Apr 29, 2022

Today in the Taxi

Poems

Sean Singer

Hosted by Robert Snyder

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Summary

The first poem in Sean Singers’ new collection of poetry, Today in the Taxi, published by Tupelo Press, begins with, “Today in the taxi, I brought a man from midtown to someplace in Astoria near the airport.”

From that ordinary beginning, the poems explore the many features of New York City--its people, its streets, its highways, and its neighborhoods--all delivered through the impressions of an Uber driver. Like Walt Whitman, whose poem “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry” turned a short boat ride into a meditation on life, death and eternity, Sean’s poetry starts in everyday experiences and grasps large realms of significance.

Sean, now a former Uber driver, holds an MFA from Washington University in Saint Louis and a Ph.D. in American Studies from Rutgers University-Newark. He is the author of two other books of poetry: Discography, which won the Yale Series of Younger Poets Prize and the Norma Faber First Book Award from the Poetry Society of America, and Honey and Smoke---which the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Yusef Komunyakaa said was “made of life’s raw lyrical energy, where jazz becomes a spiritual compass.”

Sean now works helping people write poetry and academic prose at seansingerpoetry.com.

Robert W. Snyder is Manhattan Borough Historian and professor emeritus of American Studies and Journalism at Rutgers University, where he served on Sean’s dissertation committee. He is the author of Crossing Broadway: Washington Heights and the Promise of New York (Cornell, paperback, 2019) and co-author of All the Nations Under Heaven: Immigrants, Migrants and the Making of New York (Columbia, 2019). He can be reached at rwsnyder@rutgers.edu.

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Robert Snyder

Robert W. Snyder, Manhattan Borough Historian and professor emeritus of American Studies and Journalism at Rutgers University. Email: rwsnyder@rutgers.edu.

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