The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily Podcast By American Public Media cover art

The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily

The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily

By: American Public Media
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Host Maggie Smith is your daily poetry companion. Poetry is one of the greatest tools we have to wield our own attention — to consider our own lives and the lives of others, to help us live creatively and compassionately, to use that attention to lean into wonder, and joy, and truth, and to find hope — to keep hoping. The Slowdown community knows that reflecting on a poem, every weekday, can connect us to our inner world and the world around us. Listen as you make your morning coffee, as you go on a walk in your neighborhood, as you pull away from the to-do list, as you resist the dismal, endless scroll to share five minutes of perspective through the lens of poetry, from poets old and new, well-loved and emerging onto the scene. Brought to you by American Public Media, in partnership with the Poetry Foundation.Copyright 2026 Minnesota Public Radio Art Entertainment & Performing Arts
Episodes
  • [encore] 1381: What Is This Air Changing, This Warm Aura, These Threads of Air Vibrating Rows of People by Ariel Yelen

    [encore] 1381: What Is This Air Changing, This Warm Aura, These Threads of Air Vibrating Rows of People by Ariel Yelen
    Mar 27 2026

    Today’s poem is What Is This Air Changing, This Warm Aura, These Threads of Air Vibrating Rows of People by Ariel Yelen.


    The Slowdown is taking a week to return to some of our favorite episodes from Maggie’s tenure so far. We’ll be back on Monday, March 30 with new episodes.


    Today’s episode was originally released on October 24, 2025. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Going to the elementary school choir concerts and winter music festivals, I got teary every time the kids sang. I told myself it was because of their sweet, little-kid voices, but that’s not the whole story. Something about hearing voices in unison—it’s powerful, and communal, and comforting, and deeply moving.”


    Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
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    7 mins
  • [encore] 1460: Poem to Remind Myself of the Natural Order of Things by Donika Kelly

    [encore] 1460: Poem to Remind Myself of the Natural Order of Things by Donika Kelly
    Mar 26 2026

    Today’s poem is Poem to Remind Myself of the Natural Order of Things by Donika Kelly.


    The Slowdown is taking a week to return to some of our favorite episodes from Maggie’s tenure so far. We’ll be back on Monday, March 30 with new episodes. Today’s episode was originally released on February 19, 2026.


    In this episode, Maggie writes… “Today’s poem is such a beautiful meditation on knowing ourselves, and knowing what we need to be at home in our own lives.”


    Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
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    6 mins
  • [encore] 1429: Midlife Crisis by Jane Zwart

    [encore] 1429: Midlife Crisis by Jane Zwart
    Mar 25 2026

    The Slowdown is taking a week to return to some of our favorite episodes from Maggie’s tenure so far. Today’s poem is Midlife Crisis by Jane Zwart. We’ll be back on Monday, March 30 with new episodes.


    Today’s episode was originally released on January 7, 2026. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Midlife has upended everything I thought about aging. It’s not at all what I expected. Certainly, when I was a child, I thought of people in their forties as old, and now that I’m closer to 50 than 40, I laugh at that. I feel … young! I feel younger, in many ways, than I did ten years ago.”


    Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
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    6 mins
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