Friday, July 18, 2025

Yusef Komunyakaa on PennSound

Today we're taking a closer look at PennSound's author page for Yusef Komunyakaa, which was created not long after our official launch in 2005. While it houses a modest set of recordings, it nevertheless has many of this much-anthologized poet's most iconic work.

The heart of our Komunyakaa page is a March 1998 reading at our own Kelly Writers House. This  segmented recording consists of twenty-four in total, including favorite poems like "Facing It," "The Smokehouse," "Ode to the Maggot," "The God of Land Mines," "You and I Are Disappearing," and "Ode to a Drum," along with "Rhythm Method," "Letter to Bob Kaufman," "Camouflage in the Chimera," "We Never Know," and "Thanks," which has been a cherished part of PennSound's "Poems of Thanks and Thanksgiving" playlist for more than a decade. There's also a July 1999 appearance with Deborah Garrison on BBC Radio 3's Contemporary American Poetry Program, and the single poem "Slam, Dunk & Hook," published as part of the 2005 anthology Rattapallax.

We're grateful and proud to have Yusef Komunyakaa as part of the diverse array of voices found within PennSound's vast archives. You can listen to all of the poems mentioned above my clicking here.