Paul E Nelson presenting at Cascadia Poetry Festival 8, photo by Leszek Chudzinski
“Paul formally received the Mahayana precepts of Zen Buddhism in 2023, becoming a lay practitioner within the tradition, but I believe he had long lived in accord with them. His poetry, in its sensitivity, its humility, and its deep listening, embodies practice-realization — the understanding that practice and awakening are not separate. His writing was his zazen. This collection, FLEXIBLE MIND, is more than a book. It is a continuation of that practice. A testament to a man who lives by attention, who bows to language but does not cling to it, who seeks what lays beyond words by walking straight into them.”– Kosho Itagaki, Soto Zen Priest
Organic in Cascadia: A Sequence of Energies
Organic in Cascadia: A Sequence of Energies A presentation for UW Bothell Convergence on Poetics, September 30, 2012 (See also:...
422. to Lisa Janice Cohen, Newton, MA – Limbo w the Giant Uterus
The quote's from The Book of Runes. The uterus reference came from one of those Facebook graphics which I posted to my page the day I wrote this poem. Google lapsarian.
421. to Jenifer Browne Lawrence, Poulsbo, WA – The Turning Floor
420. to Lynne Shapiro, Hoboken, NJ – No Solo Ex Nihilo
CONVERGENCE ON POETICS
I am delighted to be a part of this Conference at UW-Bothell this weekend. I present Sunday at 12N on "Organic in Cascadia: A Sequence of Energies." WITH Charles Altieri Marie Annharte Charles...
419. to Morgan Harlow, Barneveld, WI – Vole in the Past Hole
418. to Susan Tkach, Rochester, NY – Squirrel in the Buddha Pore
Interview with Nate Mackey
Ominous Animacy: Notes on an interview with Nate Mackey Interviewing Allen Ginsberg in 1994 introduced me to a deeper sense of Open Form. Interviewing Michael McClure in 1995 introduced me to...
417. to Teresa Jarmick, Kenmore, WA – Climate Refugee Secession
416. to Brendan McBreen, Auburn, WA – Mood Indigo, Mexican Blues
Cascadia Poetry Fest in Anacortes
What great coverage in the Anacortes Arts Briefings newsletter on our May 9-12 festival: Gold Passes admit the holder to all events except Steve Kuusisto's master workshop “Have Dog, Will Travel: A...
National Poetry Month
April is National Poetry Month and Carolyne Wright has organized a fine group of local poets to celebrate on April 23rd from 6-8pm at legendary University Books in Seattle: Join us for an epic...
One Year After Sam Hamill’s Death
Sam Hamill left this earthly plane on April 14, 2018, and plans are underway to recognize that anniversary in a private and low-key ceremony, along with sushi and saké after, just as Sam would have...
How does one make literary art about this time in history that avoids rhetoric and facile political positioning in this era of the spectacle? How does one avoid being consumed by the simultaneous collapse of so many systems — some being eviscerated by people in positions designed to protect such systems? Deborah Poe has some idea based on her submission to the upcoming anthology Winter in America (Still.
Deborah is the author of several books of poetry including keep, Elements, and Our Parenthetical Ontology, as well as a novella in verse, Hélène. Her visual works–video poems and handmade book objects–have been exhibited throughout the US. She lives on stolen Coast Salish land, specifically the ancestral homeland of the Duwamish, Suquamish, Stillaguamish, and Muckleshoot People.
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