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
Allergic to Cascadia Cats
You may have seen that the lineup for the 2nd Cascadia Poetry Festival has been released. I am pretty excited about it and we need 14 more sponsors at the $500 level, or 7 more at the $1,000 level,...
SPLAB Turns 20
Though the official date was December 13, 2013 that the organization I created turned 20, we celebrate Saturday at Spring Street Center. Details below. It is hard to believe how quickly 20 years can...
Jose Kozer Interview (N.13.13 in L.A., Part 2)
Today I'm posting the rest of the audio of an interview with legendary Cuban-American poet José Kozer, conducted by Cal State U at L.A. Ph.D. student Mike Sonksen. (Hear the first four parts of the...
Top Ten Posts of 2013
This is a traditionally a week of looking back at the previous year and rather than present those posts from 2013 I wrote that I liked the best, I am letting my web stats program Jetpack have its...
When I’m 124: Transcending Victim Consciousness
There's an interesting op-ed in the New York Times posted yesterday (Dec 24, 2013) about how some of the folks who brought you Paypal and Google are now focusing their vision and efforts on...
Seasonal American Sentences
The Rad Santa reading last night at Lottie's Lounge was a huge success. Graham Isaac hosted and invited me along with three other writers, including Jocelyn McDonald, Chris Gusta and Ra'anan David...
Jose Kozer Interview (L.A. N.13.13)
While I am not the guy who got the chance to interview José Kozer recently during his visit to Southern California, I was present as he responded to the questions of Cal State U at L.A. Ph.D....
Sunday Holiday Reading at Lottie’s
For years there was a popular open mic at Lottie Motts, which was a cafe in Columbia City. Now the coffee has given way to Tequila and the Angie's crowd has migrated across the street to be served...
Morris Graves Selected Letters
One of my goals during my recent residency at The Lake, awarded by the Morris Graves Foundation, was to get to know Graves better and have a deeper appreciation for his work. Mission accomplished,...
Bay Area Poets Age w/ Grace
Our recent family road trip to Southern California (or SoCal as the car ads and meteorologists there say) and back had its share of beauty and difficulty. My Cousin Steve O'Connell gave us a week at...
Prostate Cancer Update
I was asked by my local spiritual community, Subud Greater Seattle, for an update on my treatment for prostate cancer. An excerpt: I was diagnosed with prostate cancer on February 17, 2020 and had...
Poetics as Cosmology
Poetics as Cosmology (Intro to Spontaneous Composition) A six week online (Zoom) workshop for people who have had a little experience in spontaneous poetry composition and want more. Join SPLAB and...
Rattlecast #54 (Watch the Interview)
Back in March before we had a sense of how COVID-19 the novel Coronavirus would change our lives forever, Rattle Magazine's Tim Green invited me to sit down (via Skype) for an interview about my...
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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