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
415. to Kay Kinghammer, Seattle, WA – The Awakening of Any Individual…
414. to Sharmagne Leland-St. John, Arlington, WA – Percussion Painting
413. to Linda Crosfield, Castlegar, BC – Wind eeeeeee
Homage to Carl Sandburg (Visit to his only Chicago home)
Mer, Ella and I are staying at my sister Barb's house while in Chicago. She lives near Lawrence and Damen on the north side of town. We arrived here Tuesday night and she told us about the Carl...
412. to Patricia Smith, Byhalia, MS – Dangerous Subversives
411. to Mary Jo Pellerito, Redmond, WA – As if… (Two Blossomings)
Homage to Lorine Niedecker on Black Hawk Island and Ft. Atkinson, WI
When Meredith and I decided to make a road trip from Seattle to Minneapolis and Chicago & back, I knew that we would have to do a side trip to Fort Atkinson and Black Hawk Island, Wisconsin....
410. to Catherine Kigerl, Quilcene, WA – Divinity (Proximity)
409. to Karen Havnaer, Tacoma, WA – Catscratch Man Splatter
408. to Bridget Nutting, Vancouver, WA Mind’s Folktales
Zen, Bioregionalism & Poetry
Upcoming poetry events are for people who are interested in the intersection of poetry and Zen and poetry and bioregionalism. April 11, at 7:30pm, the Seattle University Eco-Sangha presents Norman...
Interview on Spokane Public Radio
I had the good fortune of being interviewed in Spokane on my way to gigs in Billings, Montana. Chris Maccini of Spokane Public Radio did his homework and asked me about American Prophets, my poetry...
Off-Site @ AWP
The joy of hanging out with poets and NOT having to attend AWP!!! Thank you Knox Gardner for lining up this with your humble narrator and other SPLAB poets: Saturday, March 30, 2019 at 7:30 PM – 12M...
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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