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Poetry Unbound

I had a teacher in high school put me on to Poetry Unbound, and it’s become my favorite way to discover new poets and their collections (including my favorite of all time, “Seventh Circle of Earth” by Ocean Vuong. Prepare for tissues and one of the most truly beautiful episodes of a non-narrative podcast I have ever heard). In it, queer Irish poet Pádraig Ó Tuama selects a new poem each episode and breaks it down, performing it once, deconstructing the poem on a technical and artistic level, relating it to a personal experience or moment in the world right now, then performing it again with the newfound context. 

I can think of no better host than Ó Tuama, using his exceptional craft as a poet and tender curiosity towards the art of verse and prose to provide illuminating insight into what makes each piece so good. I find myself coming away from each episode feeling not just soothed by his wonderful voice, but like I’ve learned something new that I can apply to all the types of creative work I do. If you’ve been wanting to read more poetry, or just appreciate it more in general, I can’t think of a better place to start.

If you want something longer: Poetry Off the Shelf is a collection of interviews with established and emerging poets that examines the personal themes in their work.

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Breaker Whiskey

Atypical Artists creates some of the most consistently interesting and heartfelt fiction podcasts in the industry: there’s a reason their first show, The Bright Sessions, got so many people invested in what initially amounted to a bunch of therapy session recordings. Their newest show, Breaker Whiskey, has quite the hook: In 1968, two women find themselves in rural Pennsylvania during an apocalyptic event that appears to vanish every other human being. Six years later, one of them flees their homestead to drive around the country in search of any other survivors. Released every weekday and recorded on a 1976 Midland CB Radio, Breaker Whiskey strikes a fine balance between remarkably detailed historical and locational accuracy and an intriguing mystery tailor-made to enrich the personal story of the titular Whiskey. Why did she leave her companion of six years on a potential suicide mission? What happened to the rest of America? And most importantly: who out there might be listening to her transmissions? Episodes of this micro-fiction podcast rarely last longer than five minutes with no ads, making it the perfect show to queue up and binge.

If you want something longer: Alice Isn’t Dead tells the story of one truck driver’s search for her missing wife, during which she discovers strange and terrifying places across a weird, unnervingly familiar United States.

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Aaron Mahnke’s Cabinet of Curiosities

If you enjoyed Lore but want something shorter and just as spooky, Cabinet of Curiosities is a great alternative. Each episode features two short stories focused on the unexplained and unnerving and centered around a particular theme, like witchcraft or medical marvels. If you want to get in the Halloween spirit, or need some creepy edu-tainment year-round, this show more than satisfies.

If you want something longer: The Memory Palace is a just-slightly-longer collection of interesting stories, with forgotten biographies and histories that range from heartwarming to heartbreaking to redefine how we think about the world today. 

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The Goblet Wire

Whenever I have a friend looking to make the jump to full-on audio dramas, I recommend The Goblet Wire. Through a twisting network of payphones and power lines, players of an ultra-secret voice-command-based roleplaying game call in and discover a world beyond consciousness. This show is weird, yet surprisingly one of the most accessible fiction podcasts for those new to the genre. Each story is told with beautiful language and stunningly detailed sound design. This is a world that will suck you in just as completely as its in-universe players by building a landscape that’s like nothing you’ve heard before. If you’re a fan of Disco Elysium, David Lynch, or Kentucky Route Zero, this show will scratch that itch in a fantastic new way.

If you want something longer: The Great Chameleon War catalogs the expedition of a lone explorer journeying into the most surreal and insanity-inducing place on earth: the battleground of a transdimensional war against giant reptiles.

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Love and Luck

Love and Luck is special in a lot of ways: it was Australia’s first LGBTQ fiction podcast, launched all the way back in 2017. It’s a slice-of-life romance with a touch of cozy magical realism. It’s told through voicemails that expand and enrich the community surrounding the main love story between Jason and Kane in present-day Melbourne. It’s basically Cheers but queer. If you love rom-coms that build a world around the core couple and fill it with fascinating, wonderful human beings, this show does all that and more. To quote the show’s website, “The good guys win, no one gets killed, and queer people of all types are all loved and valued.” It’s a bowl of warm chicken noodle soup on any day of the year, and the way magic is both incorporated into this world and found in the mundanities of modern life always puts a big smile on my face when I relisten.

If you want something longer: Life With LEO(h) is a near-future sci-fi rom com that follows a no-nonsense robotics intelligence lawyer as she struggles not to return the feelings of the illegal android programmed to love her. 

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Everything Everywhere Daily 

If part of your morning routine includes dropping the kids off at school, Everything Everywhere Daily is a car-pleaser for curious people of all ages. Each episode is a quick lesson in everything from history to science, geography to mathematics, and more, all brought to life through the infectious enthusiasm of host Gary Arndt. Whether you’re crafting a queue of topics that interest you, or going chronologically and ready to be surprised, Everything Everywhere Daily is the platonic ideal of the “here’s a new interesting fact every day” podcast.

If you want something longer: Lost Women of Science features seasonal deep dives into forgotten women and their pivotal discoveries in the history of science and technology.