Frank Skinner's Poetry Podcast
Frank Skinner shares his love of poetry, presenting a weekly selection of his favorite poems. The podcast aims to make poetry accessible and enjoyable, blending humor and emotion. It is produced by Sarah Bishop and is an Avalon production.
Episodes
Kathleen Jamie
Frank views the world from a tree house, with the fabulous Kathleen Jamie. The poem referenced is “The Treehouse” from a collection called “The Treehouse” by Kathleen Jamie.
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Richard Brautigan
The lead singer of Frank’s favourite band introduced him to the poetry of Richard Brautigan, and it is a gift that keeps on giving.
TW: mention of suicide
The novel referenced is “Trout Fishing in America”. The collection of poems referenced is “The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster”. The poems referenced are “Widow’s Lament”, “Love Poem”, “Kafka’s Hat”, “I Cannot Answer You Tonight i
George Herbert
Frank gets excited about the brilliant 17th Century poet, George Herbert. The poems referenced are “The Collar” and “The Pulley”, both by George Herbert.
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Erasure Poetry
Frank explores poems stowed away in prose, as revealed by Nicole Sealey and Emma Filtness. The collections referenced are “The Ferguson Report: An Erasure” by Nicole Sealey and “This Savage Language” by Emma Filtness. The poems referenced are “Page 260” and “Page 5”.
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Poetry Anthologies
Frank celebrates the joys of wallowing in a big fat poetry anthology, in this case "A Century of Poetry in the New Yorker: 1925-2025". The poems referenced are “My Great-Grandmother’s Bible” by Spencer Reece and “How to Listen” by Major Jackson.
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Jack Clemo
Frank loves the clay, machinery and scary religion in the poetry of Jack Clemo. The poems reference are ‘A Calvinist in Love’, ‘Christ in the Clay-Pit’, ‘The Excavator’ and ‘Sufficiency’.
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Greta Stoddart
The poet, Greta Stoddart, instructs Frank on the deeper meanings of three tulips in a milk bottle. The poems referenced are ‘Fool’ and ‘Three Tulips in a Milk Bottle’.
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Scott McKendry
Frank joins a secret society with Pebbles Flintstone and the poet, Scott McKendry. The poems referenced are ‘Keepers of the Pedigree’ and ‘Hi-Vis’.
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Amy Clampitt
Frank finds the beauty in Amy Clampitt's poetry and written-off cars. The poem referenced is ‘Salvage’ from ‘The Kingfisher’.
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Rebecca Goss
The poet, Rebecca Goss, shows Frank life in a rearview mirror. The poems referenced are ‘Pheasant in Rear-View Mirror’ and ‘Sylvia’
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RS Thomas
Frank shares a pulpit with RS Thomas. The poems referenced are ‘Border Blues’, ‘Service’ and ‘Poetry For Supper’.
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Mona Van Duyn
Frank is very moved by what the poet, Mona Van Duyn, can do with an eraser. The poem referenced is ‘The Creation’ by Mona Van Duyn.
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Craig Raine
Frank and the poet, Craig Raine, explore a disused botanical garden. The poems referenced are ‘A Martian Sends a Postcard Home’, ‘Listen With Mother’ and ‘The Old Botanical Gardens’ by Craig Raine.
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Wislawa Szymborska
Frank and the poet, Wislawa Szymborska, discover how many people actually like poetry. The poems referenced are ‘Plato, or Why’ and ‘Some Like Poetry’ by Wislawa Szymborska.
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Seamus Heaney
Frank spends a day in Belfast, wallowing in the poetry of Seamus Heaney. The poem referenced are ‘Personal Helicon’ from ‘Death of a Naturalist’ and ‘Limbo’ by Seamus Heaney.
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Ruth Padel
A poem by Ruth Padel results in Frank staring, for 15 minutes, at an embroidery of an elephant. The poem referenced is ‘Mary’s Elephant, Elizabeth’s Spinet’ from ‘The Soho Leopard’ by Ruth Padel.
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Frank O'Hara
Frank is more than slightly besotted with ‘Lunch Poems’ by Frank O'Hara. The poems referenced are ‘Personal Poem’ and ‘The Day Lady Died’ by Frank O’Hara.
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Rebecca Hawkes
Frank gets very excited about the Rebecca Hawkes collection, ‘Meat Lovers’. The poems referenced are ‘After The Blizzard I Followed My Mother’ and ‘Pony Club Summer Camp’ by Rebecca Hawkes.
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Dylan Thomas
Frank spends the night in Dylan Thomas' bedroom. The poems referenced are ‘And Death Shall Have No Dominion’, ‘Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night’ and ‘A Refusal To Morn The Death, By Fire, Of A Child In London’ by Dylan Thomas.
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Martin Bell
Frank loves a hard-drinking, hard-smoking Polytechnic lecturer like Martin Bell, especially when he is offering poetic praise to Groucho Marx. The poems referenced are ‘Ode to Groucho’ by Martin Bell and ‘The Second Coming’ by W.B. Yeats.
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Jo Shapcott
Jo Shapcott sends Frank, an enthusiastic tree-hugger, into a sap-soaked frenzy. The collection referenced is ‘Of Mutability’. The poems referenced are ‘I Go Inside The Tree’, ‘My Oak’ and ‘Cypress’.
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Sasha Dugdale
Frank stands in awe as Sasha Dugdale sends a frighteningly honest Valentine’s message. The collection referenced is ‘Joy’ by Sasha Dugdale. The poems referenced are ‘Joy’ and ‘Valentine’s’.
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AE Housman
Frank is alarmed by AE Housman’s A Shropshire Lad.
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Jessica Traynor
The Irish poet, Jessica Traynor, explores one of Frank’s favourite subjects – ageing performers who don’t know when to quit. The collection referenced is ‘Pit Lullabies’ by Jessica Traynor. The cycle of poems referenced is ‘An Island Sings’. The poems referenced are ‘The Parent’s Song’, ‘Song of the Insomniac’ and ‘Nureyev in Dublin’.
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Billy Collins
American poet, Billy Collins, makes Frank question the whole Poetry Podcast experience. The poems referenced are ‘Introduction to Poetry’ and ‘American Sonnet’ by Billy Collins.
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Sappho
Frank trembles at the fragmented beauty of Sappho, the superstar poet of Ancient Greece. The fragment translations are by Aaron Poochigian.
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T.S. Eliot
Frank explores The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot. Nuff said.
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Series 9 Trailer
Series 9 of Frank Skinner's Poetry Podcast begins on 10th January. See you there!
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Elizabeth Bishop
Is it a man? Is it a moth? Frank has a strange night out with Elizabeth Bishop. The poem referenced is 'The Man-Moth'.
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Geoffrey Hill
Frank indulges his obsession with the Anglo Saxons as he reads Geoffrey Hill's Mercian Hymns.
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Robert Browning
Did he or didn't he? Frank investigates Robert Browning's 'My Last Duchess'. The other poem referenced is 'The Pied Piper of Hamelin' by Robert Browning.
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Jean Sprackland
Nature gets horny and reflective. Frank is excited about the poetry of Jean Sprackland. The collection referenced is 'Green Noise'. The poem referenced is 'April' and the sequence referenced is 'The Lost Villages'.
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Percy Bysshe Shelley
Frank examines statues and statutes with Percy Bysshe Shelley. The poems referenced are 'England in 1918' and 'Ozymandias'. The essay referenced is 'A Defense of Poetry'.
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Sylvia Plath
Frank howls at the moon with Sylvia Plath. The poems referenced are 'The Moon and the Yew Tree' and 'Ariel. TW: mentions of suicide.
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Don Paterson
Frank celebrates the razor-sharp poetic mind of Don Paterson. The poem referenced is 'Rain'.
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Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Elizabeth Barrett Browning shows Frank that it's hard to be a mother and a poet and a revolutionary. The poem referenced is 'Mother and Poet'.
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Series 8 Trailer
Series 8 of Frank Skinner's Poetry Podcast coming very soon...
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Alans at War
This week, Frank discovers two very different war poets, Alan Ross and Alan Seeger. The poems referenced are ‘Mess Deck’ by Alan Ross and ‘I Have a Rendezvous with Death’ by Alan Seeger.
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Charlotte Mew
This week, Frank explains why the poet, Charlotte Mew, should, in his opinion, be a household name. The poems referenced are ‘The Farmer’s Bride’ and ‘Sea Love’.
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Sinéad Morrisey
This week, Frank screams the praises of Sinéad Morrissey’s Beatlemania poems. The book referenced is ‘On Balance’. The poems referenced are ‘The Millihelen’ and ‘Perfume’.
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Thomas Hardy
This week: Thomas Hardy’s poetry, featuring love, death and men that look like holly bushes. The poems referenced are ‘Exeunt Omnes’, ‘A Light Snow-Fall After Frost’ and ‘A Countenance’.
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Selima Hill
This week, Frank enters the funny but unsettling world of Selima Hill. The collection referenced is ‘Men Who Feed Pigeons’.
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John Keats
This week, John Keats talks to pottery. The poem referenced is ‘Ode on A Grecian Urn’.
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John Masefield
This week, we look at a John Masefield poem from 1911, in which a naked drunk runs through a town at midnight, threatening firefighters with their own hose-nozzles. The poems referenced are ‘Sea-Fever’, ‘The Everlasting Mercy’, ‘Dauber’ and ‘Partridges’.
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Kay Ryan
This week: why do so many of us stagger through life leaving a trail of chaos and confusion? American poet, Kay Ryan, reveals it’s because we are carrying an invisible ladder. The poems referenced are ‘We’re Building the Ship As We Sail It’, ‘Carrying A Ladder’ and ‘Blandeur’.
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Richard Wilbur
This week, American poet, Richard Wilbur, explains why stones aren’t very ambitious. The poems referenced are ‘A Dubious Night’ and ‘Two Voices in A Meadow’.
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Ada Limón
This week, American Poet Laureate, Ada Limón heads for the safe haven of the parental raincoat. The poems referenced are ‘The Contract Says: We’d Like the Conversation to be Bilingual’, ‘The Raincoat’ and ‘Before’.
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Ted Hughes
This week, Ted Hughes shows us that writing a poem is like a stinking fox walking across a snow-covered field. The poem referenced are ‘The Thought Fox’ and ‘The Jaguar’.
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Simon Armitage
This week, our Poet Laureate, Simon Armitage, writes a brilliant poem about what some might think is an unlikely subject. The poem referenced is ‘The Patriarchs – An Elegy’.
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Carol Ann Duffy
This week, Carol Ann Duffy considers the profound, prayer-like quality of the Shipping Forecast. The poems referenced are ‘Death of a Teacher’ and ‘Prayer’.
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John Betjeman
This week, John Betjeman gets a tennis-based humiliation from the girl of his dreams. The poem referenced is ‘A Subaltern’s Love Song’.
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Series 6 Trailer
Series 6 of Frank Skinner's Poetry Podcast begins on 8th February. See you there!
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Sir Thomas Wyatt
At last, our first jousting poet - Frank meets Sir Thomas Wyatt, head-on. The poems referenced are They Flee From Me and Farewell Love and All Thy Laws For Ever by Sir Thomas Wyatt.
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Emily Dickinson
Frank went on holiday with Emily Dickinson and came back in love with her poetry. The poems referenced are ‘After great pain, a formal feeling comes’, ‘One need not be a Chamber — to be Haunted’ and ‘A Wind That Rose’ by Emily Dickinson.
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Clare Pollard
Vampires and mermaids - Frank falls under the spell of Clare Pollard’s fabulous poetry. The collection referenced is Changeling by Clare Pollard and the individual poems referenced are Zennor and Whitby.
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Alfred Lord Tennyson
Frank meets Alfred Lord Tennyson’s Lady of Shalott and finds out why Camelot is a bit of a lottery. The poems referenced are The Charge Of The Light Brigade and The Lady Of Shalott both by Tennyson.
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Leontia Flynn
Drunken nights and floppy discs - Frank gets excited about the poetry of Leontia Flynn. The collection referenced is Profit and Loss by Leontia Flynn and the individual poems referenced are Anecdote and The Floppy Disk.
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The Mersey Sound
Frank explains why the first poetry book he ever bought, The Mersey Sound, changed his life forever. The poems referenced are Without You and The New ‘Our Times’ by Adrian Henri, Where Are You Now, Batman, Party Piece and After Breakfast by Brian Patten, and On Picnics, Café Portraits and Let Me Die A Youngman’s Death by Roger McGough.
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Series 5 Trailer
Series 5 of Frank Skinner's Poetry Podcast coming very soon...
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Robert Hayden
Frank shares a cold, sad Sunday morning with Robert Hayden. The poems referenced are Those Winter Sundays and The Whipping by Robert Hayden.
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Michael Symmons Roberts
Frank explores the poetic treasure-trove that is Michael Symmons Roberts’ collection, Drysalter. The poems referenced are Face to Face, Through a Glass Darkly and Discoverers by Michael Symmons Roberts.
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Wordsworth Revisited: The Leech-Gatherer
Wordsworth revisited: the leech-gatherer. The poem referenced is Resolution and Independence by William Wordsworth.
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Nick Laird
Frank loves Nick Laird’s poetry. And manual typewriters. The collection referenced is On Purpose by Nick Laird and the poem referenced is The Underwood No. 4.
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Walt Whitman
Frank loves Walt Whitman, right down to his comfortable shoes… The poems referenced are Poets to Come, To You, Song of the Universal and Song of Myself by Walt Whitman.
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Jen Hadfield
Frank heads North with the amazing Jen Hadfield. The collection referenced is The Stone Age by Jen Hadfield. The individual poems referenced are Hardanger Fiddle & Nyckelharpa, (Lighthouse) and (Erratic) by Jen Hadfield.
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John Milton
Batman, Captain America and Milton’s Paradise Lost.
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Caroline Bird
Frank celebrates Caroline Bird and wonders if he should have saved this one for Valentine’s Day. The collection referenced is The Air Year by Caroline Bird. The individual poems discussed are Temporary Vows and I Am Not a Falconer, both by Caroline Bird.
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Series 4 Trailer
Series 4 of Frank Skinner's Poetry Podcast coming soon...
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WH Auden
Frank meets WH Auden in an art gallery and falls in love all over again.
Poems referenced:
Musée des Beaux Arts - WH Auden
Funeral Blues - WH Auden
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Ellen Hinsey
Frank finds out when the Illegal Age began, with Ellen Hinsey.
Please note this podcast has some disturbing content.
Poem referenced:
The Illegal Age - Ellen Hinsey
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Matthew Arnold
Frank spends a dark night on Dover Beach with Matthew Arnold and, hold on, isn’t that Sophocles over there?
Poems referenced:
Dover Beach - Matthew Arnold
Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse - Matthew Arnold
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Tracy K Smith
Frank reads Tracy K Smith and finally gets his priorities right.
Collections referenced:
Wade in the Water - Tracy K Smith
Leaves of Grass – Walt Whitman
Poems referenced:
Political Poem – Tracy K Smith
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Peter Riley
Frank hits the high notes with Peter Riley and accidentally arrives at his favourite-ever definition of poetry.
Collection referenced:
Passing Measures – Peter Riley
Poems referenced:
The Little Watercolour at Sligo – Peter Riley
Do It Again – Peter Riley
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Denise Levertov
Frank explores the wonders and horrors of city-life, with Denise Levertov and two dogs of disproportionate size.
Poems referenced:
The Rainwalkers by Denise Levertov
The Mutes by Denise Levertov
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Robert Frost
Frank celebrates one of his all-time favourite poems: The Star-Splitter by Robert Frost.
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Ella Frears
Frank discovers Ella Frears at a motorway services and shares some intimate notes.
Collection referenced:
Shine, Darling by Ella Frears
Poems referenced:
Midpoint by Ella Frears
The Film by Ella Frears
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Alexander Pope
Couplets, cruelty and the occasional caning. Frank enters the poetical world of Alexander Pope.
Poems Referenced
Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot - Alexander Pope
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Rita Dove
Rita Dove teaches Frank the art of poetry and how to pull.
Poems Referenced:
Ars Poetica - Rita Dove
Flirtation - Rita Dove
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William Wordsworth
Frank walks the untrodden ways with William Wordsworth.
Poems Referenced:
She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways - William Wordsworth
Spring – Alexander Pope
The Tables Turned – William Wordsworth
Strange Fits of Passion Have I Known – William Wordsworth
A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal – William Wordsworth
Three Years She Grew in Sun and Shower – William Wordsworth
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Tadeusz Dabrowski
Never mind the poetry, here’s the white bits. Frank has a wild night out with the Polish poet, Tadeusz Dabrowski.
Poems Referenced:
I Believe All Round the Clock - Tadeusz Dabrowski (translated from Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones)
Soiree - Tadeusz Dabrowski (translated from Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones)
Bunny Slope - Tadeusz Dabrowski (translated from Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones)
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