Kitchen Hymns
- Jul 27, 2025
- 2 min read
Updated: Jun 22
★★★☆☆
Pádraig Ó Tuama is the host of Poetry Unbound, part of the On Being Project, which also includes the interview podcast On Being with Krista Tippett, which is how I came to learn about Pádraig. Poetry Unbound—and the return of poetry generally—came along at a pivotal time, and though it might be an exaggeration, it’s safe to say that, at the time, it very much felt like poetry saved my life. Along with long hikes in the prairie and my own writing, Poetry Unbound and the poets it introduced me to were vital in shepherding me through. So when Pádraig announced via Substack that he had a new book of poetry coming out, I promptly added it to my list. When it was released, I made an interlibrary loan request, but it was denied: The book was too new to be requested. However, much to my surprise, the library decided to purchase and add it to their collection.
Like well-constructed albums, I understand that a poetry collection is not simply a gathering up of the last batch of poems a poet has written. No, it is more than that. But like a well-constructed album whose songs don’t only work in the broader context, it is typically comprised of poems that also stand alone on their own—many of which were previously published in various literary journals. Kitchen Hymns is not that kind of collection. This is a wholly conceptual work, and one, I’ll admit, despite two readings, I don’t think I truly get. Though I’ve never read it, I recently acquired a hardcover copy of James Joyce’s Ulysses for cheap at the library’s annual book sale. I have, since college, both desired and feared to read it due to its reputation as impenetrable and requiring a level of literary knowledge I, no doubt, lack. Kitchen Hymns feels very much like that. It came as no surprise, then, to learn that this book began as the creative component for a Ph.D. Pádraig was working on at the University of Glasgow. That is, it oozes with experimentation and challenge and difficulty for their own sakes. Not, as they say on Seinfeld, there’s anything wrong with that. It’s only that your mileage might vary.
Within, Pádraig explores, most notably, religion or faith or god or God, and myth, and belief, and the many things embodied by such vast themes, perhaps especially for a gay man raised Catholic in very Catholic Ireland. Given that I read the book twice in an attempt to better understand it, which I think served its purpose, it came at the expense of enjoying the book less. There are, to be certain, moments of delight and illumination and devastation, and, on the first reading at least, Kitchen Hymns grew on me as it progressed. But like a concept album whose reach exceeds its grasp (and I’m thinking of the many Kinks albums that suffered this fate), I found the moving moments too few and too diffuse and too muted, suffocated, perhaps, under the weight of the very concept meant to give them wings.
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