[encore] 1410: Go by Kathleen Ossip - The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily

Summary4 min read

Episode Overview

Podcast: The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily
Host: Maggie Smith
Episode: [Encore] 1410: "Go" by Kathleen Ossip
Date: August 12, 2026

This episode of The Slowdown centers on the poem "Go" by Kathleen Ossip. Host Maggie Smith introduces listeners to the rich, layered experience of encountering poetry—in particular, long, intricate poems that unfold their insights bit by bit. Smith reflects on how poems serve as powerful tools for attention, wonder, and compassion, before sharing Ossip’s energetic, associative work. The episode invites reflection on the vibrancy, contradictions, and movement of life.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

Poetry as Life’s Companion

Maggie Smith opens with a meditation on the forms poems can take, likening concise poems to diamonds and expansive ones to strands of pearls:
- Quote: "Some poems are compressed like diamonds, like small gems you can hold in your palm. They shine up at you and you can come back for the glint of them whenever you want... Other poems are like strands of pearls, long and lustrous and nearly impossible to gather into your hands all at once." (00:32)
She emphasizes a personal love for both poem styles and frames "Go" as an example of a poem that's "a long, beautiful strand."

Introduction to "Go" by Kathleen Ossip

Smith sets the tone, inviting listeners to experience the unfolding, accumulative energy of Ossip's poem.
There is no formal analysis before the reading—listeners are encouraged to "listen and enjoy," staying open to the poem’s surprises.

Full Reading of "Go" (01:02 – 04:13)

The poem is presented in Maggie Smith’s clear, warm voice. "Go" is a cascade of vivid images and shifting metaphors, moving swiftly between objects, emotions, encounters, and states of being:
- Red cubes, mountains, birds of fire, everyday strangers, and cosmic imagery intermingle.
- Ossip’s poem details “the fight in you and the fight in you dying,” and shuffles quickly between comfort, tension, loss, memory, and the striving for connection.
- There are playful, poignant, and even mysterious lines (“It’s a kiss, of course it is a kiss. It’s an old, strange book, newly acquired but not yet cataloged...”).
- The poem ends on a surge of momentum: “It is going, going. It is flying now, laughing, strong enough to know anything.”

Main Themes & Insights

Multiplicity & Paradox: The poem’s "it" shifts shape constantly, reflecting both the mundanity and marvel of being alive.
Movement & Change: Recurring images of swiftness, being stuck, and transition suggest the instability yet persistence of life’s journey.
Pain and Joy: The poem holds both—"You can't let it hurt you. You must let it hurt you." (~03:08)—and refuses to resolve these into easy answers.
Everyday Wonders: Ordinary details (cats, leaves, water, pavement) are given as much weight as celestial bodies and existential urgencies.
Universality: "It’s your tablet, which is every tablet everywhere. It's an explosion. It is every explosion everywhere." (~03:28) The poem connects personal experience with the collective.

Host’s Reflection and Invitation

Smith closes by reminding listeners of poetry’s stabilizing power:
- Quote: “Listening to and reading poetry helps us find our footing in an uncertain world, especially during challenging times.” (04:35)
She invites participation in the Slowdown community, whether through daily poem deliveries or support for the show.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On the forms poems can take:
"Some poems are compressed like diamonds... Other poems are like strands of pearls, long and lustrous and nearly impossible to gather into your hands all at once." (00:32, Maggie Smith)
On the demands of loving the world:
"It is a little project called loving the world. It is howling in the dirt. It is an extravaganza." (02:29, Kathleen Ossip, read by Maggie Smith)
On holding contradiction:
"It is their heartfelt advice. You can't let it hurt you. You must let it hurt you." (03:08, Kathleen Ossip, read by Maggie Smith)
On poetry’s necessity:
“Listening to and reading poetry helps us find our footing in an uncertain world...” (04:35, Maggie Smith)

Timestamps for Important Segments

00:32 — Maggie Smith on the qualities and forms of poetic experience
01:02 — Introduction to "Go"
01:07–04:13 — Full reading of "Go" by Kathleen Ossip
04:35 — Reflection on poetry’s stabilizing influence

Tone & Style

The episode is contemplative and gently uplifting, anchored in Maggie Smith’s soothing narrative style. Her introduction and reading invite a sense of intimacy and presence, encouraging listeners to pause, reflect, and let poetry open new ways of seeing.

Summary Takeaway

This episode of The Slowdown offers both a direct, immersive encounter with Kathleen Ossip’s poem “Go” and a meditation on the value of poetry in chaotic times. Through vivid reading and gentle guidance, Maggie Smith encourages listeners to find hope, complexity, and connection—"strong enough to know anything"—in the attentive act of listening. Poetic reflection becomes here not just an art, but a means of living more fully, honestly, and compassionately.

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Transcript2 lines

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This podcast is supported by Raymond James, a financial firm offering wealth management, banking and capital markets services that are inspired by people before Raymond James. Financial Advisors build plans. They build relationships so they can craft individual strategies designed to achieve priorities and pursue what's possible. That's the power of personal disclosures@raymondjames.com Raymond James Associates, Inc. Member NYSE SIPIC the Slowdown Team is
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taking some time to reset, refine and return with more new episodes from Maggie Smith in September. In the meantime, we are sharing episodes from the Archive. I'm Maggie Smith, and this is the Slowdown. Some poems are compressed like diamonds, like small gems you can hold in your palm. They shine up at you and you can come back for the glint of them whenever you want. I love poems like that. Other poems are like strands of pearls, long and lustrous and nearly impossible to gather into your hands all at once. I love poems like that too. Today's poem is a long, beautiful strand. Listen and enjoy. Go By Kathleen Osip it is a cube, it is red, it is mountainous. It is a bird of fire. It is the bones of the pelvis. It is a walnut, it is treasured, it is yellow Saturn wobbling in its orbit. It is danger squawking. It is the desire to sit down with strangers in cafes. And then it is the strangers in cafes. It is the man with the black T shirt labeled Unarmed Civilian and it is the blind man with him and his painful trembling always. It is oxygen and more oxygen. It is the fight in you and the fight in you dying. It is the need for water and the water that falls from the sky. It is desperate for a theory and it is the axe you call evil when you know there is no evil, only desperation. It is that bravery, that arrogance, that blindness. It is the pink morning and your smile in the pink morning. It is a phantom and the thin neck of a tree. It is a little project called loving the world. It is howling in the dirt. It is an extravaganza. It's the abandoned sports bra in the dirt beside howling ewe. It's the wind chimes in the thin necked tree and it is tongue tied. It is asleep. It is waking up now. It is a small cat on the bed. It is the threads of a leaf and it is the three graces, splendor, mirth and good cheer. It is their heartfelt advice. You can't let it hurt you. You must let it hurt you. It is a careless error and the hotel pool blew with chemistry. It's a kiss, of course it is a kiss. It's an old, strange book, newly acquired but not yet cataloged. It is crazy. It is you, crazy with honesty and crazy with ambition. It's the sun that stuns over and over again. It's your tablet, which is every tablet everywhere. It's an explosion. It is every explosion everywhere. It is pavement, mineral and hot and wet with droplets. It's the stars that pitch white needles into the pond. It is provable. It is a lotion. It is a lie. It is a baby, because everyone is a baby. It talks to you, always to you. It moves swiftly. It is stuck. It moves swiftly. It is stuck. It moves swiftly. It's the impenetrable truth now clear as ice. It is serious. It is irreversible. It is going, going. It is flying now, laughing, strong enough to know anything. The Slowdown is a production of American Public Media in partnership with the Poetry Foundation. To get a poem delivered to you daily, go to slowdownshow.org and sign up for our newsletter and find us on Instagram @downdownshow and blueskylowdownshow.org. Maggie Here, host of the Slowdown Listening to and reading poetry helps us find our footing in an uncertain world, especially during challenging times. You can help keep these moments of poetry and reflection going by making a gift today. Visit slowdownshow.org donate.