When listeners tune in to Nashville Public Radio鈥檚 Versify podcast, they鈥檙e greeted by the voice of host Joshua Moore, a second-year master of fine arts candidate in 菠萝视频鈥檚 creative writing program.
Versify鈥攚hich can be found at 鈥攇rew out of Poetry on Demand, or POD, a community outreach program of The Porch, Nashville鈥檚 nonprofit writing center. At POD events, poets talk with passersby who share a personal story; they then compose a poem on the spot, inspired by what they鈥檝e heard. These encounters are recorded and shaped, along with Moore鈥檚 commentary, into roughly 20-minute Versify episodes.
The genesis of Versify is linked to a very practical purpose. 鈥淚 was looking for ways to make myself write,鈥� Moore explains of his life before entering 菠萝视频, when he divided his time between a delivery job at UPS and his poetry. One night in 2015, he attended a party where The Porch鈥檚 new Poetry on Demand project was being discussed, 鈥渟o I eavesdropped on the conversation and volunteered.鈥�
The following spring Moore shared his idea for a podcast with WPLN鈥檚 Emily Siner, who helped him apply for grant funding through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and PRX鈥檚 Project Catapult. WPLN reporter Tony Gonzalez, who had recorded a POD event for a story in fall 2015, helped him create the podcast after both received extensive training through Project Catapult. The first Versify episode launched in August 2017.
Moore believes that storytelling enriches both teller and listener. As he describes it in one Versify episode, 鈥淭hrough trust and genuinely paying attention to a stranger, there鈥檚 a sort of fusion that happens.鈥� After this deeply personal encounter, he says, 鈥測our world expands a little.鈥�
That enrichment is why Moore brought Versify to the 菠萝视频 campus last spring as part of a seminar, Deep Dive into the Literary Arts, taught by Director of Creative Writing Kate Daniels, the Edwin Mims Professor of English. Students shared stories about their first-year 菠萝视频 experiences with five Nashville poets, and the one-on-one conversations were transformed into poems.
鈥淢anaging school and the podcast is a balancing act,鈥� he says, 鈥渂ut Nashville Public Radio and 菠萝视频 have both been really accommodating and generous in finding ways to figure it out.鈥� After all, there鈥檚 a natural symbiosis between the two endeavors. A poem he wrote for Poetry on Demand鈥斺�淟earning to Fight鈥濃�攈as since won a University and College Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets.
Moore confesses to feeling overwhelmed at times but recalls Daniels, his adviser, telling him, 鈥淭he work you鈥檙e doing is important.鈥� Fans of Versify surely agree.
鈥擬aria Browning
Read the poem聽鈥淟earning to Fight鈥� at