I can’t wait to read these manuscripts.

Tonight I turned on the Magnetic Fields’ 69 Love Songs & got into the bathtub with a book & a cocktail…& I came out with pruny fingertips & the start of a new poem. That feels like a little miracle. So whatever else there is, there’s that.

Looking forward to this local launch! April 2 ✨🎉

"There’s a sense of relief when we realize we’re looking at an object, not a dead creature," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social notes in episode 1446 of The Slowdown. Read “Mistake” by Heather Christle: bit.ly/3Z9Xc7t 📖: @weslpress.bsky.social

"Today’s poem is a kind of love poem — to a beloved tree, and to the sense of home it created," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1445. Read "Hackberry" by Cecily Parks — from THE SEEDS (@alicejamesbooks.bsky.social): bit.ly/4bZhnwu

"Today’s poem captures a time of grief in the speaker’s life, when life goes a little quiet after a flurry of support and care," our host, @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social, shares in today's episode. Read "Congratulations! Your Grief Is About to Stop Being Relevant!" by Bridget Bell: bit.ly/4tb8Vk4

“One of the poets I discovered in college was H.D.," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1443. "I remember being wowed by her poems, which were experimental and strange, unlike anything I’d read before." Read “Come Back!" by Camille Guthrie: bit.ly/4rarcfo

Book tour for A Suit or a Suitcase ☁️📖🧳 open.substack.com/pub/maggiesm...

"Life will throw at us things that are hard or impossible to describe, both beautiful and awful things," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1442. "So I think [language play] isn't just a writing tool — it's a life skill." Read “Apocatastasis” by G.C. Waldrep: bit.ly/3M2lI7D

This is a really incredible piece. Share it widely 🎁https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/2026/01/minneapolis-uprising/685755/?gift=C-rzmQ8PsUHt15odxTKJDn7xrpPNxSpotkNz_P27oI0

I randomly grabbed this book last night while straightening up my bedroom. When I opened it, I read and then reread and then read one more time this poem by Joy Harjo. I then sat, leaned back, and continued reading. Thank you for this book, @theferocity.bsky.social and @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social 🙏🏻

Abolish and prosecute.

"I don’t think there’s ever an expiration date on well wishes, and frankly, we need all the well wishes we can get for 2026," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social says in today's episode. Read "New Year" by @katejbaer.bsky.social — from WHAT KIND OF WOMAN (@harpercollins.bsky.social): bit.ly/3LZ8pEU

"Today’s poem explores memory and loss — and how objects can help us resurrect the past," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1439 of The Slowdown. Read "I Have Lost It" by Monica Ferrell — from THE FUTURE (@fourwaybooks.bsky.social) — and our full episode transcript: bit.ly/49W02SK

"Today’s poem addresses a child — a child full of questions about the world," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1438 of The Slowdown. Read "The Long Now" by Robin Beth Schaer and our full episode transcript: bit.ly/4b3k3sB

"Today’s poem is a love poem, one in which the long-married speaker can hardly imagine their own 'beforetimes' — the life before their spouse," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1437. Read “Now that we’ve been married all these years" by Keetje Kuipers: bit.ly/3ZlrrbC

"Today’s poem ... reflected my own experience back to me — in a way that helped me see it differently," our host, @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social, shares in today's episode of The Slowdown. Read "Vacation" by Sara Moore Wagner and our full episode transcript: bit.ly/4jFNLX1

Student 1: You got an A on the final paper?! I wanted an A but I got an F! Will you give me your A paper? Student 2: Uh….sure. Student 2 hands him the paper with a big red A at the top. Student 2 still gets an A. Student 1 still fails, but he’s grinning and holding an A paper. 🤡🏅

Angela, thank you! 🥰 bookshop.org/p/books/a-su...

"Today’s poem feels to me like an invitation INTO poetry, into a space where the reader, or listener, can move freely," our host, @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in today's episode, number 1435. "I hope you find yourself welcome." Read "ars poetica, 2019" by Airea D. Matthews: bit.ly/49Pl4mR

"Today’s poem touched me because it acknowledges the patience and tenderness we need to have as spouses and as parents," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1432. Read "The Good Guy" by @blasfalconer.bsky.social — from RARA AVIS (@fourwaybooks.bsky.social): bit.ly/4buKSGe

ICE get the duck out. Reminds me of a great & tangentially topical @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social poem “Rose Has Hands” playing with autocorrect “and honestly — what truth can I tell her? I don’t ducking understand” www.instagram.com/p/CThXZL4r5u...

Spent the morning reading The People's Project: Poems, Essays and Art for Looking Forward curated by @theferocity.bsky.social and @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social. Grief & fear can be paralyzing., This little tome is useful to unclench the jaw. Forward we go. www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Pe...

"Today’s poem is surreal and unnerving," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social says about episode 1431 of The Slowdown. "When I finish reading it, I have that feeling of having woken up from a strange dream, suspecting it has something to tell me." Read "Going Home" by Joan Kwon Glass: bit.ly/4952mYe

"Today’s poem, which looks at the fragility of our planet, begins with two epigraphs," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social explains in today's episode, number 1430 of The Slowdown. Read “Earth Shovel” by Dan Albergotti — from CANDY (@lsupress.bsky.social) — and our full episode transcript: bit.ly/4pjV5sf

ICE murdered a poet and mother today. I don’t know how to process this horrific act, to be honest, let alone the right’s beyond-fucked-up response to it. This country is terrifying.

"I admire how today’s poem describes time, and what it feels like to reach the middle of one’s life only to be surprised at what you find," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in today's episode. Read "Midlife Crisis” by @janezwart.bsky.social, from ODDEST & OLDEST & SADDEST & BEST: bit.ly/3YXpuls

The first literary rejection of the year has arrived in my inbox. (Rude. I haven’t even set up my rejection stamp card for 2026 yet.) But this was followed by a pep talk on rejection by @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social in the Memoir Land newsletter.

To have @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social feature my poem on @slowdownshow.org would be a dream come true had I ever thought to dream such a wild thing. Thank you to all the folks who make this podcast, which has introduced me to many, many poets I admire. www.slowdownshow.org/episode/2026...

"Today’s poem pulls back the curtain on the revision process, showing us how it’s about more than just the text on the page," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares on today's episode of The Slowdown, number 1428. Read "In Defense of 'Candelabra with Heads'” by Nicole Sealey: bit.ly/3YG5K61

"Once upon a time, I was a new mother with a baby girl in my arms, and I was her whole world," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in today's episode, number 1427. Read "A toast to something beautiful flapping in the wind" by J. Hope Stein and our full episode transcript: bit.ly/44TmEBy

Oh what a perfect poem. From @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social's book Good Bones. #poem #booksky #writing

"Let us / talk more of how dark / the beginning of a day is" Tomorrow = the second year of a row of this poem by @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social being what students walk into after Winter Break (Cannot wait!)

Happy new year! I love sharing this poem by @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social. I’m reminded this year of Audre Lorde: “These places of possibility within ourselves are dark because they are ancient and hidden; they have survived and grown strong through darkness.”

"Sometimes I swear I can feel a life-changing moment as it’s happening," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1426 of The Slowdown. Read "One-Way Gate" by Jenny George — from THE DREAM OF REASON (@coppercanyonpress.bsky.social) — and our full episode transcript: bit.ly/49hrQ3s

Love this New Year's Eve poem by @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social "Let me listen to the rain's one note and hear a beginner's song." Rain, New Year's Eve, published in Good Bones, 2017 bookshop.org/p/books/good...

I haven't published many poems this year (kids, work, kids again), so seeing this poem "White Hot Star" featured on @slowdownshow.org today is a special honor to close this year out. Thanks to @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social for selecting and to the Cincinnati Review for 1st publishing. link in coms.

"Today’s poem is about fathers and sons, and about loss. It is also about the small, shining parts of our lives that survive us and get passed down to the next generation," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1424 of The Slowdown. Read "White Hot Star" by W. Todd Kaneko: bit.ly/4q25OsO

"As I was reading The People’s Project submissions from contributors, I felt strongly that this poem should come last, closing the book," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social says in today's episode. Read “Puzzle” by Randall Mann (@randallmann.bsky.social): bit.ly/4poo5PW 📖: Washington Square Press

"Today’s poem begins with a little advice that made me smile because of its sauciness, and the poem unfolds into such a rich, detailed portrait," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1419. Read "Ladies' Arm Wrestling Match at the Blue Moon Diner" by Jenny Johnson: bit.ly/4b0XQv5

I ran on the treadmill so I could eat bourbon balls & Italian rainbow cookies for lunch: A Christmas Eve Tale.

Best of 2025: @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social

I’ve reached the listening to Electric Warrior turned way up & making homemade rosemary bar nuts stage of the holidays. I like it here.

"Today’s poem moves quietly and deliberately, the way a cautious deer might walk from the shelter of the woods into a clearing," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shared in today's episode. Read "Whitetail in the Rain Moving About" by Melissa Ginsburg: bit.ly/3L6UMTB 📖: @lsupress.bsky.social

"Today’s poem has me thinking about evolution and natural selection in a different way," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in today's episode. "It has me thinking about our survival." Read “Elephants Born Without Tusks" by Alison C. Rollins: bit.ly/4s6u5PU 📖: @coppercanyonpress.bsky.social

My daughter, my firstborn, is 17 today. This morning we were listening to a playlist she made of her 17 favorite songs, and she told me her senior quote will likely be lyrics from a Cranberries song—lyrics about childhood—and I cried happy, I-was-her-age-in-1994 tears. Happy Birthday to the best.

"Today’s poem is one about parents and children, bedtime fears, and the ways we communicate love and safety," @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social shares in episode 1414. Read "This dark is the same dark as when you close" by @caesura.bsky.social: bit.ly/4oXwTf4 📖: @alicejamesbooks.bsky.social

I first read this poem in my father's final days. It took my breath away. Tomorrow will mark one week since we lost him, but I know he's still with us. So grateful to have (finally!) read _The People's Project_, edited by @theferocity.bsky.social and @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social, where it appears.

“Today’s poem speaks to me because, at its heart, is a deep curiosity about the world — a desire to know more and more," shares host @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social in today’s encore episode. Read "Hiking Moraine State Park" by Violeta Garcia-Mendoza: bit.ly/3MnJf2G