Background: EcoRegions of Cascadia, Copyright © 2022 David McCloskey, Cascadia Institute; available from Feathered Star Productions.
POETICS AS COSMOLOGY CASCADIAN ZEN BASKET THREE
A five week online (Zoom) workshop for first-time and continuing participants in the online workshops facilitated by Cascadia Poetics Lab and Poetry Postcard Fest Co-Founder Paul E Nelson. Participate in reading and discussion of foundational essays, interviews, listening and other assignments, as well as spontaneous poetry composition exercises, in the first of three, five week courses to happen before next postcard season. In Fall 2024, we will explore passages from Cascadian Zen Vol 1 – Basket Three, and related texts and assignments. How can one’s poetics be a cosmology and maintain some experience of the Poetry Postcard Fest, to allow one’s life as a creative participant in the world to rise in one’s personal hierarchy of duties/activities? How is the projective poem an antidote to Silicon Valley attention fracking? $250 for each five week session per person, scholarships are available. Thursdays, 3-5pm Pacific Time (October 3, 10, 17, 24, and 31, 2024).
Thursday Nights, 3-5 PM Pacific Time
October 3 – October 31, 2024
(October 3, 10, 17, 24, and 31)
Link to purchase Cascadian Zen Volume 1
Zoom link: (to be announced)
Course Materials Week One
(Thursday, October 3, 2024, 3-5 pm PDT)
Participants, please read a piece from this list: https://paulenelson.com/poetics/ and write a paragraph on your response to that piece.
Read: Cascadian Zen Volume I Original Mind Basket (pages 225-238)
WATCH: Deep Listening: The Story of Pauline Oliveros Trailer
Deep Listening Am I Open to the World
LISTEN:
READ: https://brooklynrail.org/2009/12/art/sylvia-plimack-mangold-with-john-yau
LISTEN: https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/2024/06/robert-michael-pyle-interview/
WRITE: House Poem Still Life
Course Materials Week Two
(Thursday, October 10, 2024, 3-5 pm PDT)
Please read another piece from this list: https://paulenelson.com/poetics/ and write a paragraph on your response to that piece.
READ: Cascadian Zen Volume I Original Mind Basket (pages 239-254)
READ: Bioregions by Peter Berg
READ: ABOUT BILL REID (Feel free to go down a Bill Reid rabbit hole.)
WATCH: Snippet from Laurie Anderson Interview (See also this review.)
LISTEN:
READ: Who Would Americans Kill
WATCH/LISTEN: DaySong of Thoughtless Openness (inspired in part by the essay in this week’s course materials by Ray Grigg.)
WRITE: Who/What Would You Kill?
Course Materials Week Three
(Thursday, October 17, 2024, 3-5 pm PDT)
READ: Cascadian Zen Volume I Original Mind Basket (pages 255-286)
READ: Olson Now: Wales Black Mountain Conference
READ: Remembering Colleen McElroy, the ‘literary North Star’ of the Pacific Northwest
WATCH: Ntozake Shange, 1976, “for all my dead and loved ones“
LISTEN: Frank Abe and the Anthology of Japanese American Incarceration
READ: 
WRITE: Hell In The Hallows (Hurricane Helene)
Course Materials Week Four
(Thursday, October 24, 2024, 3-5 pm PDT)
READ: Cascadian Zen Volume I Original Mind Basket (pages 287-305)
LISTEN:
Read: Attention Fracking
REVIEW: Slide Show by Daniel Castillo and Paul Griffith
WATCH: Evolution of English Language (Instagram)
In the Western tradition there is a recognized hierarchy of beings, with, of course, the human being on top—the pinnacle of evolution, the darling of Creation—and the plants at the bottom. But in Native ways of knowing, human people are often referred to as “the younger brothers of Creation.” We say that humans have the least experience with how to live and thus the most to learn—we must look to our teachers among the other species for guidance. Their wisdom is apparent in the way that they live. They teach us by example. They’ve been on the earth far longer than we have been, and have had time to figure things out.
– Robin Wall Kimmerer,
Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
WRITE: Strong Ancestor Exercise
Course Materials Week Five
(Thursday, October 31, 2024, 3-5 pm PDT)
READ: Cascadian Zen Volume I Original Mind Basket (pages 305-335)
Read: Hans Haacke: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/16/t-magazine/hans-haacke-art.html?unlocked_article_code=1.LE4.T6C5.90GKJ1LNZpj2&smid=url-share
WATCH. Michael McClure in 1976
Read/Watch: Obama Center Art:
https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2024/09/09/julie-mehretu-glass-mural-obama-presidential-center-chicago
https://obama.org/stories/glass-window-uprising-of-the-sun-obama-presidential-center/
Video: https://x.com/BarackObama/status/1833182307471032649
WATCH: (At least Jason’s intro and Gary.)
WRITE: Jack Spicer Magic Workshop Questionnaire