English Poetry

Originally broadcast on BBC Radio 4, Jeremy Irons' perceptive reading illuminates the poetry of T. S. Eliot in all its complexity. Major poems range from 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock' through the post-war desolation of 'The Waste Land' and the spiritual struggle of 'Ash-Wednesday', to the enduring charm of 'Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats'.

Being traded to the Seattle Vipers has left me with mixed feelings. On the one hand, they’re my team, the team I’ve loved and supported since I was a kid, but on the other hand, he’s here. Him. Ant Decker. Infamous NHL bad boy. Right wing to my left. A man who’s made it his sole purpose in life to be better than me.

Ryokan (1758–1831) is, along with Dogen and Hakuin, one of the three giants of Zen in Japan. But unlike his two renowned colleagues, Ryokan was a societal dropout, living mostly as a hermit and a beggar. He was never head of a monastery or temple. He liked playing with children. He had no dharma heir. Even so, people recognized the depth of his realization, and he was sought out by people of all walks of life for the teaching to be experienced in just being around him.

English literature is a treasure trove of wonderful poetry. From Shakespeare to Milton, Keats to Shelley and Tennyson to Yeats, this accessible history (especially written for Naxos Audiobooks) introduces the listener to countless small masterpieces, including all the old favorites and some lesser-known gems. Whitfield explores this most expressive of art forms and traces the historical development of a rich and diverse canon of poetical works.

Good Poems includes poems about lovers, children, failure, everyday life, death, and transcendence. It features the work of classic poets, such as Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, and Robert Frost, as well as the work of contemporary greats such as Howard Nemerov, Charles Bukowski, Donald Hall, Billy Collins, Robert Bly, and Sharon Olds Good Poems includes poems about lovers, children, failure, everyday life, death, and transcendence.

Poems by Emily Dickinson is a compilation of the poetry of Emily Dickinson in three different series, each composed of the following subjects: Life, Love, Nature, Time, and Eternity.

The notoriously reclusive New England poet broke all the rules of Victorian-era poetry to create a new, uniquely American style. Despite the fact that the majority of the poems recited here were never published in her lifetime, Dickinson remains one of the most influential voices in American literature.

A collection of much-loved songs and lullabies, including: 'All Through the Night', 'Brahms' Lullaby', 'Frère Jacques', 'Golden Slumbers', 'Hush Little Baby', 'Incy Wincy Spider', 'Lavender's Blue', 'Rock-a-Bye Baby', 'Sleep Baby Sleep', 'Swing Low Sweet Chariot', 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star', 'Baa Baa Black Sheep', 'Row Row Row Your Boat', 'Little Bo Peep', 'Scarborough Fair', 'Lulla Lulla Lullaby', 'Suo-Gân', 'Down in the Valley', and 'Now the Day is Over'.

Through poetry, prose, and the compassionate encouragement you would expect from someone who knows exactly what you're working through, Sparacino is here with the words you need. The Strength in Our Scars tackles the gut-wrenching but relatable experiences of moving on, self-love, and ultimately learning to heal. In this book you will find peace, you will find a rock, you will find understanding, and you will find hope.

Motherhood is messy and beautiful, and hard and humbling. We adore our children, and sometimes we miss ourselves. Beautiful Chaos is a collection of raw, honest poems about motherhood—capturing everything from pregnancy to school age. Upon becoming a mother, poet Jessica Urlichs was reminded that the everyday ordinary is extraordinary. Beautiful Chaos is a collection that chronicles it all—the highs, the lows, the confusion, the loss of identity, the becoming, and the brutal but beautiful ways our children hold up a mirrors to ourselves.

Prodigy Akiane Kramarik shares her artwork, poetry, and the fascinating story surrounding her talent. Growing up in a home with an atheistic mother and a non-participating Catholic father did not stop four-year-old Akiane Kramarik from finding God. This girl's dreams began a conversation in the home that has eventually brought them all to Christianity and the world's attention. Akiane: Her Life, Her Art, Her Poetry is a collection of the best of Akiane's full-color paintings and poetry created from ages 4 to 10.

In this honest, layered and unforgettable book that alternates between storytelling and her own poetry, Pamela Anderson breaks the mold of the celebrity memoir while taking back the tale that has been crafted about her. Her blond bombshell image was ubiquitous in the 1990s. Discovered in the stands of a football game, she was immediately rocket launched into fame, becoming Playboy’s favorite cover girl and an emblem of Hollywood glamour and sexuality. But what happens when you lose grip on your own life—and the image the notoriety machine creates for you is not who you really are?

Aristotle’s Poetics is the earliest-surviving work of dramatic theory and the first fully intact philosophical treatise to focus on literary theory. The respected Greek sage offers an account of what he calls "poetry" (which the Greeks understood to literally mean "making"), examining its "first principles" and identifying its genres and basic elements, including what he terms drama-comedy, tragedy, and the satyr play - as well as lyric poetry, epic poetry, and iambic pentameter, which he always associates with wit.

At the end of his life, William Blake (1757-1827) gave up hope of being widely understood, but the twentieth century brought to his work a new and intense interest and acclaim.

The whole Bible teaches truth and awakens emotions, but the Psalms are in a category of their own. They do not just awaken the heart; they put it in the foreground. They do not merely invite our emotions to respond to God's truth; they put our emotions on display. The Psalms are more than commanding-they are contagious. We are not just listening to profound ideas and feelings. We are living among them in their overflow.

Few writers have so brilliantly and poignantly conjured the desperation and absurdity of ordinary life as Charles Bukowski. Resonant with his powerful, perceptive voice, his visceral, hilarious, and transcendent poetry speaks to us as forcefully today as when it was written. Encompassing a wide range of subjects—from love to death and sex to writing—Bukowski’s unvarnished and self-deprecating verse illuminates the deepest and most enduring concerns of the human condition while remaining sharply aware of the day to day.

Blending humor with insight, tension with tenderness, complexity with care, 44 Poems on Being with Each Other articulates the power of poetry itself. Through careful and incisive readings, it illuminates aspects of the human condition, particularly the ways we are inextricably linked to each other, and provides inspiration for grounded self-reflection. It is an anthology that will delight listeners, just as Pádraig's podcast has done for millions around the world.

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mary Oliver presents a personal selection of her best work in this definitive collection spanning more than five decades of her esteemed literary career.

Astronomy-loving Calliope June has Tourette's syndrome, so she sometimes makes faces or noises that she doesn't mean to make. When she and her mother move yet again, she tries to hide her TS. But it isn't long before the kids at her new school realize she's different. Only Calliope's neighbor, who is also the popular student body president, sees her as she truly is - an interesting person and a good friend.

Prelude to Bruise is a song from a tightrope, balancing ecstatic existence and the chaos that always threatens to engulf a life on the margins. How do we reckon our past without being ravaged by it? How do we use people, their bodies, to express ourselves? Danger is everywhere in these poems, but never overwhelms them; the poet is always an anchor on the other side. And his story carries us relentlessly along.

A Century of Poetry in The New Yorker is a celebratory selection from 100 years of influential, entertaining, and taste-making verse in The New Yorker. Seamus Heaney, Dorothy Parker, Louise Bogan, Louise Glück, Randall Jarrell, Langston Hughes, Derek Walcott, Sylvia Plath, W. S. Merwin, Czeslaw Milosz, Tracy K. Smith, Mark Strand, E. E. Cummings, Sharon Olds, Franz Wright, John Ashbery, Sandra Cisneros, Amanda Gorman, Maggie Smith, Kaveh Akbar: these stellar names make up just a fraction of the wonderfulness that is present in this essential anthology.