Words That Burn - Poetry Podcast

Welcome back to Words That Burn, the poetry podcast taking a closer look at poetry. In this episode, host Benjamin Collopy offers a close reading of Kaveh Akbar's "Famous Americans and Why They Were Wrong", from his 2021 collection Pilgrim Bell.

The poem runs to seven couplets and moves from a ribbon tied around an oak tree to a wish that somebody forgets you today. Benjamin situates Akbar as a poet formed by prayer and by place, tracing the poet's biography from a boy reciting Arabic he could not translate to a writer preoccupied with what empire does to language.

In This Episode, I Explore:

The Ribbon and the Hostage Crisis: Why the opening image reads so strangely to a non American audience, and how the yellow ribbon curdled from a welcome into a warning after 1979. We follow the poem discussion through the oak's roots sinking into the dirt and the heart that sinks alongside them, and ask what exactly is seeping into whom.
Akbar's Ghazal: A look at the form, its couplets, its refrains, and the strict rules Akbar declines to follow. The ghazal is famous for what Agha Shahid Ali called its formal disunity, and that disunity turns out to be the literary technique doing the heaviest lifting here. We break down how enjambment carries meaning across couplets that seem unrelated on the page, one of several literary devices worth slowing down for.
Data at the Centre of a Heart: The sinking library, the architect who forgot the weight of the books, and Akbar's argument that empire uses abstraction to cudgel us into idleness. We look at what the word "data" is doing in a poem that also treats untranslated prayer as a kind of data, and why only one of those is sacred.
The Mercy of Being Forgotten: Why a poem about erasure ends by wishing for it. Visibility inside an empire is rarely a gift, and Akbar's closing hope is offered in the grammar of prayer, which is to say with no guarantee anyone is listening.

Accessible enough for poetry for beginners and no prior reading required. As always, this poetry interpretation belongs to Benjamin and is very much up for debate. Full script with citations and references on Substack, linked below.

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The Music In This Week's Episode:
'Hydra' by Huda - released under CC-BY 4.0.

Time Stamps:
00:00 Poetry Reading
00:51 Poetry as Prayer
01:43 Kaveh Akbar's Background
03:39 The Iranian Hostage Crisis
05:04 Iranian Identity in America
06:43 Understanding the Title
08:28 Ribbons and Patriotic Symbols
09:50 The Ghazal Form
13:00 Weaponisation of Language
15:25 Data and Dehumanisation
18:52 The Final Couplet
20:58 Empire and Prayer
21:39 Closing Thoughts

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In this episode of Words That Burn, the poetry podcast dedicated to literary analysis and poetic interpretation, I sit down with Belfast poet Matthew Rice to discuss his new collection Plastic: a book-length poem mapped across a single night shift in an invented plastics factory. It's published by Fitzcarraldo Editions.
Born from his PhD at the Seamus Heaney Centre, Queen's University Belfast, Plastic sits at a rare intersection in contemporary poetry: a deeply personal account of fifteen years working factory floors, fused with literary devices and techniques drawn from medieval romance, Gothic literature, and pop culture.

We discuss the historical context behind the collection, tracing Rice's place within a tradition of working-class and "factory poets" like Philip Levine and Larry Levis, and explore how Sir Gawain and the Green Knight becomes a recurring avatar for the speaker's own quest through the night.
This conversation doubles as a poetry education in itself, perfect whether you're new to contemporary poetry or already fluent in poetic analysis.

We chat about:

How timestamps and form mirror the malleability of plastic itself
The Gothic undercurrents running through a hyper-modern, industrial setting
Literary allusion: from Wolverine comics to Kubrick's Gotham to Fassbender's Prometheus, and how pop culture deepens poetic meaning
The poet biography behind the book: Rice's journey from factory worker to MA and PhD in poetry
A live reading of two poems from the collection, including the recurring Gawain sequence

Whether you're after rigorous poem discussion, a beginner-friendly entry point into poetry interpretation, or simply want to hear from one of the most original voices in Irish poetry and Global poets writing today, this episode of this poetry podcast offers a rich, accessible deep-dive into a genuinely singular collection.

Follow Matthew Rice:
On Instagram
Buy His Collection

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Read the Interview on Substack
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Time Stamps:

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
00:40 Inside the Book Plastic
02:17 Factory Poetry Gap
03:40 Molds and Poetic Form
06:05 Long Poem in Sections
07:38 Poetry as Escape
11:23 Dream Time and Imagination
12:34 Mapping Time on Shift
16:19 Gawain on the Factory Floor
19:47 Reading a Gawain Poem
21:00 Reviews and New Meanings
22:55 Pop Culture Allusions
24:14 Fosse One Sentence Novel
25:05 Wolverine And Prometheus
27:37 Factory As Monster
29:31 Kubrick City Character
31:28 Flesh Meets Machine
36:01 Gothic Hauntings And Swift
38:12 Gotham Politics And Capital
42:12 Prologue Ritual And Verbing
45:54 Hidden Easter Egg Poem
47:44 Final Thoughts And Thanks
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Welcome back to Words That Burn, the poetry podcast where host Benjamin Collopy takes a closer look at the verse that shapes our world.

Whether you're here to deepen your poetry appreciation or are simply looking for accessible poetry for beginners, the goal is to make poetry education engaging for everyone.
In this episode, Ben sits down for an in-depth poem discussion with Mark Ward, an incredible voice in modern Irish poetry. They explore Mark's compelling poet biography; from his early days writing in Dublin to his work as a playwright, before jumping into a full poem deep dive of his brand-new collection, Real Estate ( from Salmon Poetry).
Listeners will get the mechanics of Mark's poetry explained by the poet himself. Through thoughtful poetry analysis, Ben and Mark unpack the evocative literary devices used to capture everything from the collapse of a relationship to the profound grief of losing a beloved pet.

Key Topics Discussed
The Architecture of Verse: Why Mark considers every line of a poem to be "prime real estate" and the importance of leaning into subjects that scare you.
Grief and the Physical World: A close look at the sequence Nine Lives, dedicated to Mark's cat, Carbon, which beautifully captures the tactile realities of caregiving and loss.
Body Horror & Metaphor: Exploring the complex imagery and literary devices in the poem Hunger, where inner anxieties warp physical, domestic spaces.
Documenting Queer History: How poetry serves as an alternative lineage, with a focus on 1992, a piece that memorializes Dublin's 1980s and 1990s gay culture.
Subverting Expectations: A reading and analysis of Slow Evening, a joyful and tender poem that acts as a poignant rebuke to the tragic "Bury Your Gays" narrative trope.

About the Guest

Mark Ward is a poet, playwright, and short story writer based in Dublin. He is the author of two full-length collections with Salmon Poetry: Nightlight (2023) and his latest release, Real Estate. His diverse body of work also includes six chapbooks ranging from sonnets to queer ekphrastic verse, and his plays have been staged at the International Dublin Gay Theatre Festival.

Follow & Support Mark:

On Instagram
Buy the book here
or here

Follow the Podcast:

Read the interview on Substack
Follow the Podcast On Instagram
Follow the Podcast on X/Twitter
Follow the Podcast on Tiktok
Follow the podcast on Bluesky

Time Stamps:

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
01:01 What Real Estate Means
03:04 Building Poem Sequences
05:00 Revisiting Old Work
06:29 Writing Breakup Darkness
11:05 Nine Lives and Pet Grief
13:16 Reading Carer Aloud
14:44 Desire and Physicality
17:41 Hunger Image Craft
20:43 Reading Hunger Aloud
22:35 Desire Versus Self
24:15 Writing From Observation
26:04 Finding Poetry Mentors
28:14 Ekphrasis And Queer Lineage
31:42 Poetry As Cultural Memory
36:18 Reading Poem 1992
38:24 Slow Evening And Gay Joy
42:47 Closing Thanks

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Welcome back to Words That Burn, the podcast taking a closer look at poetry. In this episode, host Benjamin Collopy offers a close reading of Mary Ruefle’s four-line masterpiece, “Deconstruction.”
This brief but devastating poem masterfully bridges ancient myth with the unbearable weight of modern existence. Benjamin situates Ruefle as a master storyteller and meticulous "sentence maker," breaking down how four short lines can bend time, space, and human memory.

In This Episode, We Explore:
The Sirens & The Metatextual Turn: How Ruefle uses Homer’s The Odyssey to force us to look inward. The poem presents a brilliant metatextual idea: that the Sirens actually sang The Odyssey itself, seducing listeners with the terrible, irresistible story of their own lives. We explore how the poem’s subtle shift from “I” to “we” invites shared introspection about how we remember, retell, and mythologise ourselves.
Erasure vs. Found Poetry: Using Ruefle's own remarks, we distinguish her specific practice of erasure (or blackout) poetry from standard found poetry, highlighting the intent and precision required to carve a poem out of an existing text.
Erasure as Survival: We connect "Deconstruction" to Ruefle’s broader lectures on reading, memory, and survival. Discover why picking apart existing texts isn't just an artistic choice, but a vital coping mechanism for processing life’s overwhelming excess.

Mary Ruefle's Erasure Notebooks

Follow the Podcast:

Read the Script on Substack
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The Music In This Week's Episode:
'Memories Of Stone' by Scott Buckley - released under CC-BY 4.0. www.scottbuckley.com.au

Time Stamps:
00:00 Sirens and Self Story
00:27 Why This Poem
01:28 Mary Ruefle's Style
03:02 Erasure Poetry Explained
04:53 Reading the Poem
05:43 Metatext and Reading
06:50 Sirens in The Odyssey
08:21 Erasure as Survival
11:22 Title Does the Work
12:47 Why It Stays With Us

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In this episode of Words That Burn, I sit down with poet Shannon Kuta Kelly to explore the beautifully haunting landscapes of her debut poetry collection, The Tree is Missing (coming this April from Faber and Faber).
Shannon’s work has been featured in the New England Review, Poetry Ireland Review, and The Irish Times. As a PhD graduate from the Seamus Heaney Centre at Queen's University Belfast and a 2025 Ciaran Carson Fellow, she brings a profound depth of knowledge and intuition to her craft. We discuss the tension between the past and present, the eerie realities of urbanisation, and how transient living shapes our identities.

This episode explores:
The Meaning of "The Tree is Missing": Unpacking the symbolic, ecological, and geographical resonances behind the collection's title.
Liminality and Urban Sprawl: How manmade borders, transient city living, and the meeting point between nature and concrete influence her writing.
History’s Phantom Limbs: Grounding the tragic, echoing histories of places like Tarnów, Poland, through human-centric storytelling and everyday images.
Folklore and Dream Logic: Why poetry and myth are a "match made in heaven," and how Shannon taps into our shared subconscious and collective symbols.
An Exclusive Reading: Shannon treats us to a reading of her poignant poem, Gost, and discusses the linguistic overlap between "ghosts" and "guests."

Whether you are a writer looking for advice on peeling back the layers of your own poetry or a reader fascinated by the intersection of myth and reality, Shannon’s insights are not to be missed.

Follow the Podcast:
Read the Script on Substack
Follow the Podcast On Instagram
Follow the Podcast on X/Twitter
Follow the Podcast on Tiktok
Follow the podcast on Bluesky

Time Stamps:

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
01:05 Why The Tree Is Missing
02:25 Borders Urban Sprawl Erasure
03:33 Liminal Life and POV Shifts
04:49 Observing Strangers and Details
06:00 From Reality to Spare Images
08:43 Tarnov and Haunted History
12:44 Storytelling Women and Three Sisters
15:20 Poetic Truth and Let It Be August
16:58 Endings Claustrophobia and Book Shape
19:58 Editing Influences and Breathing Space
22:28 Decay in Pastoral Scenes
24:56 Folklore and Poetic Logic
26:48 Two Brothers Divided
29:31 Nostalgia and Lost Homes
32:11 Dream Time Symbols
34:45 How Poems Are Collected
36:07 Gost Guests and Ghosts
39:50 Refrain and Repetition
42:05 Advice for other poets

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