TED Talks Daily - "The minister of loneliness" | Sarah Kay

Episode Date: November 28, 2025

Sarah Kay performs "The minister of loneliness," a heartwarming poem imagining what life would look like if homes were connected with tin-can telephone strings, creating a universe of curiosity, joy and connection.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hugh. In a complex world full of both grief and joy, poet Sarah Kay reflects on curiosity and connection with a spoken word performance for you today. She imagines the responsibilities, a so-called Minister of Loneliness,

might have, and what that might mean for the world we live in. In the country of Japan, in the month of October 2020, more people died by suicide than had died from COVID-19 in all of 2020 up to that point. In response, the Japanese. his government instituted a new position of a minister of loneliness. The minister of loneliness has abolished email. He is installing tin cans on every window cell

with a piece of string to someone else's window. Not several, just one. Each person, of course, does not need a lot of people to speak to, just the one, but the one must be reliable, must be available when needed. We are employing a buddy system now. Every day is a field trip to the adulthood museum,

and we don't go home until everyone has been accounted for. The way you find your buddy is a nationwide game of guess who, where you sing the song that has always started, describe the movie you can't get through without crying, the hardest you've ever laughed, the outfit you wish you could pull off, and the only person who can spot you is the one you are assigned.

All of Japan is a ball of string now. The economy has ground to a halt. Productivity is entirely impossible. Sometimes you go to talk into the can on your window cell, and a knot in the string, accidentally gives you someone else's conversation, the fading fabric of someone else's loneliness, evaporating into the air between buildings.

You are allowed to eavesdrop, but so is everyone else. The Minister of Loneliness has moved all kindergartens to the ground floor of elderly assisted living centers. There are daily story hours, animal shelters across the street. The Minister of Loneliness has, not abolished Valentine's Day,

but has instituted a nationwide, bring enough for the class regulation, and nobody goes home empty-handed. The Minister of Loneliness has prescribed therapy for everyone. Daily walks through the many gardens, opportunities for meditation by a brook in the rain, under falling blossoms, or along a snowy riverbank, depending on the season.

He has commissioned musicians and actors, and poets to create concerts and radio plays and poetry readings to be pumped across the knotted tin can radio lines every evening when you order dinner for one. The person who delivers it arrives with an appropriate ability and comfort level, dance instruction video and two hours to spare. Grieving is encouraged,

and art-making is rampant, but because of the knots, Sometimes when you are expecting a visit from a grief counselor, the dance partner food delivery arrives instead. Sometimes they are the same person. The Minister of Loneliness isn't tired. He is the most popular man in the country. He has a crush on a middle school teacher across town,

and everyone eavesdrops to hear the way he stumbles when she answers. Everyone is on the edge of their seats. Everyone forgets about dying, because they can't wait to find out what happens next. Everyone has opinions. The minister has to start a hotline where people can call in to tell him their thoughts. The tin cans rattle nonstop.

The minister is grateful for the advice, but is nervous. His crush will hear the commotion. He is nervous. She prefers quiet. But he does not know for sure yet. He does not know what she is thinking. Does not know how she spends her Saturdays, or how she prefers her tea or whether she likes to walk in the rain.

But he likes wondering, when nobody is paying attention, when the window cells are quiet, late at night awake, he does like to wonder. That was Sarah Kaye speaking at TED. 2025. If you're curious about Ted's curation, find out more at TED.com slash curation guidelines.

And that's it for today. TED Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective. This talk was fact-checked by the TED Research Team and produced and edited by our team, Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Brian Green, Lucy Little, and Tonsica Sung Marnivong. This episode

was mixed by Christopher Faisi Bogan. Additional support from Emma Tobner and Daniela Balaozo. I'm Elise. Hugh, I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening.