Jacques's Brocken Spectre here. Find Jacques J. Rancourt’s website here. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram @jj_rancourt. Read Jacques’s “Golden Gate Park” from Brocken Spectre on Poetry Daily here. Writing for the Los Angeles Review Erica Charis-Molling says this of Ra...
2022-08-2229 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastBig SonnyThe queens defy Big Sonny and play an associative game that leads to a lot of poetry love -- and some hot dish.Please support the poets we mention in today's show by buying their books! You can shop indie at Loyalty Bookstores, a Black-owned DC-area independent bookseller. Walt Whitman's “Song of Myself" ends with these lines:If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.{....}Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,Missing me one place search another,I stop somewhere waiting for you. Mark...
2022-08-1528 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastAaron Awards the PulitzerAaron and James correct history and re-award the Pulitzer Prize. Hindsight is 20/20 and we definitely are hind-oglers.Support the poets we mention by buying their books. We recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a Black-owned indie bookseller in the DC area.Read David Trinidad's dishy and detailed account of how Anne Sexton got her Pulitzer here. More/other insight into the Pulitzers can be had in reading this July 1957 article by Arthur Mizener that appeared in The Atlantic. After Forest Gander won the Pulitzer, he gave a 5-book recommended reading list that included C.D...
2022-08-0129 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture Podcast(Taylor's Version)The queens get Swiftian!As always, please support the writers we mention by buying at indie bookstores. If you need a good one, we recommend Loyalty Bookstores, a black-owned DC-area store. Catherine Barnett is a Taurus. Watch Nicole Sealey perform Barnett's "Apophasis at the All-Night Rite Aid" here. (~2 min)You can read Vievee Francis's poem "Say It, Say It Any Way You Can" here. You can read the title poem of Cathy Linh Che's book, Split, here. The Literary House Press released a broadside of that poem; you can purchase that here...
2022-07-1827 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTheoretically 30We're 30, dirty, and thriving! The queens name 30 poets for each other, and then we associate a word or phrase with each one. No beeps! Please consider supporting the poets we mention in today's show by buying their books! We can recommend Loyalty Bookstore, a black-owned DC-based indie bookstore that ships nationally. Watch Anne Carson read "A Lecture on Corners" here (~58 min)Marilyn Chin's website is http://www.marilynchin.orgWatch Carolyn Kizer talk poetry and writing with Lucille Clifton, and read her poem "Bitch" here (~30 min)Find Rachel Zucker online here. Wat...
2022-07-0429 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastRuPaul RuPoetThe ladies pay tribute to the Queen of Drag and to the makeup of language! Consider buying books by authors mentioned in today's episode (and, hey, Aaron's and James's too!) at an independent bookstore. If you need a recommendation, we like Loyalty Bookstore, a Black-owned indie in DC, or The Ivy, a woman-owned indie in Baltimore. 1. For more about jush/zhuzh and its meanings, click here.2. Watch Fleabag tell the hairdresser that hair is everything! (If you can believe it, we recorded this episode before "Fleabaggots," and if you haven't listened to that epis...
2022-06-2025 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastOdd JobsWork, girl! And we give love to our power bottom brethren.Read Emily Dickinson's Poem 260. You can listen to it read by Yina Liang, courtesy of the Favorite Poem Project here (~5 min). Read (or listen) to Richard Blanco's poem "We're Not Going to Malta" here. Watch Larry Levis read with Phil Levine (~76 minutes; Levis is first). Aaron is right, Levis has a lovely, crisp, deep man-voice.Read Jane Kenyon's "Having it Out with Melancholy" here. Hear her read "Otherwise" here (video is of her and Donald Hall, walking with thei...
2022-05-2329 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastThe Living World (interview with Diane Seuss pt. 1)Diane Seuss joins us for the Breaking Form Interview.Seuss won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry for frank: sonnets. Frank also won the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Pen/Voelcker Award, and the LA Times Book Prize. If you haven't read frank yet, you can buy get it from Loyalty Books, a Black-owned independent bookstore.Her four previous books are It Blows You Hollow (1999); Wolf Lake, White Gown Blown Open (2010); Four-Legged Girl (2015, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize), and Still Life with Two Dead Peacocks and a Girl (2018). She grew up and lives in Michigan.
2022-05-1629 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastTIM THOM JESUS JORIEPoetry, promiscuity, philosophy: maybe you should ask your next question!Thom Gunn was born on August 29, 1929 and died on April 25, 2004. He was born in Gravesend, England to parents who were both journalists. Jorie Graham (born May 9, 1950—Taurus) won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1996 for The Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems 1974-1994. Since 1999, she has been Boylston Professor of Oratory and Rhetoric at Harvard—and she is the first woman to hold the Boylston professorship. She has received many honors and awards for her work. Her newest book is Runaway (Ecco/HarperCollins, 2020). Watch Graha...
2022-05-0927 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastCrimes Against Poetry Readings Our intrepid hosts investigate poetry reading cliches and surmise which poets of the past (and present) would have committed these heinous crimes -- and in broad daylight, too!Poets we mention include:1) Read a fabulous essay by Emily Wilson on Sappho here. 2) Many of (Sagittarius) William Blake's artworks can be viewed online through the National Gallery of Victoria here.3) Catullus's manuscripts are viewable online here; you'll need to be able to read Latin.4) Aaron references James Wright's "The Sumac in Ohio," which ends:"Before June begins, the sap...
2022-04-0425 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastBannedWhat happens when a voice is silenced? Who holds power to account for itself?Some support & info resources:The Trevor Project:https://www.thetrevorproject.org/BIPOC mental health resources:https://www.thementalhealthcoalition.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/BIPOC-Mental-Health-Resources.pdfNational Alliance on Mental Illness: https://www.nami.org/Support-EducationNational Mental Health Association (Mental Health America), including phone line & chat:https://www.mhanational.org/finding-helpCarl Phillips’s poem “All the Love You’ve Got” can be read here.: https://poets.org/poem/all-love-youve-gotAaron Sm...
2022-03-0727 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastDon't Play for SafetyThe queens revisit Lucille Clifton's poem "won’t you celebrate with me." Then the queens are NOT. HAVING. IT. with misogyny in an Anthony Hecht poem. Consider supporting and shopping at Loyalty Bookstores, a black-owned DC-area independent bookstore. You can listen to Lucille Clifton read "won't you celebrate with me" here (the text of the poem is available with the audio; ~1 min). Read more here about The Clifton House. Writers and artists interested in participating and developing Clifton House programs may contact Sidney Clifton at cliftonhousebaltimore@gmail.com Watch Lucille Clifton read...
2022-02-1428 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastFamily IssuesHow do you protect your family from your writing, and your writing from your family? The queens get serious about grief, death, homophobia, and family issues. Dear Dr. Freud!First, some resources:If you're struggling with LGBTQIA+ mental health issues (or want to be an ally for someone who is), visit the National Alliance on Mental Illness website here. It has great resources!Another great resource list for queer and trans BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) can be found here.The Atlantic published an informative essay regarding family estrangement. You can...
2022-01-3127 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastQueers of PopPop Culture Thursdays arrive! We discuss Divas, 90s TV, and why Elycia can go f*ck herself.Anita Baker is an Aquarius.Gladys Knight is a Gemini.Gloria Estefan is a Virgo. Gloria remembers the bus accident here.Bette Middler is a Sagittarius. Siskel and Ebert gave Beaches 2.5 stars, calling it mechanical and sentimental. Watch Middler sing "I Think It's Gonna Rain Today" here. Cher is a Taurus. Aaron was referencing "not.com.mercial," which showcased Cher's writing and was released through her website. She took the songs to the studio i...
2022-01-2028 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastWhat Got Us Through (End-of-the-Year Countdown pt.2)Top 10 Part 2: James and Aaron continue recounting the top 10 things that got them through 2021. Here's there top 5 faves:Please support independent bookstores whenever possible. If you need a good one to support, try Loyalty Bookstores.James's Top 5:5. Postcolonial Love Poem by Natalie Diaz, winner of the 2021 Pulitzer Prize. Visit the author's website here.4. Dispatch by Cameron Awkward-Rich, 2019. Winner of the Lexi Rudnitsky Editor's Choice Award and published by Persea Books. Visit the author's website here.Listen to Cameron Awkward-Rich read "What Returns" here.3. No Doubt I Will Ret...
2021-12-2728 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastWhat Got Us Through (End-of-the-Year Countdown pt.1)James and Aaron recount the top 10 things that got them through 2021. In part one, they share 10-6. As always, please consider buying books from the authors we mention (or any others!) from independent bookstores. If you don't have one, we can recommend Loyalty Bookstores: https://www.loyaltybookstores.comAaron's 10-6:10. Hunter Fashion Magazine: Summer of Love Issue 36 SS 2020You can follow the magazine on Instagram: @hunterfashionmagazine9. Brontez Purnell, 100 Boyfriends. Johnny Would You Love Me If My Dick Were BiggerThe Cruising Diaries: Expanded Edition b...
2021-12-2724 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastCherapyJames quizzes Aaron on his literary loves through the song titles of Cher. Then the homosexuals play Knockout: The Contemporary Poets Edition. Please consider supporting authors and independent bookstores. You can purchase books by authors we discuss at Loyalty Bookstores, a black-owned indie bookseller in Washington, DC.1) Dorianne Laux. The poem we reference in What We Carry is called "The Lovers"2) Timothy Liu "In the Outhouse" from Burnt Offerings (Copper Canyon, 1995; ISBN 1556591047)3) Word of Mouth: An Anthology of Gay American Poetry (Talisman House, July 1, 2000; ISBN: 1584980060)4) Marie H...
2021-12-2024 minBreaking Form: a Poetry and Culture PodcastPrancing Across the PageJames challenges Aaron to a game of Linda, Linda, Lynda, and we revisit Mark Doty's poem "Homo Will Not Inherit," and we delve into the poetry-world homophobia that Doty's poem critiques.Buy books by authors we've mentioned at Loyalty Bookstore!Linda GreggLinda Gregg was born on Sept. 9, 1942 (Virgo); she died on March 20, 2019. Her books includeAll of It Singing: New and Selected Poems (2008); In the Middle Distance (2006); Things and Flesh (1999), finalist for the Kingsley Tufts Award for Poetry; Chosen by the Lion (1995); Sacraments of Desire (1992); Alma (1985); and Too Bright to See (1981).Read "T...
2021-12-2023 min