Episode 17: Marie Ponsot (November 4, 2016)

The beloved poet Marie Ponsot returns to her alma mater, St. Joseph’s College in Brooklyn, for an evening celebrating the publication of her magisterial Collected Poems. A constellation of poetry world luminaries reads poems and shares impressions of the great writer’s work and life; as one friend observes, “If you want to know what legitimate skill looks like, Marie Ponsot is a model to study. Her force is true, it’s genuine, it’s powerful, and those who encounter it come away with the knowledge that they have seen something rare. I have seen taxi drivers bow to her.” The evening’s speakers include Alice Quinn, L. B. Thompson, Cynthia Zarin, Timothy Small, Rosemary Deen, Edward Hirsch, Hettie Jones, and Jackson Taylor, concluding with a reading by the 95-year-old poet herself.