Get Lit Minute

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet, CA Conrad. They write poems in which stark images of sex, violence, and defiance build a bridge between fable and confession. They are the author of nine books of poetry and essays, including their latest book JUPITER ALIGNMENT: (Soma)tic Poetry Rituals (Ignota Books, 2020) and Wh...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet, Elizabeth Bishop. Bishop was a perfectionist who did not write prolifically, preferring instead to spend long periods of time polishing her work. She published only 101 poems during her lifetime. Source This episode includes a reading of her poem,  "One Art", featured in...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet, Sara Borjas. Her debut collection of poetry, Heart Like a Window, Mouth Like a Cliff was published by Noemi Press in 2019. Her work can be found in Ploughshares , The Rumpus , Poem-a-Day by The Academy of American Poets , Alta and The Offing , amongst others. She digs oldiez, oute...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet, Ada Limón.  She is the author of five poetry collections, including The Carrying , which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry. Her fourth book Bright Dead Things was named a finalist for the National Book Award, a finalist for the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, and...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet, Tyree Daye. He is the author of two poetry collections River Hymns and Cardinal. Source This episode includes a reading of his poem,  "Learning Whitney", featured in our 2021 Get Lit Anthology . "Learning Whitney" My father loved my mama quiet. She never was.  ...

In this episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet and writer, Tommye Blount. He is the author of Fantasia for the Man in Blue (Four Way Books, March 2020) and the chapbook What Are We Not For (Bull City Press, 2016). Source This episode includes a reading of his poem,  "The Pedestrian", featured in our 2021 Get Lit Anthology . &quot...

In this episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet, Traci Brimhall. Her poems have appeared in The New Yorker, Poetry, and New England Review, among others. Some of her work has also been featured on Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, Best of the Net, PBS Newshour, and Best American Poetry 2013 & 2014. Source This episode includes a reading of her...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of a highly esteemed performing poet, Sekou Sundiata. He wrote for print, performance, music and theater.  Source This episode includes a reading of his poem,  "Shout Out", featured in our 2021 Get Lit Anthology . "Shout Out" Here’s to the best words In the right place...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet and spoken-word artist, Saul Williams. He has been breaking ground since his debut album, Amethyst Rock Star, was released in 2001 and executive produced by Rick Rubin. Most recently, Williams’ released his latest music works entitled, Encrypted & Vulnerable (July 2019), which...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of American poet and spoken-word artist, Dr. Eve L. Ewing. She is a sociologist of education and a writer from Chicago. She is the author, most recently, of the poetry collection 1919 and the nonfiction work Ghosts in the Schoolyard: Racism and School Closings on Chicago's South Side....

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of American poet and spoken-word artist, Natasha Trethewey. A former US poet laureate, Trethewey is the author of five collections of poetry: Monument (2018), Thrall (2012), Native Guard (2006), Bellocq’s Ophelia (2002), and Domestic Work (2000). She is also the author of a book of creativ...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of American poet and spoken-word artist, Nicole Sealey.  Sealey is the author of Ordinary Beast (Ecco Press, 2017), which was a finalist for the PEN Open Book and Hurston/Wright Legacy Awards. Her chapbook, The Animal After Whom Other Animals are Named (Northwestern University Press, 2016)...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your favorite poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of poet Evie Shockley. “because there should be love” there should be love poems. iridescent odes to skies and their fluid, mutating blues, their restless canvases   where we cast the adjectives—brilliant, dark, deep, clear—   that name our daily moods, ringing doubt and delight, confusi...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of American poet and spoken-word artist, Angel Nafis. She is the author of BlackGirl Mansion (Red Beard Press/ New School Poetics, 2012). Her work has appeared in The Rattling Wall, The BreakBeat Poets Anthology, MUZZLE Magazine, The Rumpus, Poetry magazine, and elsewhere .  “Woo Woo Roll...

In this week's episode of The Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight Harryette Mullen, a poet and a professor of English at the University of California, Los Angeles. Mullen has said, “writing became important to me when I was very young. It was the only way I could communicate with my father after my parents were divorced. My mother believed in educating ‘the whole child.’...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight Puerto Rican writer, Wille Perdomo. He is the author of The Essential Hits of Shorty Bon Bon (Penguin Poets, 2014), a National Book Critics Circle Awards finalist, Where a Nickel Costs a Dime ( W. W. Norton & Company , a Poetry Society of America Norma Farber First Book Award finalist, 1996), [1] Postca...

In the latest episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight John Murillo, the author of the poetry collection Up Jump the Boogie (Cypher 2010, Four Way Books 2020. Learn more about Murillo and discover his other poems by visiting our Virtual Anthology. Support the show Support the show

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we feature the life and work of American Poet Jamaal May. Born and raised in Detroit,  May's first book, Hum (2013), won a Beatrice Hawley Award and an American Library Association Notable Book Award and was an NAACP Image Award nominee. Hum explores machines, technology, obsolescence, and community; in an intervie...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight Kevin Young, American poet and teacher of poetry and the director of the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of African American History and Culture. Read his full poem "Ode to Midwest" via our Get Lit Anthology.  Support the show Support the show

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight Nate Marshall, an award-winning author, editor, poet, playwright, performer, educator, speaker, and rapper. Interested in learning more about poetry or bringing our spoken word curriculum into a school near you? Visit https://www.getlit.org/  for more info.  "Praise Song" praise the Hennessy, the...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight Crystal Valentine, a nationally and internationally acclaimed poet. Crystal is a generator and fierce protector of black joy, and strongly believes that intersectionality is a key factor in liberation. As a queer, black, woman, a lot of her work revolves around bridging the ever-present gap between her iden...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight American poet, novelist, and editor, Morgan Parker. "Heaven Be A Xanax" When people say how are you I say good It is a rule no one can answer Crying in The Gap by my therapist’s office or I am still angry with my parents for traumatizing me through organized sports Dangerous and satisfying body of...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight Paul Laurence Dunbar,  an American poet, novelist, and short-story writer of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Dunbar was one of the first influential Black poets in American literature. Support the show Support the show

In this episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist, Langston Hughes. One of the earliest innovators of the literary art form called jazz poetry, Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. excerpt of “Let America Be America Again” Let America be America again. Let it be the dream it use...

In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight  Jamaican American poet, essayist, teacher, and activist, June Jordan. In her writing, she explored issues of gender, race, immigration, and representation. Jordan was passionate about using Black English in her writing and poetry, teaching others to treat it as its own language and an important outlet for...