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.
Review of PN & DB’s Existential Trio
I met Dick Metcalf last night at Rhythm & Rye in Olympia, WA, before the gig I did with Dan Blunck's Existential Trio, featuring Steve Bentley and Ariel Calabria. He wrote a kind review that you...
490. Bronzing Mexican Air
Another 2014 August Poetry Postcard Poem written in Puebla, Mexico, when I was attending the 14th Subud World Congress. Again a reference to Pablo Vargas Lugo and the exhibit at Museo Amparo.
489. Bandera de la Mariposa
489. Bandera de la Mariposa is a reference to an exhibit at Museo Amparo in Puebla, Mexico that was running during the recent Subud World Congress. A beautiful museum in a restored colonial...
Poetry & Music (Paul Reads with Blunck)
What does it mean when the Existential Trio is actually a quartet? What happens to poems when they are read with music backing? Do they become songs? I've been very fortunate to have some excellent...
488. Hold the Thorns
Sam Hamill and Christopher Yohmei Blasdel
Please join us Saturday, November 1, 2014, at 7:30, for an evening of poetry and music as Sam Hamill and Christopher Yohmei Blasdel are reunited for one evening at Spring Street Center, 1101 15th in...
487. Sin Carne
This poetry postcard was written August 11, 2014, also at the 14th Subud World Congress. The Bhakti referenced is Subud Portland Co-Chair Bhakti Watts whose name means "devoted one."
Climate March, Poetry & Proprioception
I was delighted to learn that in addition to a Subud couple from Portland, my friend Stephen Collis also traveled to New York to participate in the huge Climate March on September 21, 2014. His...
486. Tormenta Gigante
My recent trip to Mexico was quite an experience. My real first visit since I was a little boy (I did see the airport in Cancun in 2005) my parents told me that back then all I wanted in Mexico was...
A Fly Landed
I missed out on Rattle's Poets Respond AGAIN!
The Art of the Blurb
I have been asked on occasion to write blurbs for friends and acquaintances and, like any other form of writing, it takes some practice. The first thing is to learn what NOT to blurb. Really, if it...
POPO Birthday Bounty
I'm a little stunned by the amount of birthday wishes I am getting for my 59th and it seems a perfect day to share THE CARDS I GOT. Each year I create a photo or video of postcards I have received...
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.