The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily
960 episodes Last Updated: Jun 10, 25
Poet Major Jackson is your guide on the pathways to feel and understand our common journey – through poetry. In sharing poems, we take a moment to pause and acknowledge the world’s magnitude, and how poets illuminate that mystery. Join The Slowdown for a poem and a moment of reflection in one short episode, every weekday. Produced by APM Studios in partnership with The Poetry Foundation and supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Make us a part of your routine as you drink coffee in the morning, as you take a walk in nature, or as you wind down to go to sleep in the evening. With host Major Jackson, we collectively take a moment to calm, to inspire, to learn, and to engage with the best emerging poets and established writers of our time and generations past, from Emily Dickinson to Danez Smith, from Amanda Gorman to Mary Oliver.
Listen to our back catalog for episodes by our previous hosts, Tracy K. Smith and Ada Limón, as well as guest hosts Jenny Xie, Brenda Shaughnessy, Tina Chang, Nate Marshall, Shira Erlichiman, and Jason Schneiderman. Our hosts and production team select poems that move them, and we hope they move you, too.
Episodes
Today’s poem is In Response to Feeling Alone by t. liem. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re going back into the archive to revisit Ada Limón’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on October 5 2021. In this episode, former host Ada Limón writes… “I spend a lot of time alone during the days. Though the dog would like to assure you I am not alone. And the cat sleeping in the upstairs bathroom would also beg to differ. Still, many of my days are spent in my office, or on the back porch, or at the kitchen table alone with my thoughts.”Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Jun 09, 2025
[encore] 603: Sligo Abbey by Rebecca Lindenberg
Today’s poem is Sligo Abbey by Rebecca Lindenberg. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re going back into the archive to revisit Ada Limón’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on February 3 2022. In this episode, former host Ada Limón writes… “In today’s gorgeous poem of honoring, we see how the speaker transforms the story of her mother’s illness into something that feels like an offering. Sometimes the job of the poet is simply to listen, and sometimes it is to become the unburied voice.”Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Tracing the Horse by Diana Marie Delgado. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re going back into the archive to revisit Tracy K. Smith’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on April 29, 2020. In this episode, Tracy writes… “I turn to words constantly—to help me clarify a thought, to dig deeper into an idea, to keep something from slipping away and being forgotten. And yet, there is so much that I love—and so much that I remember—that doesn’t need words. Images, sounds, scents, feelings that dawned instantly and imparted something different from sense but indelible nonetheless. I could read today's poem over and over, dwelling in the states of awareness and sensation it invokes.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Jun 05, 2025
[encore] 459: The Feeling by Ari Banias
Today’s poem is The Feeling by Ari Banias. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re going back into the archive to revisit Tracy K. Smith’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on August 27, 2020. In this episode, Tracy writes… “We are living through what I want to believe is an awakening. Many people who have never given an injustice like racism much thought are beginning to think about it. Now what? What are those who are awake to this reality willing to give up, change, renounce, replace in order to begin righting age-old wrongs? And what’s next?” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Jun 04, 2025
[encore] 303: Telling My Father by James Crews
Today’s poem is Telling My Father by James Crews. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re going back into the archive to revisit Tracy K. Smith’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on October 19, 2020. In this episode, Tracy writes… “Sometimes love looks like small things. Gentle gestures rich with import. We give such things to one another at times without even realizing it. Tiny soul-saving acts.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Portrait of the Alcoholic with Withdrawal by Kaveh Akbar. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re going back into the archive to revisit Tracy K. Smith’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on December 6, 2018. In this episode, Tracy writes, “One day I was a drinker; the next, I was an ex-drinker. A braver person would say: one day I came to understand I am an alcoholic. I consider myself lucky. The best way I can describe the change is to call it an unburdening.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Jun 02, 2025
[encore] 311: Listen, by Barbara Crooker
Today’s poem is Listen, by Barbara Crooker. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re going back into the archive to revisit Tracy K. Smith’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on October 19, 2020. In this episode, Tracy writes… “Today’s poem offers up a message of calm and gratitude. It's one I want to learn to offer myself—especially on days when peace feels far-away. Are there people out there who live always with that gratitude? That sense of the world with its simple gifts being all the plenty they seek? I’d like to be one of them for more than just an hour at a time.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is I Have No Idea What's Going to Happen by Justin Marks. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re revisiting some favorites from Major Jackson’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on February 24, 2023. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s understated poem shows us how impromptu encounters with art, those that are unforeseen, disruptive in the best sense, have us dwell outside time and exist within the spirit of the maker, then return us to our days with a new purchase on our lives.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Egrets, While War by Tishani Doshi. The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re revisiting some favorites from Major Jackson’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on May 8, 2024. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s compelling poem honors the ancient and indomitable essence of human beings who continue on even in the face of tragedy, who crossover into the perfect fullness of their truth and emotions.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Refusing Rilke's "You must change your life" by Remica Bingham-Risher.The Slowdown is currently taking a break. We’ll be back soon with new episodes from a new host. This week, we’re revisiting some favorites from Major Jackson’s time as host. Today’s episode was originally released on July 24, 2024. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “I live with Rilke’s famous line, “You must change your life,” in my ear on repeat, an earworm, as if something is less than stellar about who I am today. I move instinctively towards myself as though I were a massive project, believing I will someday, again in Rilke’s words, “burst like a star.” That this is how to be seen, to be loved, to be cherished. This quest has distorted my sense of what is important, sown constant dissatisfaction, and emotional states of being that pose health risks. Pursuing perfection has, at times, alienated me from those I hold dear. Not that I don’t love them or they me — but that I get tunnel vision in seeking some heroic terminus.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp