An Anniversary of Verse
NC Poetry Society Celebrates 80th Year with Statewide Readings
2012 marks the 80th year of the North Carolina Poetry Society, and the Society and its friends and members are celebrating that anniversary with a series of readings across the state organized by and featuring NC’s most prestigious poets.
It all begins with the state’s current Poet Laureate, Joseph Bathanti, on November 29. The reading and Open Mic to be held at 3:30 at the Scholars Bookshop (Appalachian State’s university bookstore) will include ASU professors and poets Hilda Downer and Lynn Doyle.
Six other readings will be held on December 1.
In Charlotte, Myers Park Baptist Church will host organizer Tony Abbott, Morri Creech, Annalee Kwochka, Alan Michael Parker, Dannye Romine Powell, David Radavich, and Lisa Zerkle at 2:00.
The Regulator Bookshop in Durham will feature readings by Betty Adcock, Noel Crook, and Marylin Hervieux also at 2:00.
Former state Poet Laureate, Kay Byer will host Kathryn Kirkpatrick, Joe Mills, and Julie Suk at City Lights Bookstore in Sylva at 3:00.
Another former state Poet Laureate, Fred Chappell, will be featured along with Malaika King Albrecht, Terry Kennedy, Val Nieman, and John Thomas York at the Community Arts Café in Winston-Salem at 2:00.
Peter Makuck and Mark Cox will read at St. Francis by the Sea in Salter Path at 4:00.
And Shelby Stephenson, Alex Albright, Marty Silverthorne, and Jim Clark will participate in a marathon reading from 9:00 AM to 3:15 PM at the R.A. Fountain General Store in Fountain.
All events are free and open to the public. For more information, visit the NC Poetry Society website at www.ncpoetrysociety.org
Showing posts with label Fred Chappell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fred Chappell. Show all posts
Thursday, November 8, 2012
Monday, August 1, 2011
Review of Solo Cafe 8 & 9: Teachers & Students
Review
by Scott Owens
SOLO CAFÉ, 8 & 9: TEACHERS & STUDENTS
Edited by Lenard Moore, et. al.
Solo Press, 2011
ISBN: 0941490505
I have never written a review of a magazine. It’s not the sort of thing I usually set out to do as most magazines don’t cohere tightly enough to be written about as a single piece. But I have written reviews of anthologies, and when I came across the 2011 issue of the annual journal Solo Café, it was clear that this was as much an anthology as it was a journal, and the subject of this journal/anthology, “Teachers & Students,” was of particular interest to me.
The various poetry and prose pieces found in this anthology are just the sort that bring great joy, contemplation, and insight to teachers, students and poets, and perhaps most of all to teacher-poets or poet-teachers, however one with such dual “citizenship” might identify oneself. One will find here a full range of learning and teaching situations, including “students writing their fierce and luminous poems” in Laura Boss’s “Workshop at the Great Falls, Paterson,” where “William Carlos Williams . . . looked / at these same falls so many decades ago” and both prose and poetic tributes to specific teachers, like Earl Sherman Braggs’s “Mrs. Davis,” who “farm plowed and pushed a field full / of books . . . . / taught Shakespeare till Shakespeare, / himself, shook / the classroom walls . . . . /” and made clear that in the world of her students, the world of ongoing race war, “’To be or not to be’ was never a question” but rather an existential imperative.
As Braggs’s poem suggests, learning is not always a simple matter of X’s and O’s. When things go smoothly, as presented in Sally Buckner’s “Teacher,” learning is a fine balance of knowledge and passion that meet as they might nowhere more powerfully than in a classroom:
I will fill your plate as full as you will let me. //
I’ll bring the bread,
and you -- with yearning green in your young heart
and eyes that can see newly each new moment --
You bring the wine.
On the other hand, sometimes learning is a struggle between creativity and correctness, between autonomous vision and received knowledge or expectations of obedience, as in Randy Pait’s “Boy in a Classroom” or Susan Meyers’ “First Grade,” where a young student, having excitedly colored “a bold yellow sun” belatedly discovers “Words her other hand, / . . . / has hidden from her: / Color the pretty ball red.”
Just so, this anthology provides what at times seems an exhaustive variety of educable opportunities, demonstrating learning from history (Kelly Cherry’s “War and Peace: Cliff Notes”), and philosophy (George Burns’s “Partly Heliotropic”), from art (Ray Gonzalez’s “The Long Library”), and books (Michael Harper’s “Negritude: a Poem Written When Everything Else Fails to Translate”), from teachers (Kevin Lucia’s “Physics”) and observation (Terre Ouwehand’s “Vital Signs”). Similarly, the selections here cover every level of education: first lessons (Shayla Hawkins’s “The Seed”), grade school (Lenard Moore’s “The Art of Living”), middle school (Lamont Steptoe’s “Instructions”), high school (Nancy Simpson’s “In Room Nine”), college (Ray Gonzalez’s “Fear of Dying”) and adulthood (Teddy Macker’s “Teacher”).
In addition to the poems, a selection of reviews and essays further examine the influences particular teachers have had upon their students who have become writers. Of particular note in these prose selections is the frequency with which the word “generosity” is mentioned in regards to a poet-teacher. It is there in Mary Ann Cain and George Kalamaras’s reflections on Judith Johnson and Muriel Rukeyser, in Karen McKinnon’s recollection of George Sidney, in Shelby Stephenson’s discussion of Guy Owen, and in John Tritica’s homage to Mary Rising Higgins and Gene Frumkin.
If I had known about this journal before it went to press, I would have certainly submitted a poem of my own, and so I add it here to those in Solo Café 8 & 9 not because I think it is as good as those in the journal but because I think it expresses what every teacher-poet knows and one of the things the wonderful writers collected here would like us all to remember. I include it as tribute to the spirit of the poet-teachers this volume celebrates and includes and as tribute to the poet-teachers that have been so instrumental in my own life: Galway Kinnell, Robert Waters Grey, Paul Nelson, Tim Peeler, Ann Carver, Hepzhibah Roskelly, Stuart Dischell, Fred Chappell, and many others:
All There Is to Say
If it happens that you find yourself
at the front of a room full of people
younger than you
listening to all you have to say
about what you think you know
and suddenly you hear
from an open window
you hadn’t even noticed was open
the voice of a mockingbird
as clear as the voice of God
singing in every language at once
you owe it to yourself
to stop in the almost silence
and say out loud, Listen
by Scott Owens
SOLO CAFÉ, 8 & 9: TEACHERS & STUDENTS
Edited by Lenard Moore, et. al.
Solo Press, 2011
ISBN: 0941490505
I have never written a review of a magazine. It’s not the sort of thing I usually set out to do as most magazines don’t cohere tightly enough to be written about as a single piece. But I have written reviews of anthologies, and when I came across the 2011 issue of the annual journal Solo Café, it was clear that this was as much an anthology as it was a journal, and the subject of this journal/anthology, “Teachers & Students,” was of particular interest to me.
The various poetry and prose pieces found in this anthology are just the sort that bring great joy, contemplation, and insight to teachers, students and poets, and perhaps most of all to teacher-poets or poet-teachers, however one with such dual “citizenship” might identify oneself. One will find here a full range of learning and teaching situations, including “students writing their fierce and luminous poems” in Laura Boss’s “Workshop at the Great Falls, Paterson,” where “William Carlos Williams . . . looked / at these same falls so many decades ago” and both prose and poetic tributes to specific teachers, like Earl Sherman Braggs’s “Mrs. Davis,” who “farm plowed and pushed a field full / of books . . . . / taught Shakespeare till Shakespeare, / himself, shook / the classroom walls . . . . /” and made clear that in the world of her students, the world of ongoing race war, “’To be or not to be’ was never a question” but rather an existential imperative.
As Braggs’s poem suggests, learning is not always a simple matter of X’s and O’s. When things go smoothly, as presented in Sally Buckner’s “Teacher,” learning is a fine balance of knowledge and passion that meet as they might nowhere more powerfully than in a classroom:
I will fill your plate as full as you will let me. //
I’ll bring the bread,
and you -- with yearning green in your young heart
and eyes that can see newly each new moment --
You bring the wine.
On the other hand, sometimes learning is a struggle between creativity and correctness, between autonomous vision and received knowledge or expectations of obedience, as in Randy Pait’s “Boy in a Classroom” or Susan Meyers’ “First Grade,” where a young student, having excitedly colored “a bold yellow sun” belatedly discovers “Words her other hand, / . . . / has hidden from her: / Color the pretty ball red.”
Just so, this anthology provides what at times seems an exhaustive variety of educable opportunities, demonstrating learning from history (Kelly Cherry’s “War and Peace: Cliff Notes”), and philosophy (George Burns’s “Partly Heliotropic”), from art (Ray Gonzalez’s “The Long Library”), and books (Michael Harper’s “Negritude: a Poem Written When Everything Else Fails to Translate”), from teachers (Kevin Lucia’s “Physics”) and observation (Terre Ouwehand’s “Vital Signs”). Similarly, the selections here cover every level of education: first lessons (Shayla Hawkins’s “The Seed”), grade school (Lenard Moore’s “The Art of Living”), middle school (Lamont Steptoe’s “Instructions”), high school (Nancy Simpson’s “In Room Nine”), college (Ray Gonzalez’s “Fear of Dying”) and adulthood (Teddy Macker’s “Teacher”).
In addition to the poems, a selection of reviews and essays further examine the influences particular teachers have had upon their students who have become writers. Of particular note in these prose selections is the frequency with which the word “generosity” is mentioned in regards to a poet-teacher. It is there in Mary Ann Cain and George Kalamaras’s reflections on Judith Johnson and Muriel Rukeyser, in Karen McKinnon’s recollection of George Sidney, in Shelby Stephenson’s discussion of Guy Owen, and in John Tritica’s homage to Mary Rising Higgins and Gene Frumkin.
If I had known about this journal before it went to press, I would have certainly submitted a poem of my own, and so I add it here to those in Solo Café 8 & 9 not because I think it is as good as those in the journal but because I think it expresses what every teacher-poet knows and one of the things the wonderful writers collected here would like us all to remember. I include it as tribute to the spirit of the poet-teachers this volume celebrates and includes and as tribute to the poet-teachers that have been so instrumental in my own life: Galway Kinnell, Robert Waters Grey, Paul Nelson, Tim Peeler, Ann Carver, Hepzhibah Roskelly, Stuart Dischell, Fred Chappell, and many others:
All There Is to Say
If it happens that you find yourself
at the front of a room full of people
younger than you
listening to all you have to say
about what you think you know
and suddenly you hear
from an open window
you hadn’t even noticed was open
the voice of a mockingbird
as clear as the voice of God
singing in every language at once
you owe it to yourself
to stop in the almost silence
and say out loud, Listen
Friday, June 24, 2011
Poet Publishes Seven
Here is an article about my forthcoming book from Barbara Burns at Outlook
Poet Publishes Seven
(first published in Outlook, 23 June 2011)
“These poems are necessary,” writes former NC Poet Laureate Fred Chappell about Hickory poet Scott Owens’s soon-to-be-released new collection of poems, Something Knows the Moment.
According to Chappell, Owens’s seventh book is “about the nature of God, the nature of faith, of doubt, of trust and distrust, disillusion and resignation.” And he adds, “Occasionally the subject of hope is addressed.”
Joe Milford, host of the Joe Milford Poetry Show, says of Owens that he “stares steadfastly into the unrelenting zero as if trying to pierce the other side of being itself with laser-like intensity.” He states that Owens “forces the reader to ponder his own nature and humanity,” and Milford concludes “there is a tenderness in this book that might shame you.”
Scott Owens is the founder of Poetry Hickory, editor of Wild Goose Poetry Review, vice-president of the Poetry Council of NC, and an instructor of English and creative writing at CVCC.
His more than 800 published poems have received awards from the Academy of American Poets, the NC Writers Network, the Poetry Society of SC, the Pushcart Prize Anthology, and the NC Poetry Society.
Having read at hundreds of schools, libraries, bookstores and coffee shops, Owens describes himself as an activist for and through poetry. His articles on poetry can be read regularly in Outlook and on his blog at www.scottowensmusings.blogspot.com.
Something Knows the Moment will be released by Main Street Rag Publishing Company on August 2. Copies can be ordered now at an advance order discount of just $9 through July 19 at www.mainstreetrag.com.
Sample poems from the book as well as three other recent books by Owens can also be found at this website.
A book launch party and reading will be held at Taste Full Beans Coffeehouse in downtown Hickory on Tuesday, September 13, at 6:30.
Poet Publishes Seven
(first published in Outlook, 23 June 2011)
“These poems are necessary,” writes former NC Poet Laureate Fred Chappell about Hickory poet Scott Owens’s soon-to-be-released new collection of poems, Something Knows the Moment.
According to Chappell, Owens’s seventh book is “about the nature of God, the nature of faith, of doubt, of trust and distrust, disillusion and resignation.” And he adds, “Occasionally the subject of hope is addressed.”
Joe Milford, host of the Joe Milford Poetry Show, says of Owens that he “stares steadfastly into the unrelenting zero as if trying to pierce the other side of being itself with laser-like intensity.” He states that Owens “forces the reader to ponder his own nature and humanity,” and Milford concludes “there is a tenderness in this book that might shame you.”
Scott Owens is the founder of Poetry Hickory, editor of Wild Goose Poetry Review, vice-president of the Poetry Council of NC, and an instructor of English and creative writing at CVCC.
His more than 800 published poems have received awards from the Academy of American Poets, the NC Writers Network, the Poetry Society of SC, the Pushcart Prize Anthology, and the NC Poetry Society.
Having read at hundreds of schools, libraries, bookstores and coffee shops, Owens describes himself as an activist for and through poetry. His articles on poetry can be read regularly in Outlook and on his blog at www.scottowensmusings.blogspot.com.
Something Knows the Moment will be released by Main Street Rag Publishing Company on August 2. Copies can be ordered now at an advance order discount of just $9 through July 19 at www.mainstreetrag.com.
Sample poems from the book as well as three other recent books by Owens can also be found at this website.
A book launch party and reading will be held at Taste Full Beans Coffeehouse in downtown Hickory on Tuesday, September 13, at 6:30.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
A Gathering of Poets
A Gathering of Poets, April 9, Community Arts Cafe in Winston-Salem. This looks like a poetry event not to be missed. 4 workshops with people like Fred Chappell, Kay Byer, Debra Kaufman and Joseph Mills! Here is the link: http://www.press53.com/GatheringofPoets2011.html
SATURDAY, APRIL 9, 8 AM - 6 PM
SPECIAL OPEN MIC EVENING, 7:30-9:30 PM, FEATURING A CAPPELLA POETRY BY FLEUR-DE-LISA
Held at The Community Arts Café, Fourth & Spruce, Winston-Salem, NC
SCHEDULE AND WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS
Check-in & Continental Breakfast: 8 - 9 a.m.
First Morning Workshop Block: 9 - 10:15 a.m.
These workshops will be offered again during the First Afternoon Workshop Block: 1:30 - 2:45 p.m.
Debra Kaufman: Polishing the Lines (Limited to 30 poets)
We write poetry to discover something about ourselves and our world, and to share what we learn with readers. We will look closely at how to strengthen our poems by focusing on the ways precise imagery and musicality in our lines reveal a poem’s intended meaning. We will explore ways to refine our images and enhance our musical
phrasing to better reveal to ourselves and our readers the deeper truths inside our poems. Please bring a poem you would like to work on.
Alex Grant: Compression in Poetry (Limited to 30 poets)
This workshop focuses on practical, tangible methods and techniques to help you strip down and polish your poems. We will focus on specifics, before reading and discussing poems which exemplify this approach, then working on your own poems. Participants will take away practical, understandable methods they can immediately
apply to both new poems and work under revision.
Joseph Mills: What’s in a Name? (Limited to 30 Poets)
Margaret Mitchell considered naming her story Tomorrow Is Another Day and Tote the Weary Load. F. Scott Fitzgerald suggested Under the Red White and Blue and The High Bouncing Lover to his publisher. None of these phrases has entered popular culture; instead we have Gone with the Wind and The Great Gatsby. Titles are not simply handy ways to catalogue works; they can be crucial elements. Without the title “Station in a Metro,” the reader would have little idea what Ezra Pound’s poem was about. In this workshop, we’ll consider the importance of a variety of titles from books, paintings, poems, and songs, and we’ll explore ways to develop intriguing, effective titles for our own work.
Terri Kirby Erickson: Marketing Yourself and Your Work (Limited to 30 Poets)
Google "Terri Kirby Erickson" and you will find her everywhere, from her personal blog, to online lit mags and book blogs. In 2010, her poetry collection, Telling Tales of Dusk, reached #23 on the Poetry Foundation's list of Contemporary Best Sellers thanks to the endorsement of nationally syndicated columnist Sharon Randall in her column entitled, “Best Reads.” No matter where you are in your writing process, it’s never too early to start selling yourself and your work. The difference between being an unknown poet and a widely read poet is effective
marketing. In this workshop, we’ll examine various methods and strategies to get you and your poetry noticed by readers, editors and publishers.
Second Morning Workshop Block: 10:30 - 11:45 a.m.
These workshops will be offered again during the Second Afternoon Workshop Block: 3:00 - 4:15 p.m.
Fred Chappell: Master Workshop (Limited to 30 Poets)
Kathryn Stripling Byer: Studio-style Master Class (Limited to 50 Poets)
In this studio-style master class, former North Carolina Poet Laureate Kathryn Stripling Byer will select poems written by four poets in attendance to read and discuss in a studio-style forum with the four selected poets and then everyone in attendance. Attendees may submit one poem for consideration no later than March 15. Ms. Byer will select four poems for discussion, to be announced at the beginning of the master class.
Valerie Nieman: Every Picture Tells a Poem (Limited to 30 Poets)
Ekphrasis is a marriage of imaginations, that of the visual artist and the writer. In this poetry workshop, Valerie Nieman will discuss noted works, such as poems by Rilke, Auden, and Fred Chappell, and will take advantage of the Community Arts Café’s Gallery of the Arts to lead writing exercises using contemporary art as the source for new poems.
Other Important Times and Events
Lunch Break: 11:45 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. (Buffet lunch provided)
Faculty Reading With Special Guest Poet Isabel Zuber: 4:30 - 5:30 p.m.
Closing Remarks: 5:30 - 6 p.m.
Dinner on Your Own: 6-7:30 p.m.
Open Mic Reading with A Cappella Poetry by Fleur-de-Lisa: 7:30 - 9:30 p.m.
($5 cover, Free to Gathering of Poets Attendees.) Poets wishing to read must place his or her name in a bowl. Readers will be determined by a drawing at two different times during the evening. If the poet called is not present, another name will be drawn. Sixteen poets will be selected to read during this event. Each poet will have three minutes to read, and this will be strictly enforced to be fair to all poets.
Registration:
To register, visit the registration page.
Check box to select your desired workshops.
If workshop is full, you may check the "waitlist" box and you will be placed on the waitlist in the order you signed up.
Waitlists will be cleared if space becomes available.
Press 53 reserves the right to make last-minute changes due to cancelations by faculty. If a cancelation by faculty occurs, we will do our best to replace the workshop with an equally beneficial workshop, but no guarantees can be made.
To Register, click here.
Questions can be emailed to Kevin Watson at kevin@press53.com or by calling Kevin at 336-414-5599.
SATURDAY, APRIL 9, 8 AM - 6 PM
SPECIAL OPEN MIC EVENING, 7:30-9:30 PM, FEATURING A CAPPELLA POETRY BY FLEUR-DE-LISA
Held at The Community Arts Café, Fourth & Spruce, Winston-Salem, NC
SCHEDULE AND WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS
Check-in & Continental Breakfast: 8 - 9 a.m.
First Morning Workshop Block: 9 - 10:15 a.m.
These workshops will be offered again during the First Afternoon Workshop Block: 1:30 - 2:45 p.m.
Debra Kaufman: Polishing the Lines (Limited to 30 poets)
We write poetry to discover something about ourselves and our world, and to share what we learn with readers. We will look closely at how to strengthen our poems by focusing on the ways precise imagery and musicality in our lines reveal a poem’s intended meaning. We will explore ways to refine our images and enhance our musical
phrasing to better reveal to ourselves and our readers the deeper truths inside our poems. Please bring a poem you would like to work on.
Alex Grant: Compression in Poetry (Limited to 30 poets)
This workshop focuses on practical, tangible methods and techniques to help you strip down and polish your poems. We will focus on specifics, before reading and discussing poems which exemplify this approach, then working on your own poems. Participants will take away practical, understandable methods they can immediately
apply to both new poems and work under revision.
Joseph Mills: What’s in a Name? (Limited to 30 Poets)
Margaret Mitchell considered naming her story Tomorrow Is Another Day and Tote the Weary Load. F. Scott Fitzgerald suggested Under the Red White and Blue and The High Bouncing Lover to his publisher. None of these phrases has entered popular culture; instead we have Gone with the Wind and The Great Gatsby. Titles are not simply handy ways to catalogue works; they can be crucial elements. Without the title “Station in a Metro,” the reader would have little idea what Ezra Pound’s poem was about. In this workshop, we’ll consider the importance of a variety of titles from books, paintings, poems, and songs, and we’ll explore ways to develop intriguing, effective titles for our own work.
Terri Kirby Erickson: Marketing Yourself and Your Work (Limited to 30 Poets)
Google "Terri Kirby Erickson" and you will find her everywhere, from her personal blog, to online lit mags and book blogs. In 2010, her poetry collection, Telling Tales of Dusk, reached #23 on the Poetry Foundation's list of Contemporary Best Sellers thanks to the endorsement of nationally syndicated columnist Sharon Randall in her column entitled, “Best Reads.” No matter where you are in your writing process, it’s never too early to start selling yourself and your work. The difference between being an unknown poet and a widely read poet is effective
marketing. In this workshop, we’ll examine various methods and strategies to get you and your poetry noticed by readers, editors and publishers.
Second Morning Workshop Block: 10:30 - 11:45 a.m.
These workshops will be offered again during the Second Afternoon Workshop Block: 3:00 - 4:15 p.m.
Fred Chappell: Master Workshop (Limited to 30 Poets)
Kathryn Stripling Byer: Studio-style Master Class (Limited to 50 Poets)
In this studio-style master class, former North Carolina Poet Laureate Kathryn Stripling Byer will select poems written by four poets in attendance to read and discuss in a studio-style forum with the four selected poets and then everyone in attendance. Attendees may submit one poem for consideration no later than March 15. Ms. Byer will select four poems for discussion, to be announced at the beginning of the master class.
Valerie Nieman: Every Picture Tells a Poem (Limited to 30 Poets)
Ekphrasis is a marriage of imaginations, that of the visual artist and the writer. In this poetry workshop, Valerie Nieman will discuss noted works, such as poems by Rilke, Auden, and Fred Chappell, and will take advantage of the Community Arts Café’s Gallery of the Arts to lead writing exercises using contemporary art as the source for new poems.
Other Important Times and Events
Lunch Break: 11:45 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. (Buffet lunch provided)
Faculty Reading With Special Guest Poet Isabel Zuber: 4:30 - 5:30 p.m.
Closing Remarks: 5:30 - 6 p.m.
Dinner on Your Own: 6-7:30 p.m.
Open Mic Reading with A Cappella Poetry by Fleur-de-Lisa: 7:30 - 9:30 p.m.
($5 cover, Free to Gathering of Poets Attendees.) Poets wishing to read must place his or her name in a bowl. Readers will be determined by a drawing at two different times during the evening. If the poet called is not present, another name will be drawn. Sixteen poets will be selected to read during this event. Each poet will have three minutes to read, and this will be strictly enforced to be fair to all poets.
Registration:
To register, visit the registration page.
Check box to select your desired workshops.
If workshop is full, you may check the "waitlist" box and you will be placed on the waitlist in the order you signed up.
Waitlists will be cleared if space becomes available.
Press 53 reserves the right to make last-minute changes due to cancelations by faculty. If a cancelation by faculty occurs, we will do our best to replace the workshop with an equally beneficial workshop, but no guarantees can be made.
To Register, click here.
Questions can be emailed to Kevin Watson at kevin@press53.com or by calling Kevin at 336-414-5599.
Friday, August 6, 2010
Review of "The Sound of Poets Cooking"
First Published in "Wild Goose Poetry Review" and in a modified form in "Outlook"
Review of The Sound of Poets Cooking, edited by Richard Krawiec
Jacar Press, 2010, 172 pages
ISBN: 9780984574001
It happens to all of us at one time or another. Late of an afternoon, we start to feel a certain emptiness, as if something is missing, something needed. We call it hunger or craving. And the more we try to ignore it, the stronger it gets. Maybe we long for something light and refreshing, or something heavier, meaty. Maybe just something sweet. Or maybe we can’t figure out exactly what we want. And that’s when we know that the answer to our appetite is surely a buffet. And that’s just what Richard Krawiec has arrayed before us as editor of The Sound of Poets Cooking. Whether we long for something exotic, something familiar and comforting, something spicy, salty, or even a bit saucy, this enticing collection of delectable delights is sure to satisfy.
To be clear and leave metaphor behind for a moment, The Sound of Poets Cooking is a new, 172-page anthology of poems about food accompanied by related recipes, from Krawiec’s fledgling press, Jacar Press. And it is an impressive debut, featuring wonderful work from poets both familiar and new, including two NC Poets Laureate, Fred Chappell and Kathryn Stripling Byer, and numerous other standards: Joseph Bathanti, Kelly Cherry, Jaki Shelton Green, Susan Ludvigson, Joanna Catherine Scott, Shelby Stephenson, and more, wrapped in a clever cover with an image of Buddha cradling a pomegranate, eggplant, carrots, tomatoes, sweet potato, chef’s knife and some spiky yellow fruit I’m not familiar with, appealingly conveying the mixture of spirituality and whimsy one might expect from poetry about food.
Of course, individual poems and individual recipes from the collection prove both enjoyable and useful, but like any good recipe, The Sound of Poets Cooking also masterfully blends disparate elements to create what might be experienced as a single savory delight, a cohesive record of the diverse ways in which the culinary arts and poetic arts are woven into the fabric of our memories, our experiences, and our daily emotional and intellectual lives. Here a reader finds the mock heroic tetrameter couplets of Chappell’s “Pot Luck Supper: Aunt Lavinia Strikes” delicately balanced by the therapeutic free verse of Grey Brown’s “Scrambled.” Or the stick-to-your-ribs heaviness of Debra Kaufman’s “Minestrone, Rainy Day” relieved by the joyful ad-libbing of Alice Owens Johnson’s “Gumbo.” Or the formal propriety of Jim Clark’s “Sunday Dinner” harmonized by the titillating temptation of Deborah Kolodji’s “Eggplant Parmigiana.”
As for the recipes, there are many I intend to try my hand at, including the onion pie, the Brussels sprouts & goat cheese risotto, and the coconut cake, but like Lenard Moore’s daughter, the one I look forward to the most is the three cheese macaroni and cheese.
To whet your appetite a bit more here is a sampler platter of some of my favorite lines from The Sound of Poets Cooking. Bon appetit!
from Scott Douglass’ “Bread Crumbs:”
. . . I fill
each page with bread crumb words,
a trail for someone, sometime
to follow back to me
from Anne Barnhill’s “Tiramisu:”
Don’t give me puffy white clouds
Fat as marshmallows
To lounge on when I die.
. . . . . . . . . .
Just place a generous block of tiramisu
In front of me;
. . . . . . . . . .
Sin straddling goodness--
Delicious as Dante.
from Pat Riviere-Seel’s “Road Trip Conversation:”
Beside you now I am ravenous
for the ripe figs of your fingers
folded around the steering wheel.
from Michael Beadle’s “Fromage:”
For a flash of free verse, I invoke
the Goddess of Gorgonzola, //
who bids me long life
as long as I use her bounty //
upon this holy cracker of truth,
this snack we have to share //
as the Muenster metaphor
melts in our minds.
from Susan Meyers’ “Fork: Song for the Misunderstood:”
May the fork in its daily travels discover
an insatiable mouth.
May the mouth
always adore the fork’s repetitive tune.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
NCWN Spring Conference
Here is a link to the info and registration page for the North Carolina Writers' Network Spring Conference to be held in the Elliott University Center at UNCG on April 24:
http://www.ncwriters.org/programs-and-services/conferences/568-spring-conference-2010.
Fred Chappell is the keynote reader, and registration includes eligibility to participate in workshops in the morning and afternoon. Workshop leaders include myself, Keith Flynn, Ed Southern, Sheila Smith McKoy, John McNally, Nathan Ross Freeman, Chris Roerden, Holly Goddard Jones, Cynthia Nearman, and Malcolm Campbell. The link provides bios and workshop summaries as well as a complete schedule and registration information.
Come join us, and bring friends!
http://www.ncwriters.org/programs-and-services/conferences/568-spring-conference-2010.
Fred Chappell is the keynote reader, and registration includes eligibility to participate in workshops in the morning and afternoon. Workshop leaders include myself, Keith Flynn, Ed Southern, Sheila Smith McKoy, John McNally, Nathan Ross Freeman, Chris Roerden, Holly Goddard Jones, Cynthia Nearman, and Malcolm Campbell. The link provides bios and workshop summaries as well as a complete schedule and registration information.
Come join us, and bring friends!
Thursday, May 28, 2009
NC to Lose Poet Laureate
“Musings” for May 21
NC to Lose Poet Laureate
On June 1, North Carolina will join 8 other states in the dubious claim of being the only states without a poet laureate. At that time, Kathryn Stripling Byer, North Carolina’s Poet Laureate since 2003, will complete her term, and in the wake of state budget cuts, no new laureate will be named.
The word “laureate” is derived from the Greek laureatus, meaning crowned with laurel, after the practice of crowning Olympic champions with branches of the laurel or bay tree. Over the years that practice was applied to other fields, and the term laureate was used to designate a person who had been honored for achieving distinction in a particular field.
It is unclear who the world’s first poet laureate was. The term was used as a degree in rhetoric in the Middle Ages, so it was applied to a number of poets from that time. At the same time, British monarchs had developed a tradition of having a court or royal poet, the earliest perhaps being Gulielmus Peregrinus, King’s Poet for Richard I in 1190. Geoffrey Chaucer was considered poet laureate in 1389, and James I named Ben Jonson poet laureate in 1617, but Charles II was the first to have a legally designated poet laureate, that being John Dryden.
In the U.S. there has been an official Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress since 1937, but the term poet laureate has only been used in an official status at the national level since 1985. On the other hand, North Carolina has had a poet laureate since 1948. The first such NC Poet Laureate was Arthur Abernethy from 1948 to 1953. He was succeeded by James Larkin Pearson (53-81), Sam Ragan (82-96), and Fred Chappell from 1997 until Byer took over the post.
The official purpose of the state poet laureate, as overseen by the NC Arts Council, is to promote the reading, writing, and appreciation of poetry across the state. The poet laureate is also called upon to write “occasional” (meaning written for a particular event or ceremony) poetry and to mentor the state’s community of writers. Byer has gone well beyond the official call of duty, visiting hundreds of schools, judging competitions, and creating her blog, “The Laureate’s Lasso,” which features poetry news and events, commentary on and samples from new books of poetry in NC, links to NC poetry journals, links to other poetry-related blogs, and a poet-of-the-week profile of NC poets.
It is difficult to say what impact not having a poet laureate will have on the state of poetry in NC. Poets tend to be missionary in their work, and with or without the title I know Byer will continue in her efforts to promote the mission of poetry. Nevertheless, one can’t help but be saddened when their home state becomes one of the few to no longer have a publicly-supported presence in an undertaking as noble and vital as that of poetry. Certainly the inability to share in a statewide pride in our very own poet laureate will weaken our sense of North Carolina as a place rich in the arts, and if Mary Cloake, Director of the Arts Council in Ireland is right when she says the presence of publicly-funded arts is “considered a key indicator of a mature and attractive knowledge-based economy [which] plays a crucial role in attracting inward investment by global corporations,” then our financial health may be damaged as well.
In honor of Byer’s work as poet laureate and to illustrate the sort of “occasional” verse she created in that post, I’m including below a poem she wrote for her own coronation.
Piece of Cake
When the young woman calling from
Charlotte to interview me for her radio program
asked, “What is a Laureate, anyway?”
I heard my voice hem and haw
like a bad line of poetry. I thought I heard all of the Old
North State holding its breath while I struggled
to say something clever, but all I could think of
was “lariat.” Then in a moment
of quiet desperation, I thought of Laurette,
who lives just down the road
from my childhood home, hands busy sculpting
the icing on each of her Milky Way cakes
as she stands in the heart of her kitchen,
the sun sliding into the cornfields, another June
day disappearing, another night kindling
its Milky Way stars,
and at long last I know how to answer
that question. A Laureate
lassoes the Milky Way,
word after luminous word of it,
holding it out in her hands
like a piece
of Laurette’s chocolate cake
saying,
Try this!
Believe me,
You’ll like the way poetry tastes!
NC to Lose Poet Laureate
On June 1, North Carolina will join 8 other states in the dubious claim of being the only states without a poet laureate. At that time, Kathryn Stripling Byer, North Carolina’s Poet Laureate since 2003, will complete her term, and in the wake of state budget cuts, no new laureate will be named.
The word “laureate” is derived from the Greek laureatus, meaning crowned with laurel, after the practice of crowning Olympic champions with branches of the laurel or bay tree. Over the years that practice was applied to other fields, and the term laureate was used to designate a person who had been honored for achieving distinction in a particular field.
It is unclear who the world’s first poet laureate was. The term was used as a degree in rhetoric in the Middle Ages, so it was applied to a number of poets from that time. At the same time, British monarchs had developed a tradition of having a court or royal poet, the earliest perhaps being Gulielmus Peregrinus, King’s Poet for Richard I in 1190. Geoffrey Chaucer was considered poet laureate in 1389, and James I named Ben Jonson poet laureate in 1617, but Charles II was the first to have a legally designated poet laureate, that being John Dryden.
In the U.S. there has been an official Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress since 1937, but the term poet laureate has only been used in an official status at the national level since 1985. On the other hand, North Carolina has had a poet laureate since 1948. The first such NC Poet Laureate was Arthur Abernethy from 1948 to 1953. He was succeeded by James Larkin Pearson (53-81), Sam Ragan (82-96), and Fred Chappell from 1997 until Byer took over the post.
The official purpose of the state poet laureate, as overseen by the NC Arts Council, is to promote the reading, writing, and appreciation of poetry across the state. The poet laureate is also called upon to write “occasional” (meaning written for a particular event or ceremony) poetry and to mentor the state’s community of writers. Byer has gone well beyond the official call of duty, visiting hundreds of schools, judging competitions, and creating her blog, “The Laureate’s Lasso,” which features poetry news and events, commentary on and samples from new books of poetry in NC, links to NC poetry journals, links to other poetry-related blogs, and a poet-of-the-week profile of NC poets.
It is difficult to say what impact not having a poet laureate will have on the state of poetry in NC. Poets tend to be missionary in their work, and with or without the title I know Byer will continue in her efforts to promote the mission of poetry. Nevertheless, one can’t help but be saddened when their home state becomes one of the few to no longer have a publicly-supported presence in an undertaking as noble and vital as that of poetry. Certainly the inability to share in a statewide pride in our very own poet laureate will weaken our sense of North Carolina as a place rich in the arts, and if Mary Cloake, Director of the Arts Council in Ireland is right when she says the presence of publicly-funded arts is “considered a key indicator of a mature and attractive knowledge-based economy [which] plays a crucial role in attracting inward investment by global corporations,” then our financial health may be damaged as well.
In honor of Byer’s work as poet laureate and to illustrate the sort of “occasional” verse she created in that post, I’m including below a poem she wrote for her own coronation.
Piece of Cake
When the young woman calling from
Charlotte to interview me for her radio program
asked, “What is a Laureate, anyway?”
I heard my voice hem and haw
like a bad line of poetry. I thought I heard all of the Old
North State holding its breath while I struggled
to say something clever, but all I could think of
was “lariat.” Then in a moment
of quiet desperation, I thought of Laurette,
who lives just down the road
from my childhood home, hands busy sculpting
the icing on each of her Milky Way cakes
as she stands in the heart of her kitchen,
the sun sliding into the cornfields, another June
day disappearing, another night kindling
its Milky Way stars,
and at long last I know how to answer
that question. A Laureate
lassoes the Milky Way,
word after luminous word of it,
holding it out in her hands
like a piece
of Laurette’s chocolate cake
saying,
Try this!
Believe me,
You’ll like the way poetry tastes!
Monday, April 20, 2009
Hickory Native Featured in Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poet Series
HICKORY NATIVE FEATURED IN GILBERT-CHAPPELL DISTINGUISHED POET SERIES
Reading To Be Held at Patrick Beaver Library on March 29
A couple of weeks ago I wrote a column about the North Carolina Poetry Society. One of the more innovative programs NCPS sponsors is the Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poet Series. The GCDPS was conceived in 2002 when Bill Blackley, then president of NCPS, asked then North Carolina Poet Laureate, Fred Chappell, how NCPS could best promote poetry in North Carolina. One of Chappell's recommendations was to create opportunities for student poets to read publicly. As part of the NCPS long range plan, Chappell's insight was embraced, and the late Marie Gilbert, former NCPS President and published poet, generously funded GCDPS. Gilbert's husband, Dick Gilbert, and daughter, Mrs. Terry Sanford, (Laurie Gilbert), of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, continue the funding.
The result is a series that provides an honorarium to three Distinguished Poets (one each in the east, middle and west of the state) to mentor middle school, high school, college and adult student poets (three or four student poets a year for each Distinguished Poet) on a dozen pages of poetry over three to six months. To date, 56 student poets have participated in the series. The Distinguished Poet reads with his or her students at a regional college or university in April of each year.
The series also teams with Frannie Ashburn, Director of the North Carolina Center for the Book (NCCB). The NCCB funds up to nine readings annually by the Distinguished Poets with student poets in their hometown public libraries. These programs have created an opportunity for Hickory to experience the poetry of Tony Abbott (one of the Distinguished Poets for 2009-2010, along with Lenard Moore and Catherine Carter) and his student and Hickory native, Liz Monish. The two will read along with Jo Taylor of Raleigh at Patrick Beaver Library on March 29 at 3:00.
Tony Abbott, Professor Emeritus at Davidson College, is the author of 8 books, including 4 collections of poetry, 2 novels, and 2 books on theater. He received the Novello Prize for his first novel, Leaving Maggie Hope. He is past president of the North Carolina Writers Network. For the reading in Hickory, he intends to read from a soon-to-be-completed new collection of poetry.
Liz (Megan Elizabeth) Monish graduated in 2006 from St. Stephens High School. There, she participated in the band, Future Business Leaders of America, and competed in equestrian events. She is currently attending Saint Andrews Presbyterian College with a major in Biology and a minor in Creative Writing. In 2007, she participated in a study-abroad program in Italy for her fall semester where she stayed at Brunnenburg Castle and studied at the Ezra Pound Center for Literature. She is the current host of the Fortner Writers’ Forum and, last year, the poem I am fortunate enough to reprint below won first place in a statewide poetry contest sponsored by the University of North Carolina at Pembroke. Monish states, “This poem is about my time in Italy. We had to work in the vineyard every week, and harvesting the grapes was one of our biggest chores.”
Dionysian Bees
The grape harvest,
busiest week of the fall.
We walk down to the waiting vineyard
rubbing our eyes and making small talk.
The grapes hang in rows,
a pergola of sweetness.
Sticky clusters wait for fermenting.
Crawling underneath them,
we notice many drunk bees
feeding on grapes that have been pried open
drinking the sugar inside.
Ecstasy slows their movements,
and they fly in a rhythm,
performing an intricate dance,
a hymn to Dionysus.
One bee taps his sneaker
as he lifts a grape to his lips
thinking that the bee across the row looks nice,
and it’s that time of year
when she can make a few mistakes
and wrap her lacy wings around him.
Yet another bee flies in an intricate pattern
letting her body move in an instinctual way
dancing to the rhythm of wings
praising her god in the way she knows best.
Me, an outsider,
I could pick out a bee
lift him from his grape
in between forefinger and thumb
and ask him why he prays to the wine god
but my western ways
will never understand bee culture
so I pick up my clippers
and begin the harvest.
Reading To Be Held at Patrick Beaver Library on March 29
A couple of weeks ago I wrote a column about the North Carolina Poetry Society. One of the more innovative programs NCPS sponsors is the Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poet Series. The GCDPS was conceived in 2002 when Bill Blackley, then president of NCPS, asked then North Carolina Poet Laureate, Fred Chappell, how NCPS could best promote poetry in North Carolina. One of Chappell's recommendations was to create opportunities for student poets to read publicly. As part of the NCPS long range plan, Chappell's insight was embraced, and the late Marie Gilbert, former NCPS President and published poet, generously funded GCDPS. Gilbert's husband, Dick Gilbert, and daughter, Mrs. Terry Sanford, (Laurie Gilbert), of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, continue the funding.
The result is a series that provides an honorarium to three Distinguished Poets (one each in the east, middle and west of the state) to mentor middle school, high school, college and adult student poets (three or four student poets a year for each Distinguished Poet) on a dozen pages of poetry over three to six months. To date, 56 student poets have participated in the series. The Distinguished Poet reads with his or her students at a regional college or university in April of each year.
The series also teams with Frannie Ashburn, Director of the North Carolina Center for the Book (NCCB). The NCCB funds up to nine readings annually by the Distinguished Poets with student poets in their hometown public libraries. These programs have created an opportunity for Hickory to experience the poetry of Tony Abbott (one of the Distinguished Poets for 2009-2010, along with Lenard Moore and Catherine Carter) and his student and Hickory native, Liz Monish. The two will read along with Jo Taylor of Raleigh at Patrick Beaver Library on March 29 at 3:00.
Tony Abbott, Professor Emeritus at Davidson College, is the author of 8 books, including 4 collections of poetry, 2 novels, and 2 books on theater. He received the Novello Prize for his first novel, Leaving Maggie Hope. He is past president of the North Carolina Writers Network. For the reading in Hickory, he intends to read from a soon-to-be-completed new collection of poetry.
Liz (Megan Elizabeth) Monish graduated in 2006 from St. Stephens High School. There, she participated in the band, Future Business Leaders of America, and competed in equestrian events. She is currently attending Saint Andrews Presbyterian College with a major in Biology and a minor in Creative Writing. In 2007, she participated in a study-abroad program in Italy for her fall semester where she stayed at Brunnenburg Castle and studied at the Ezra Pound Center for Literature. She is the current host of the Fortner Writers’ Forum and, last year, the poem I am fortunate enough to reprint below won first place in a statewide poetry contest sponsored by the University of North Carolina at Pembroke. Monish states, “This poem is about my time in Italy. We had to work in the vineyard every week, and harvesting the grapes was one of our biggest chores.”
Dionysian Bees
The grape harvest,
busiest week of the fall.
We walk down to the waiting vineyard
rubbing our eyes and making small talk.
The grapes hang in rows,
a pergola of sweetness.
Sticky clusters wait for fermenting.
Crawling underneath them,
we notice many drunk bees
feeding on grapes that have been pried open
drinking the sugar inside.
Ecstasy slows their movements,
and they fly in a rhythm,
performing an intricate dance,
a hymn to Dionysus.
One bee taps his sneaker
as he lifts a grape to his lips
thinking that the bee across the row looks nice,
and it’s that time of year
when she can make a few mistakes
and wrap her lacy wings around him.
Yet another bee flies in an intricate pattern
letting her body move in an instinctual way
dancing to the rhythm of wings
praising her god in the way she knows best.
Me, an outsider,
I could pick out a bee
lift him from his grape
in between forefinger and thumb
and ask him why he prays to the wine god
but my western ways
will never understand bee culture
so I pick up my clippers
and begin the harvest.
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