1309: 5 A.M. by Michael Ondaatje

Today’s poem is 5 A.M. by Michael Ondaatje. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “The nature of my youth was one in which my passion for art lived out in my passion for life. At times, there was a recklessness about it. Like Greg, Quraysh, and me spilling out of a Soho bar at first light, having debated literature and writers with a seriousness that felt like life mattered, truly mattered.” 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 Mother's Rules by Yalie Saweda Kamara. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual.In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem shows how we impossibly carry our parents’ voices well into our adulthood, a measure by which to shape our lives independent of their nurturance and instructions.” 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 What Good Is Silence by Phuong T. Vuong. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Our episode today is one of many from the archives. We’ll be back tomorrow with more new poetry and reflection! In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem illustrates returning to listening as a ventilation of the soul, sublimating the ego in the interest of interacting with more than just our thoughts.” 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 Field Guide as Sonnet by A. D. Lauren-Abunassar. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem honors the spirit of courageous women who humbly persist, who do not hold back on love.” 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 Ode to the Pink Cowboy Hat by Quinn Carver Johnson. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem honors how popular culture made room for a different kind of masculinity in the most unlikely of shows, the World Wrestling Federation with Chief Jay Strongbow, André the Giant, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair and “Adorable” Adrian Adonis.” 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 An Apology for Trashing Magazines in Which You Appear by Nicole Sealey. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Around what has become known as “awards season,” casual conversations are abuzz with talk of the year’s movies. This week’s episodes explore how poets take up movies as subjects — how the two art forms intertwine to make us feel more closely this life we share. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s cleverly sonic poem collapses the distance even more between celebrities and us, by using a parasocial relationship as a jumping off point for a journey of the imagination.” 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 Cinema Paradiso by Claire Booker. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Around what has become known as “awards season,” casual conversations are abuzz with talk of the year’s movies. This week’s episodes explore how poets take up movies as subjects — how the two art forms intertwine to make us feel more closely this life we share. In this episode, Major writes… “One of my favorite moments in Italian Cinema is the movie Cinema Paradiso. It finds a young boy named Toto as the helper of a film projectionist named Alfredo. To satisfy Church authorities, Alfredo has to cut out all depictions of physical contact between people before showing the films. Young Toto moves away from the town of his youth to become a film director himself. When Alfredo dies, he leaves behind for Toto to view a gorgeous collage of kisses from banned movies over the years. The reel of intimate moments is a beautiful display of personal desires set against a national agenda of religious and moral strictures.” 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 Chaplinesque by Hart Crane. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Around what has become known as “awards season,” casual conversations are abuzz with talk of the year’s movies. This week’s episodes explore how poets take up movies as subjects — how the two art forms intertwine to make us feel more closely this life we share. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s iconic Modernist poem celebrates the artist and movie icon who inspired generations of filmmakers and actors, but even more so, the man who both made us laugh at the folly of progress and urged us to embrace the tenderness of our hearts.” 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 One Shies at the Prospect of Raising Yet Another Defense of Cannibalism by Josh Bell. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Around what has become known as “awards season,” casual conversations are abuzz with talk of the year’s movies. This week’s episodes explore how poets take up movies as subjects — how the two art forms intertwine to make us feel more closely this life we share. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem whimsically plays with faux intimacy as an aesthetic experience, and with the value of cinema, how our psychic needs for understanding are either thwarted or are actualized.” 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 Jaws by Emma Hine. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Around what has become known as “awards season,” casual conversations are abuzz with talk of the year’s movies. This week’s episodes explore how poets take up movies as subjects — how the two art forms intertwine to make us feel more closely this life we share. In this episode, Major writes… “As a kid, I saw Steven Spielberg’s movie Jaws in 1975. It’s 2025. I now have an app that tells me the location of sharks. I do not have what psychologists call thalassophobia, a fear of the sea, but I just want notice of which beaches to avoid, you know, just in case.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp