Hello and welcome to Frank Skinner's poetry podcast this week, Kay Ryan. Now, Kay Ryan

is an American poet who I can honestly say I love. I discovered Kay Ryan not that long

ago actually in the last year and it feels so good and these poems are short poems with

short lines sort of stacked up on top of each other like like piles of American pancakes

with maple syrup nearby. So I don't want to get all gushing about Kay Ryan but I do I love

her stuff and there's lots of it available on the internet you don't have to go out and buy a book

and trust me straight off but when you've read some you'll want to buy a book I think okay what

can I say about it she was the American poet laureate this is my poet laureate theme for this series

from 2008 to 2010 that was her two-year stretch and one thing I'd say before I read the first poem

I'm actually really excited about reading it I like to feel her words on my lips anyway

she uses a thing that she calls recombinant rhyme I think that's how you say recombinant

binari c-o-m-b-i-n-a-n-t and she says this is Kay's story I'm speaking like I know her I feel

like I know her I don't know her but she said that when she first started writing poetry she really

wanted to rhyme she was desperate to rhyme but she recognized that rhyme was a very unfashionable

thing at the time certainly an American poetry I think just American and British it's seen as a bit

too rad for a lot of people and she herself felt that she couldn't confront end rhymes rhymes that come

at the end of a line like um no of course no I need one and I know a thousand I can't think of one

but I was walking down the street I saw a person who looks sweet that kind of end rhyme she didn't want

that but she couldn't resist rhyme so her rhymes this recombinant rhyme of which she speaks

is rhymes that are sort of redistributed occasionally occasionally you'll get an end rhyme when she

which making a big big final point but usually they come in the middle of lines they creep up on

you out of nowhere they might not be one for a while and then two or three come together like the

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