Poetry can be intimidating and inaccessible. Why even bother?
Guest Philip Metres is a living reminder that it’s worth it to bother, worth it to wrestle with poetry even when it’s difficult because the power of language is uniquely human and is one of the best parts of being alive.
Phil is a poet, author and professor of English literature at John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio. He’s the author of ten books and has won fellowships from institutions like the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. As the product of a Jesuit high school and college education, it’s consoling to see that much of his work takes up themes of spirituality and social justice, and what prompted host Mike Jordan Laskey to invite Phil on the show was a fabulous essay Phil wrote for Image Journal that was part book review, part memoir and part theological reflection. Phil also reads two of his poems and talks about them.
