Showing titles in Themes & Styles

Edward Lear's much-loved comic poem, featuring the most elegant fowl in literature and his beautiful feline friend, read by Jenny Agutter.

From the two-term Poet Laureate of the United States Billy Collins comes his first compilation of new and selected poems in 12 years. Aimless Love combines new poems with selections from four previous books— Nine Horses, The Trouble with Poetry, Ballistics, and Horoscopes for the Dead. Collins’s unmistakable voice, which brings together plain speech with imaginative surprise, is clearly heard with every word, reminding us how he has managed to enrich the tapestry of contemporary poetry and greatly expand its audience.

Beautifully composed and written by international best-selling author Lang Leav, this new collection of poetry and prose will positively influence your life.

In The Nectar of Pain, Zebian sheds light on the feelings and experiences that emerge from a painful heartbreak. She writes that the process of cleansing oneself of that pain—day by day, hour by hour, and second by second—is the real work of healing. With uncommon warmth and wisdom, Zebian empowers all who have lost to let go of anger and transform their suffering into the softness, sweetness, and beauty of nectar. She holds her listeners by the hand as they heal.

Life is like poetry. It has many styles, messages, and dimensions. Poetry, like life, can be happy, sad, serious, comical, etc. Like life, poetry is action, motion, and movement. Time never stands still. Every second of our day is moving toward a predestined journey. This journey is poetry in motion.

Conjuring vivid imagery and drawing from the four elements: earth, air, fire, and water, Prince Neptune presents poems and prose on themes of life, love, fame, escapism, environmentalism, with an overarching narrative of nature as a nod to the author's passion for the earth and the environment. Simpson’s poetry combines themes of freedom and the ocean with the wisdom of an old soul.

The Iliad is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the Odyssey, the poem is divided into 24 books and was written in dactylic hexameter. It contains 15,693 lines in its most widely accepted version. Set towards the end of the Trojan War, a ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Mycenaean Greek states, the poem depicts significant events in the siege's final weeks.

Since its debut in 1998, In Our Time has amassed a dedicated following of more than 2 million listeners. Hosted by Melvyn Bragg, with a panel of guest experts, each show features a plethora of fascinating facts and inspirational discourse on topics ranging from democracy to dark matter. This specially curated collection celebrates the rich diversity of poetry in English, focusing on 25 major works and writers from the mediaeval era to the 20th Century.

“The Iliad“ is an epic poem by the ancient Greek poet Homer, which recounts some of the significant events of the final weeks of the Trojan War and the Greek siege of the city of Troy (which was also known as Ilion, Ilios or Ilium in ancient times). Written in the mid-8th Century BCE, “The Iliad" is usually considered to be the earliest work in the whole Western literary tradition, and one of the best known and loved stories of all time.

The Iliad, set 9 years into the Trojan War, tells the story of the wrath of Achilles. The Odyssey tells the story of Odysseus as he wearily travels home from the war. The two epics provide the basis of Greek education and culture in the classical age. They have long remained among the most significant poems of European tradition. Produced here in full cast arrangement and narrated by Rob Goll, one can experience these age-old stories in a brand new way.

Francesco Petrarch’s Canzoniere (translated in English as ‘Scattered Rhymes’) is a collection of 14th century poems famed for their exploration of love, grief, spirituality and nature. Peter Thornton's accessible new translation brings Petrarch to the 21st century in direct, rhymed, English verse - for academics and poetry enthusiasts alike.

Popular Instagram poet and bestselling author Morgan Harper Nichols reimagines the classic heroine's journey—from the very first call to adventure, through trials, hardships, and new relationships, all the way back home—and offers key lessons and affirmations to encourage and equip you every step of the way.

By turns moving, playful and wise, the poems gathered in Dearly are about absences and endings, ageing and retrospection, but also about gifts and renewals. They explore bodies and minds in transition, as well as the everyday objects and rituals that embed us in the present. Werewolves, sirens and dreams make their appearance, as do various forms of animal life and fragments of our damaged environment.

Thomas Traherne (1636-1674) was an English theologian and author, who was initially known for his books Roman Forgeries (1673), Christian Ethics (1675), and A Serious and Patheticall Contemplation of the Mercies of God (1699). Centuries of Meditations was first published in 1908 after the manuscript was rediscovered in 1898. It is a collection of visionary poems divided into "centuries" with themes that encompass the Christian life and ministry, childhood, happiness, nature, and philosophy.

Alexa, What Is There to Know About Love? is a wonderful collection of poems about love in all its forms, covering everything from romantic love to familial love, to long-distance love and even love on the internet. The collection also features poems about the true passions for many booklovers, reading and literature, and the odd one about the subject causing many of us heartbreak: politics. With titles like ‘Hold My Hand While We Jump Off This Cliff’ and ‘Remembrance of Things Pasta’, there’s something for even the most jaded romantic within.

In this anthology of poetry, combining her bestselling collections She Must Be Mad and Validate Me, and with 70 new poems and handwritten annotations, she paints a complex picture of the formative experiences of womanhood and living with Bipolar II disorder.

I know you don’t want to talk sometimes. Sometimes because it hurts and sometimes because you’re just not supposed to talk about what you want to talk about. Sometimes it can be hard to say, “this is beautiful,” when no one else can see what you see. Or, “Here, this is where the pain is.” But some part of you knows, the truth about the words you cannot say is that they only hurt until you say them. They only hurt until the person who needs to hear them, hears them.

The ancient story and legend of the fall of Troy.

Apples of Gold is a collection of twenty eight poems meant to inspire and uplift, and offer encouragement for Christians. It is written with the spirit to edify and perfect the faith of those who have been walking with God for a while and those who are new to the faith. In addition, I hope this poetry speaks to others who have not initiated a relationship with the Lord. Just as my first two books, Words Fitly Spoken and Words Fitly Spoken Book Two spoke of God’s mighty power, his faithfulness and his tender loving care for us, Apples of Gold continues along the same vein.

In nearly four decades as a journalist covering conflict from Rwanda to Kosovo to Palestine, Channel 4 News International Editor Lindsey Hilsum has always carried a book of poetry. In Ukraine, she tweeted a poem a day, and people began to read, to share, to ask for more. Here, Lindsey collects her favourite poems from ancient times to modern, by writers from all around the world. Alongside each, she recalls a memory from her own work, whether interviewing the warlords of Bosnia, meeting child soldiers in Uganda or giving testimony in Rwanda.