Pencil Sales Soar to New Hai(ku)

A book of poems caused sales of traditional wooden pencils to soar by nearly a third in the past few months. [story]

If you are in the Fan Francisco or East Bay areas, PLEASANTON POET LAUREATE Cynthia Bryant will hold an all-day poetry workshop:

The City of Pleasanton Civic Arts-sponsored poetry workshop will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. July 8 at the Pleasanton Senior Center, 5353 Sunol Blvd. The workshop fee is $50 and includes continental breakfast and a box lunch. Call Michelle Russo at 925-931-5350 to make a reservation or e-mail her at mrusso@ci.pleasanton.ca.us.

Sometimes the poetry is in the pauses - "A Little White Shadow" is Mary Ruefle's experiment in "found poetry" in which she recreates the ravages of time formally. [story]

Bits from my journal:

• "...clutch the remote in a whiteknuckled figment of a controlling imagination grip."
• "...upon my windshield, each lull a momentary reload of Orval's finest."
• Name and origin uncertain, but you know nothing good ever comes of it."

I sent an entry of three poems off yesterday to a contest that this past year I was a runner up in. Now the wait. :::sigh:::

Intent

"I have experienced healing through other writers' poetry, but there's no way I can sit down to write in the hope a poem will have healing potential. If I do, I'll write a bad poem." - Marilyn Hacker

I can indeed identify with two aspects of this statement. First, I have read other poetry that spoke to me in such a way as to provide therapeutic benefit. I really don't think that is going to come as an earth shaking revelation because I think most of us have had such experiences. The second is about writing poetry with the same intent. Or, any specific intent for that matter. While I have set out writing with a specific intent in mind, I don't do it often and usually don't do it well. It is all a part of that "forced" and very unnatural flow that seems to inflict poems which such intent. Fact is, I can't tell you right off the last time I wrote a poem with a specific "intended message" before my hand started dragging the pen across the blank page.

Marilyn Hacker bio (here)

Tags: Marilyn Hacker Writing and poetry Poetry

Surprise, Surprise!

In 5-3 Decision - The Supreme Court today delivered a stunning rebuke to the Bush administration over its plans to try Guantanamo detainees before military commissions, ruling that the commissions are unconstitutional. Story here.

Written any poems you'd be willing to go to jail for? Four poets get sentences ranging for seven to nineteen years for publication of book of poems. Story here.

You've Got Till Friday!

You've still got till Friday to take advantage of the sale on selected Stick Poet Gear - Like the Woman's Tank Top pictured here.....

Go to the Stick Poet Shop [CLICK]

Poetry In The News June 27th

• Gotta love the "self portrait" by James. (here)
• And if you had happened to be present on that day in 1956 at the Cambridge poetry shindig where Sylvia Plath met Ted Hughes. (here)
• "The next Truman Capote. The next Langston Hughes. The next Sylvia Plath are here today, referring to some of the many notable authors who created important works at Yaddo," said Elania Richardson - More than $120,000 were be raised on a single evening - noting the arts colony's role in the future is as prevalent as its historic past. (here)
• Poetry workshop returns to Hartwick. (here)
• Watkins’ words making big impact - Former Kansas Jayhawk releases first book of poetry through own company. (here)
• Captured Inspirations -A collection of Poetry. (here)

Tags: Writing and poetry Yaddo Sylvia Plath Ted Hughes

On Holding Another Back

On Holding Another Back








Chained to a heavy discontent.
An iceberg-grip,
Consequences deep below the surface;

Always holding more than a handful
Back. Back to where the fingers burn
And the palm is cotton dry.

Back to some trench of foul stench
A dirty-rotten shame on all
Who hold a fellow down and

By ignorance or hate
Seal their own fate
Anchored to the same ground.

Poetry in The News

As I was bemoaning the very lackluster way in which the major hometown newspaper presents coverage of the literary arts an then, I see this:

The Edmonton Journal commissioned several well-known local poets to write poems just for the newspaper. Each month for the next several months, the paper is publishing one of the poems illustrated by a Journal photographer and provide a biographical sketch of the poet. I am truly impressed by this. The first installment can be seen here with poet Diane Buchanan

As to our local paper, my complaint is not with the book editor, who in fact is respectable in his work, but the way the paper integrates the literary material within the paper itself a well as the amount of space dedicated to it. I'm speaking of the Kansas City Star.

Yes, the star features a weakly poem from someone local. There is never any real biographical material on the author. Just so and so lives in (insert general part of the metro area). The space provided for literary arts is quite limited (as I realize it is with most big daily papers) but sometimes we have a literary calendar and sometimes we don't. The new format of the paper is not user friendly though I admit that I very much like the feel of the newspaper stock they are using now. That is a big improvement.

High Five!!! for The Vermont Humanities Council and the Vermont Women's Fund. Together they provided for nine two-hour sessions by for novelist and Vermont Humanities Council Scholar Deborah Lee Luskin to come to the Southeast State Correctional Facility in Vermont, to encourage the creative impulse of women behind bars. (story here)

Poem in Arkansas Junior High class incites parental complaints (here) for use of "f" word.

The virtues of memorized poetry are extolled by Alice Quinn, who talks about her new book, Edgar Allan Poe and the Juke-Box. (here) I am especially interested in reading this book. It has been somewhat controversial among some who believe it is a disservice to the work of Elizabeth Bishop because it contains some of her drafts that have not been published. Honestly, that is precisely why I want to see it.

Tags: Writing and poetry parental Elizabeth Bishop Deborah Lee Luskin Vermont Humanities Council Alice Quinn Kansas City Star Edmonton Journal Diane Buchanan