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Are the Kids Alright?

Vanessa Kisuule unearths the poems that speak to the big issues we're all grappling with… This week it's raising teens. Can poetry help?

Vanessa Kisuule unearths the poems that speak to the big issues we are grappling with. This week, it's raising teens

How might we equip kids for a future, that we adults are struggling to get our heads around? In this media-saturated, politically-divided, ecologically threatened landscape, how can we raise resilient, happy children? And what, if anything, can poetry do to help us along the way?

With poets Matthew Guenette, Jackie Kay and Steven Camden (aka Polar Bear), Valerie Kinloch, author of June Jordan: Her Life and Letters... and some obliging kids.

Produced in Bristol by Ellie Richold

Available now

28 minutes

Last on

Tue 30 Dec 2025 16:00

Poems in this Episode


Love Will Tear Us Apart

By Matt GuenetteÌý

From Matthew Guenette

Published by University of Akron Press

Ìý

Television

By Roald Dahl

From Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Published by Puffin

Ìý

Hope is The Thing With Feathers

By Emily DickinsonÌý

From The Complete Poems – Emily Dickinson

Published by Faber & Faber

Ìý

Talking Turkeys

By Benjamin Zephaniah

From Talking Turkeys

Published by Puffin

Ìý

July 4, 1974

By June JordanÌý

From Directed by Desire: The Collected Poems of June Jordan

Published by Copper Canyon Press

Ìý

A Banquet for the Boys

By Jackie KayÌý

From May Day

Published by Picador

Ìý


Broadcast

  • Tue 30 Dec 2025 16:00