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
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Denis Mair on Huang Nubo (Luo Ying)
I have known Denis Mair from my earliest days attending Red Sky Poetry Theater at the Globe Cafe at 14th & Pine. This would have been as early as 1995. A tall, soft-spoken man, he would read his...
May 13 Nanaimo Workshop
I have been fortunate to be able to travel to much of Cascadia. Sometimes I get to share the fruit of my research on Organic Poetry. David Fraser of Wordstorm has invited me back to Diana Krall's...
Xi Chuan Notes on the Mosquito
After making a presentation in Xining, China in August, 2011, at the 3rd Qinghai Lake International Poetry Festival, a Chinese poet came up to me, told he he enjoyed my presentation and asked if I...
The interview I conducted with Sam O’Hana, a Ph.D. student at CUNY, is immensely critical and immensely validating for the work we do at the Cascadia Poetics Lab. At its core, the discussion is about whether writing is for people of means, or if it can be people who have skill and something to say. It means the literary gatekeepers have failed us and have a role in perpetuating neoliberalism in North America which has paved the way for authoritarianism. The interview is available as a podcast here and as a YouTube video here. Below, I have pasted in the transcript and here is my introduction to Sam O’Hana and his topic.