vocalisms is a regular feature that presents selected tracks from Voca, the Poetry Center's online audiovisual archive of more than 800 recorded readings, spanning from 1963 to today. 

Next month, the Poetry Center will celebrate its 60th anniversary. Over the past six decades, we have had the privilege of welcoming poets early in their careers who would go on to great prominence. Louise Glück, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature this month, first read at the Poetry Center in 1978, sharing work from her recently published third book as well as then-unpublished portions of her fourth book. In this track, she reads “Origins,” a poem which illustrates what the Nobel committee describes as “her unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal.” On Voca, you can also watch a reading given by Glück in March 2000.