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
Nurse Log Poem at Bradner Gardens
I think it might be seven times now that I have been invited to read poems by Jim O'Halloran at his annual concert at Bradner Gardens. One of the jewels of Seattle's P-Patch system of community...
Two Countries Anthology
Was having after-party drinks and tacos with Nadine Maestas and we were commiserating about the intensity of people of Latino descent. When you have a name like Nadine Antoinette Maestas, and you...
POetry POstcard Update (APPF11 2017)
There is less than a week to sign up for the 11th August POetry POstcard Fest. We have 5 and a half complete groups so far. Last year we had seven complete groups and there are many who love to...
August POetry POstcard Fest Year 11 Official Call
The August Poetry Postcard Fest was initiated in 2007 by poets Paul Nelson and Lana Ayers. 2017 marks the eleventh year of the fest and this is your official call. Directions to participate in the...
The Hanners: Husband & Wife Postcarders
It's almost 4th of July which means August is coming. August for me has become synonymous with the heart of summer because of my poetry postcard habit. This year is the 11th year of the August...
5th Cascadia Poetry Fest – Tacoma Oct 12-15
A few months ago I changed the header of this here website once again and added the phrase "Twenty Year Cascadia Bioregional Cultural Investigation." I've blogged about it a few times...
Charles Potts Interview
John Oliver Simon, former director of California Poets in the Schools and recipient of an NEA grant for translation, called Charles Potts “…the greatest poet born in Idaho since Ezra Pound…and one...
Profile of an Anarcho-Leftist, Poet/Librarian, Gentrifier, Greg Bem
When you think of the kind of person gentrifying the Rainier Valley, a man who could be described as an Anarcho-Leftist, Poet/Librarian might not be tops on your list. Greg Bem is a Rainier Valley...
2017 August POetry POstcard Fest is Coming
The call for the eleventh year of the August Poetry Postcard Fest goes out July 4, 2017, and registration opens then. Like last year, as soon as 32 participating poets get signed up, the list will...
Poetry Wars Revived
Most of the LANGPO vs. Black Mountain poetry war was fought before I was invested in poetry, so I have done my best to catch up, but a recrudescence has emerged thanks to Dispatches, a website...
For Mary Norbert Körte
I have finished creating podcasts with my two interviews conducted in October 2019 with the former Nun and poet Mary Norbert Körte. She died on November 14 at age 88 at her home near Willits,...
A Winter Solstice Reading
Over the past ten+ years my friend the poet and librarian Greg Bem has created some of the most inventive poetry gatherings I have ever experienced. One that involved divination and chance...
Rainier Beach Arts & Crafts Market/New Chapbook
I am delighted to be part of the Rainier Beach Arts & Crafts Market, December 3, from 11am to 3pm, at the Rainier Beach Community Club, 6038 S. Pilgrim Street. Bhakti and I have lived here in...
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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To get original poetry right in your mailbox this summer, check out the Poetry Postcard Fest.