Welcome back to the Daily Poem. I'm David Kern, and today's Thursday, October 8th, 2020.

Today's poem is by an American poet named Louise Glick. She was born in 1943, April of

1943, and word came down, I believe this morning, or yesterday perhaps, that she was being awarded

the Nobel Prize in

Literature in 2020. She's won many major literary awards, including the National Humanities

Medal, the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and others. But to win the Nobel Prize

in literature is, of course, a huge deal. So what I want to do today is in honor of that and in recognition of that.

I want to read a couple of poems by her.

I'm going to read three different poems by Louise Glick.

And before I read those three poems, I'm just going to share a few comments that you can find online about her canon, about her work.

And each of the particular comments that I'm going to

share with you right now before I read those three poems come from the Guardian's article on Glick

winning the Nobel Prize. Quote, the chair of the Nobel Prize committee, Anders Olson, hailed Glick's

candid and uncompromising voice, which is, quote, full of humor and biting wit.

Her twelve collections of poetry, including her most recent faithful and virtuous knight,

the Pulitzer Prize winning the Wild Iris and the masterly Averno, are characterized by a striving

for clarity, he added, comparing her to Emily Dickinson with her severity and unwillingness

to accept simple

tenets of faith. The news is welcomed by her fellow poets. Claudia Rankine told the guardian that

she was so pleased. Something good had to happen, Rankin said. She's a tremendous poet, a great

mentor and a wonderful friend. I couldn't be happier. We are in a bleak moment in this country,

and we as poets continue to imagine our way forward. Louise has spent a lifetime showing us how to make language

...