About

Poet Maggie Smith is your guide on the pathways to feel and understand our common journey – through poetry. Join The Slowdown for a poem and a moment of reflection in one short episode, every weekday. Produced by American Public Media in partnership with The Poetry Foundation and supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.

Production Team

Maggie Smith

Maggie Smith is the award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of nine books of poetry and prose, including You Could Make This Place Beautiful, Good Bones, A Suit or a Suitcase, and Dear Writer: Pep Talks & Practical Advice for the Creative Life. Beauty Emergency!, Smith’s second picture book for children, is forthcoming from Simon & Schuster in 2028.

Smith has received a Creative Writing Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, a Pushcart Prize, and numerous grants and awards from the Academy of American Poets, the Sustainable Arts Foundation, the Ohio Arts Council, and the Greater Columbus Arts Council. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The Nation, The Atlantic, and The Best American Poetry. She writes about craft in her bestselling Substack newsletter, For Dear Life. You can find her on social media @MaggieSmithPoet. (Photo by Chad Cochran)

Myka Kielbon

Myka Kielbon is the lead producer of The Slowdown. She previously was a producer on the team of Blind Landing, an independent podcast on the world of elite sports. Her work in multiple disciplines has appeared with LAist, KCRW, the Altadena Poetry Review, High Noon, Feast, and elsewhere. She lives in Los Angeles.

Maria Württele

Maria Württele is a producer at American Public Media, working on The Slowdown and The Splendid Table. She was previously a producer on podcasts like The One Recipe, Girl Tales and Call to Mind; a production coordinator at Ten Percent Happier and ZigZag; and a sound designer at various regional theaters. In her free time, Maria is usually reading, watching movies, or hanging out with her pup, Jackson.