TONYA MOSLEY, HOST:
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Tonya Mosley. When Ada Limon became the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States in 2022, she imagined her role would be to bring poetry to the people. What she found instead was that poetry was already everywhere - in waiting rooms, on subway cars and secret journals. People just didn't call themselves poets. It's that kind of intimacy - poetry is a quiet, essential part of daily life - that defines Limon's own work. Her new collection, "Startlement: New And Selected Poems," spans nearly 20 years of writing, bringing together poems from six earlier books alongside new works that grapple with living in this moment - the climate crisis, the erosion of privacy and the exhaustion of being constantly on display. Previous collections include "The Carrying," which won the National Book Critics Circle Award, and "Bright Dead Things," a finalist for the National Book Award. She's also a recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and was named one of Time Magazine's Women of the Year and recently completed a three-year tenure as Poet Laureate.
Ada Limon, welcome to FRESH AIR.
ADA LIMON: Thank you so much for having me. Such a pleasure.
MOSLEY: Ada, you know, that word, startlement, the name of your book, that's also a poem in the book, it's not a word we use anymore. It feels almost Victorian.
LIMON: Yeah.
MOSLEY: But it's the title of your new collection. And I'd love for you to read, actually, the first poem, and on the other side we can talk about it. Will you read it for us?
LIMON: Yeah, absolutely.
(Reading) Startlement. It is a forgotten pleasure. The pleasure of the unexpected blue-bellied lizard skittering off his sunspot rock, the flicker of an unknown bird by the bus stop. To think, perhaps we are not distinguishable, and therefore, no loneliness can exist here. Species to species in the same blue air, smoke, wing flutter buzzing, a car horn coming, so many unknown languages to think we have only honored this strange human tongue. If you sit by the riverside, you see a culmination of all things upstream. We know now we were never at the circle's center. Instead, all around us, something is living or trying to live. The world says what we are becoming, we are becoming together. The world says one type of dream has ended, and another has just begun. The world says once we were separate, and now we must move in unison.
MOSLEY: That's Ada Limon reading "Startlement." Thank you so much for reading that. Tell me how did that word startlement become what really is this poem, but also a container for 20 years of your poetry?
LIMON: Thank you. Yeah, startlement, for me, I mean, it's a Shakespearean word. And then when I was thinking of a title for the whole collection, which was really hard to come up with a title, or how do you title, you know, a life of work, a whole collection that spans your life? And I kept thinking maybe a startlement was the collective noun for poems, a startlement of poems, like a murder of crows, like a murmuration of starlings. So, yeah, it became the container. But I think, really, at its core, it's about wonder - about not being scared of being amazed, but also the way something can shove you off its center for a moment and being available to that moment.
MOSLEY: You wrote this poem "Startlement" for a government report on climate change, initially, is that right? The Fifth National Climate Assessment.
LIMON: That's correct. I was asked to write this poem for the front matter of the Fifth Annual National Climate Assessment, which is a congressionally mandated report. And it was difficult to write the poem, but I will admit that I met with a bunch of the scientists and the journalists and all the people that spent all this time making this report. And one of the women followed me out, and she was near tears, and she said I know that you have to write this poem for the front matter, but do me a favor - don't make it nostalgic. And it really stuck with me about how there is no going bac. That even if we can practice river restoration and remove dams and even if we are lucky enough to see some return of salmon or some flourishing in the oceans, it's not going to be a return to what we had. Whatever happens next is the way forward. It's what happens next. And that's where this poem - where the seed of the poem was planted.
MOSLEY: This collection includes - am I right that this includes poetry that you also wrote when you were in your early 20s all the way...
LIMON: Yes.
MOSLEY: ...Through to you now in your 40s?
LIMON: Yes, yes, that's very true. Yeah.
MOSLEY: Yeah. When you look back, do you see yourself aging in your poems? How was that process of you going through over 20 years worth of work?
LIMON: Yeah. It was pretty bizarre and surreal to go and look at everything you've made from your, you know, I think the earliest poem, I believe I was maybe 22, 23. I think that's probably the earliest poem in the book. And up until now. And so I think there's a level in which you stare at the work you've made and start to think about, oh, how it reflects not just your impulses as an artist but who you are as a human being and the people you've lost. You know, I think about the poems that are about grief. I lost my stepmother when I was in my mid-30s, and I think about those poems that were in the original collection "Bright Dead Things" and how she's become a ghost in these poems. And I think about how I really tried to see not only the poems but the person that wrote the poems with as much generosity as possible. And that's how I made the collection, which was this was an offering to myself back then, too.
MOSLEY: What is that earliest poem? What is - which poem is that that you wrote at 22, 23?
LIMON: I want to say - the youngest. Oh, you know what? I think it's "Centerfold."
MOSLEY: Can I have you read "Centerfold?"
LIMON: Absolutely. This is a poem I wrote while I was in graduate school at New York University, and I was - still remember I was studying with Sharon Olds. I was in her workshop, and I think I was just 22, maybe 23.
(Reading) "Centerfold." Crouched in the corner of the barn, we sat with the cedar chest splayed and the magazines laid out in perfect piles. I was the first to reach the centerfold, and together, we stared. These women, these giantesses, folded over couches on bear rugs or steel bars, their bodies so slick they can slip through the pages and then through your fingers. One in particular was my favorite with her left leg perched on a ballet bar and her hair piled around her shoulders. I thought, she must be famous. I thought, how lovely it would be to be her, to be naked all the time and dancing.
MOSLEY: Thank you so much for reading that. That's "Centerfold" by my guest, Ada Limon, she wrote when she was just in grad school. What was the impetus for that poem?
LIMON: You know, I was thinking about the naive child and how there's so much tenderness in, often, a young person's viewpoint. And for me, I was this young girl discovering, you know, this pile of old magazines, you know, Playboys or whatever they were. And instead of being horrified or scared by them, I thought, oh, this is amazing. You could just be a naked woman dancing and be so free. And there was a real moment where I thought this was great. And, of course, as you age, you begin to understand the terror of that. And you also begin to understand the danger that surrounds women and the figure of women. And I feel like that - this poem sort of wants to hold both of those things in the same - at the same time, which is that wonder and awe that the child has and then also how clearly the next part of this poem - right? - the next thing that happens is the discovery of the danger of what it is to be in a female body moving through our world.
MOSLEY: Let's take a short break. If you're just joining us, our guest is poet Ada Limon, the 24th U.S. poet laureate whose tenure just ended in April. She's out with a new collection called "Startlement." We'll continue our conversation after a short break. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
MOSLEY: This is FRESH AIR. And today, I am talking with Ada Limon, the nation's 24th poet laureate, about her new book of poems, "Startlement." Limon is the author of six previous books of poetry, including "The Hurting Kind," "The Carrying" and "Bright Dead Things."
The Library of Congress asked you to serve a second two-year term, which had never been done before, because the poet laureate position is typically a one-year term. And so I was just wondering, when they asked you to extend for that second term, what was the unfinished work that both of you felt you needed to complete?
LIMON: There were two things that were really key to making that decision to sign on for the second two-year term, which was, one, the project that I was creating - my signature project called "You Are Here" - was with the National Parks, and it was quite large. And we wanted time to do it and to do it right. And so we were able to not just do the project, but then unveil those poetry picnic tables in seven different parks around the country. And that was really meaningful. The other thing was that I have a poem that's engraved on the spacecraft the Europa Clipper.
MOSLEY: Right.
LIMON: And that went to space. It launched on October 14, 2024. And so it felt, also, as I should be serving in that role while that spacecraft launched. I think that was another part of that decision because it felt like it might be a disservice to the next poet laureate to have them come in in September and then for there to be this sort of big NASA project that was continuing with me, and we didn't want to rush it in any way.
MOSLEY: One of the poems that you read at your inauguration was "The New National Anthem" (ph), which I'm going to have you read. But I want a little bit of backstory about it because I also have heard that you were afraid that this actual poem would be the reason why you would not become poet laureate.
LIMON: (Laughter).
MOSLEY: And it ended up being the thing that you read - the piece of work that you read in your inauguration.
LIMON: Yeah. I wrote that poem in 2016, and I wrote it in a fury. And it just came out in one sitting, which is very rare. And this is a poem that I wrote and then immediately sent it to a friend who worked at a news site called BuzzFeed, and he immediately published it. And I thought, oh, no. I think this will - I laughed with my husband. I was like, now I'll never become poet laureate. And I was thinking, of course -joking that that would never happen anyway. But then the odd thing was that it was Dr. Carla Hayden's - it was one of her favorite poems.
MOSLEY: And just to remind people who Hayden is, she was the head of Library of Congress.
LIMON: Yeah, Dr. Carla Hayden, who is the librarian - was the librarian of Congress while I was serving, and she encouraged me to read the poem - a few times - and then I read it at my inaugural reading at the library.
MOSLEY: Can I have you read it?
LIMON: (Reading) "A New National Anthem." The truth is I've never cared for the national anthem. If you think about it, it's not a good song. It's too high for most of us with the rocket red glare. And then there are the bombs. Always, always, there is war and bombs. Once, I sang it at homecoming and through even the tenacious high school band off key. But the song didn't mean anything - just a call to the field, something to get through before the pummeling of youth. And what of the stanzas we never sing? The third that mentions no refuge could save the hireling and the slave. Perhaps the truth is every song of this country has an unsung third stanza - something brutal snaking underneath us as we absent-mindedly sing the high notes with a beer sloshing in the stands, hoping our team wins. Don't get me wrong. I do like the flag, how it undulates in the wind like water, elemental. And best when it's humbled, brought to its knees, clung to by someone who has lost everything - when it's not a weapon, when it flickers, when it folds up so perfectly you can keep it until it's needed, until you can love it again. Until the song in your mouth feels like sustenance, a song where the notes are sung by even the ageless woods, the short grass plains, the Red River Gorge, the fistful of land left unpoisoned. That song, that's our birthright that's sung in silence when it's too hard to go on that sounds like someone's rough fingers weaving into another's, that sounds like a match being lit in an endless cave. The song that says my bones are your bones, and your bones are my bones, and isn't that enough?
MOSLEY: You highlight this poem as kind of being central to your philosophy as poet laureate. And I was just wondering how you see that role of critique, especially for a beloved national symbol. Obviously, you felt some fear around it because you joked, you know, you wouldn't become poet laureate. But how do you see your role of critique in that role as part of what a poet laureate should offer?
LIMON: Yeah, I think that in the role, you know, first and foremost, you serve the Library of Congress. And the library is the largest library in the world. And so you're thinking about knowledge, collections, not just the books that were saved, but also the items that are saved. But you're also thinking about the history of the country. So I think that the poet's job, in many ways, is to - or at least the poet laureate's job is to be aware of where we are in context. And I think that's important, because for the most part, we are just reactive to the now - right? - especially given social media and how everything is about breaking news, as well you know.
And it feels like we get trapped into a moment of always reacting, and so we get overwhelmed, at least for me. I shouldn't say we. But I know that I get overwhelmed. I feel like, oh, I can only live in outrage, right? Or I can only live in fear or anxiety. And maybe it's too much. Or maybe I'm not allowed beauty. Maybe I'm not allowed joy. How can I be joyful when so many people are suffering, you know? How can I kiss and be hugged and celebrate love while so many people are suffering? And I think that poetry allows us to hold all of those realities and make space for the full spectrum of not just human emotion, but the full spectrum of truths.
MOSLEY: Your signature project when you were poet laureate was this poetry installation in national parks. It was called You Are Here. Even in your description of poetry, for me, it gives me that same sensation of how I feel when I'm out in the world and in nature. And so I just wonder, what did you learn from watching people encounter poems in these outdoor spaces versus reading them on a page?
LIMON: Oh, that's a great question. I think there were so many people that I ran across when we were doing that unveiling of those legacy poems on these picnic tables inside national parks, where people would come. And at first, they're looking around. At first, they're figuring out where they are. And then when they had a moment to actually spend time reading the poem that was on the table, they got so quiet. And it was so beautiful, you know? They would just get so quiet.
And they would reflect on the language and the song that the poem was making while they were staring at this place. And I think the thing that I was hoping it would do, and I still hope it's doing, is allowing them not just to be quiet in those beautiful spaces but also think of ways that they might offer something back. But I think sometimes if we can find language to sort of sing back to the places we love, we can feel a deeper sense of connection. And it can actually feel like we are working together, that there is something like reciprocity there.
MOSLEY: Our guest today is Ada Limon, the 24th U.S. poet laureate and author of the new poetry collection "Startlement." We'll be right back after a short break. I'm Tonya Mosley, and this is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF CHICK COREA'S "WHERE ARE YOU NOW? - A SUITE OF 8 PICTURES - PICTURE 4")
MOSLEY: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Tonya Mosley. And we're continuing our conversation with Ada Limon, the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States, whose tenure just ended last April. Her new book of poems, "Startlement," explores nature, loss and resilience. Limon is the author of seven books of poetry, including "The Hurting Kind," which was a finalist for the Griffin Prize, and "The Carrying," which won the National Books Critics Circle Award. She's also the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and was named a 2024 Time Magazine Woman of the Year.
You've told this story about the way you found your way to poetry. Elizabeth Bishop, high school, you're reading her poetry. You fell in love. What was it about her work in particular that you still remember about that falling-in-love moment?
LIMON: Oh, yeah. I'm so glad you brought that up. The Elizabeth Bishop poem, it's called "One Art," and I remember exactly where I was. I was near the front of the classroom at Sonoma Valley High School - go Dragons. And I remember we had this poem on a test, and we were reading it out loud. And it just made sense to me. I felt like it wasn't a puzzle at all. And I think before then, I thought maybe poems were like puzzles. And this wasn't a puzzle at all. This felt like music. Of course, I was 15, so I was madly in love and, you know, tender to everything that was crush related. And so I saw this poem. I was like, oh, this is a love poem. And then it had this form. It's a - arguably one of the most famous villanelles. And as I was reading it, I had no idea that this was a form that existed, but I knew that she was making a pattern, and I could see the pattern, and I could see how it wasn't unlike a song that has a chorus or a bridge and how you can see those repeated things.
And I remember that phrasing, the art of losing isn't hard to master. So many things seem filled with their intent to be lost, that their loss is no disaster. And I just thought, oh, wow. She's beginning with the small items, you know? And she says, I lost my mother's watch. And look, you know, so she's going on with these, oh, you can and then practice losing farther, losing faster, places and names and where it was you meant to travel. And it's like, oh, she's just showing us that losing is part of life and that there's almost something easy to it. And then, at the very end, you get the even losing you. And then I thought, oh, the you in poetry is everything. And I remember being 15, going, this is masterful. This is incredible.
MOSLEY: And I can imagine that so many people that you've encountered, as you talked about, poetry for them is - it's pretty academic, where they think about it as it relates to school, those moments in high school or in other grades where you finally come to a piece of poetry that sticks with you. But there's a difference there between loving it intensely like you loved it and so many people do, and then the decision to actually become a poet. When did you decide you wanted to be a poet?
LIMON: I'll tell you a story, but I was with my best friend. She's still my best friend, Trish (ph). She's a great playwright. And we were sitting around her kitchen table in Seattle. We met at the University of Washington sketching a sundial. And I said to her, I think I want to be a poet. And we were splitting a tomato because neither of us had any money, and she never had any utensils in the house. And I still remember she had a fork...
MOSLEY: This sounds so Pacific Northwest. I just hate to say. Continue.
LIMON: It is. It is.
MOSLEY: Sundial. Eating a tomato.
LIMON: Yeah.
MOSLEY: Yeah. Go ahead.
LIMON: And we're eating a tomato, and we're splitting a tomato. And I still remember she was - she had a fork and a pizza cutter that was, like, all the utensils she had in the world. And we were splitting this tomato and salting it. And I said, I think I want to be a poet. And she said, oh, good, 'cause I think I want to be a playwright. And I was thinking, oh, if we would just memorialize this tomato that we were splitting around her kitchen table because we had nothing else to eat. And I thought, oh, yeah, I think we're just going to have to get used to just splitting a tomato from here on out because we're choosing...
(LAUGHTER)
LIMON: We're choosing jobs or careers or lives, creative lives because there's not jobs or careers, that may mean that we have to be pretty frugal.
MOSLEY: So you make this declaration, but you do take on other types of jobs. Like, you don't go into becoming a full-time poet. You had a whole other career in marketing before you made this decision to take the leap.
LIMON: Oh, yes. I mean, I've said this before, but I do think it's, you know, if you choose art as your passion, as the thing you want to pursue, people will say, you know, do what you love, and the money will follow. And I think in reality, if you choose the creative life, you often have to do what you love and then also get a real job. And that - so I was trying to figure out how to make a living, you know? And I really needed to make sure that I could make rent and I could pay off my student loans from graduate school. And I think that I was very lucky to find magazines and work for marketing and really put language to use in a different way.
MOSLEY: I was wondering about this because...
LIMON: Yeah. Yeah.
MOSLEY: ...Writing for marketing, I mean, slogan, selling things, because sometimes, like, promos had come across our desks where we have to give ideas or thoughts or even write them. And they really require compression and clarity. And so I'm also just wondering how that maybe helped or kind of enhanced your own poetry, if at all.
LIMON: Yeah. You know, I don't think that they - I don't think that writing copy ever necessarily helped my poetry, but I do think that understanding language and working with language all day long was really good for my brain because it also allowed me to understand the absurdity of language. You know, if you really want to start to get surreal about where language works and where it fails, you know, read a sales report...
(LAUGHTER)
LIMON: ...You know? Or try to - or be in a room where people are coming up with ad campaigns. And the more and more earnest that you get, the more and more you think, you know, this matters, like, there's nothing else that matters like this cellphone, you know? And the absurdity of that. The absurdity of selling things, the absurdity of marketing things was kind of great to witness firsthand and to play around with it. I think one of the things that was really healthy for me was that I was never attached to my campaigns. I liked to play with them. I was happy to do headlines, and it was fun for me. It was a game. But...
MOSLEY: You weren't emotionally invested.
LIMON: I was never emotionally invested because I was going home, and I was writing poems. And that's where I was emotionally invested. And so, in many ways, you know, if someone said, oh, this one's not going to work, I'd say, oh, great, here are five more options. You know? And so it was a good job for me. And I was really lucky to work with a lot of good people. And I think it not only helped me, you know, make a living, which I needed desperately in New York City.
But it also helped me develop some perspective about what it was to be an artist and also have to exist in a world where you needed to pay rent, and you needed to save money and it was great if you could get health insurance, all of these things. So I've always been a firm believer that artists need to talk about the way we make livings and the way that we can move in the world, because I wasn't less of an artist because I had a full-time job. I think I was, you know, just as much of an artist as I am today.
MOSLEY: Was there ever a moment where you gave up on poetry or came close?
LIMON: Yeah. I think that, honestly, I think it happens a lot. I'd like to say it doesn't happen a lot. But oftentimes I think, what can I be doing if, OK, this is one life, right? I have one life that I get to live. And I'm so grateful that I get to live it. And I don't know how many years that I will have left. But I think, what do I want to dedicate myself to? And sometimes it's difficult to not think, oh, I need to immediately go into a full-time activist mode, or a full-time mode where I am helping animals or helping to preserve nature or working solely for the climate crisis and helping to serve, to really serve in a, you know, physical way.
And then there are times where I think that poetry is my way of serving. And I think that I go back and forth. And I also think that there are times where I think poetry saves me all the time. It saves me, and then I think, can it save others? And I don't I don't know. Yeah, I think that. But I think that doubt is so beautiful because I distrust certainty sometimes. Like, this idea that, oh, you know, poetry matters more than anything, it's like, it does, it does. But so does, you know, being able to eat (laughter), being able to be safe. You know, those things really matter. And they all matter together.
MOSLEY: Our guest today is Ada Limon, the 24th U.S. poet laureate and author of the new poetry collection "Startlement." We'll be right back after a short break. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF CHARLIE HADEN'S "EL CIEGO (THE BLIND)")
MOSLEY: This is FRESH AIR, and today I am talking with Ada Limon about her new book of poems, "Startlement."
Ada, you spoke out when Carla Hayden from the Library of Congress was fired by the Trump administration. And so, you've been vocal on things that you really care about. How do you see your role in this moment in American history and what poetry can bring to it?
LIMON: Yeah, you know, I think that one of the things that I really hope I can do is really be a true artist in all that sense, to give myself the freedom to keep making things and to be as expansive as I possibly can. And I think that as a woman, as someone with, you know, Mexican heritage, you know, I think that there's a way in which we can make sure that young people can see that. I think about that a lot. I think about how important it is to have representation.
And at the same time, I also really feel like what we need right now is tenderness and vulnerability, because everything that is being asked of us is to be, oh, we are just reacting with these suits of armor that I know we need. I know we need, right? This rise to action, this feeling like we are up against everything. And that feels so difficult. And I feel that with everyone else. And yet, at the same time, I feel like we can't lose our softness. We can't lose our tenderness. And if I can fight in some way to hold onto that, to show that, to show the softness, to show the importance of love, as silly as that may sound, when everything feels violent and horrific, to point out the beautiful thing when everything feels, you know, like, there's no hope. I guess I want to keep doing that. And I want to make sure I do it not just for others but for my own soul, for my own self.
MOSLEY: I think you said that after your appointment, after April, you returned home, and it felt like you were returning to yourself as a poet, which kind of implies the role as Poet Laureate maybe had taken you away from that self. What part of Ada the Poet did you have to let go of to be Ada the Laureate?
LIMON: You know, the Poet Laureate role is symbolic. It is - I don't know if people are interested in the tarot, but it's like a major arcana card. You become a symbol. You become a part of something. And what you end up talking about usually is the power of poetry, the power of language. And you talk about poetry as an art form, as a whole, right? Where as an artist, we talk about what we make. We talk about, oh, this is the weird poems I make, and this is my strangeness, and doesn't matter, etc., etc. And then I think then in that role, you're thinking about, OK, I want to represent not just poetry, but I want to represent the library. And then they say, oh, you know, you're the Poet Laureate of the United States. So then you think, oh, no, do I represent the United States? That's a lot, right?
So, then it becomes, like, this idea of, oh, I'm just trying to represent these other things. And in some ways, to do that well, you kind of have to let go of some of yourself. You need to become a little stronger, you know? You have to have a little bit of a hard shell, and you need to be someone who can be very articulate about what it is that matters and the importance of language. And I think, as an artist, those things unravel a bit. We can say, wait, does poetry matter? And then you make your poems and you think, oh, yeah, they do. They do matter for me, you know? So I think that I'm returning to myself in some ways. I'm getting weirder. I'm embracing my strangeness again.
MOSLEY: Yeah?
LIMON: And I think that in the role as the Laureate, there's a part of you that's, you know, you're just trying - I am someone who is always - I'm really always trying to do my best. And in that role, I was really - I will be very honest with you, I was just trying to do my very best. And I think now I can work towards a type of excellence in my own work, which is that strangeness and that softness and the slipperiness of reality that makes me who I am.
MOSLEY: Ada Limon, it was such a pleasure to talk with you, and thank you so much for this collection, 20 years of your work.
LIMON: Thank you. The pleasure was mine.
MOSLEY: Ada Limon is the nation's 24th Poet Laureate. Her new collection is called "Startlement."
Coming up, rock critic Ken Tucker reviews the re-release of the album "Buckingham Nicks." This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF THE DAVE BRUBECK QUARTET'S "UNSQUARE DANCE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
