Paul E Nelson presenting at Cascadia Poetry Festival 8, photo by Leszek Chudzinski
Paul Nelson’s ongoing honing of the Day Song poetry event has produced some of the most lively and consequential verse of our time. How else write about the calamities and demands and mental/emotional/political consequences of the materialist apocalypse upon us, than an ongoing poesis of awareness and participation the anti-form the Day Song provides? Truly a praxis of proprioception and of Olson’s demand to “keep it moving…
– Sharon Thesen, Cascadian Poet/Scholar from B.C.
The Next Big Thing (Self-Interview)
I was tagged by C.E. Putnam for this project, the Next Big Thing self-interview. I tagged 6 other writers whose work I admire and will post links to their answers once they send them to me. The...
Ghost Tantras (Ceremonies to Change The Nature of Reality)
It was early in 2012 that I finally acted on my interest in sound poetry. I had heard Dada sound poems, Jerome Rothenberg's recitation of the sound poetry of Hugo Ball, the Canadian group the Four...
Celebrating Ian Boyden (80. Bear Dream Bird Dream)
When Sam Hamill read at Spring Street Center back in November 2012 to celebrate and display his collaborations with the painter, book maker and artist Ian Boyden (see this link) Ian gave me a copy...
More Walking the Arboretum with Jim Demetre
A second and, hopefully, shorter post about my walk with Jim Demetre at Washington Park Arboretum. What a place this is and late winter is one of the most inspiring times to go, giving those who...
Walking the Arboretum in Winter with Jim
Each morning I look over last year's journal entry for the same day and it had been a year since I walked through Washington Park Arboretum with Jim Demetre. Jim's an amateur botanist whom I met...
Shave and a Slight Cut, $10K
So I have to tell the story of finding out about my surgery date for the two, count ‘em, TWO hernias I have being diagnosed with. (A bilateral inguinal hernia and an abdominal hernia.) I got a call...
Featured Reading Wedgwood Ale House
Peter Munro has been kind enough to invite me to be the featured poet at his fine open mic in Wedgwood on Monday, February 11, 2013. I will be reading some classics, some American Sentences, some...
Residency at the Morris Graves Foundation
It was the most intensive residency application I have ever seen. Two letters of reference to be sent directly to the foundation. An essay outlining my thoughts on the significance of at least two...
John Olson 1999 Interview
John Olson is the author of Eggs & Mirrors, from Wood Works Press; Swarm of Edges, from BCC Press; and Logo Lagoon, from Paper Brain Press in San Diego. His poetry has been published in numerous...
Zhang Er Interview
A year after Sam Hamill’s death, in what might be his last book blurb, he writes: “Zhang Er brings us startling “burial ground poems from Chinese that are striking in their perspective and elegant...
American Prophets Review
Delighted to see a kind review of American Prophets that ran in an actual NEWSPAPER! How about that. Thank you Barbara McMichael for this: The book has now sold TENS of copies! Thanks to everyone...
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...
In Honor of David McCloskey “The Father of Cascadia”
David McCloskey passed away on July 3. In honor of his lifetime of work to create and spread a culture that was deeply connected to the Cascadian bioregion, Cascadian Prophets, which owes more than just its name to his work, we want to share this interview from October, 2013. Find it transcribed on our website.
To listen to the original audio of this interview, click here.
Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website.
In Honor of David McCloskey "The Father of Cascadia"
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.
Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website.
To get original poetry right in your mailbox this summer, check out the Poetry Postcard Fest.