Poetry Gift Guide 2011

THE POETRY GIFT GUIDE 2011

It’s that time again. I just watched the last leaf fall from the sugar maple in my backyard, so I know it’s time to start thinking about holiday gifts again. For me, and for so many like me, there could be no better gift than a book of poetry. Unfortunately, those who don’t read poetry themselves rarely know which book of poems to get for those who do, as can be evidenced by the Leonard Nimoy, Susan Polis Schultz, Jewel, and Treasured Verse books -- roughly the equivalent of holiday fruitcake -- on my shelves at home (please forgive me if you’re reading this and gave me one of those in the past). To help out those who know poetry-lovers but are not poetry-lovers themselves, every year I do a column suggesting certain titles from the year as ideal gift selections. I usually focus on the local and state level since there are other sources for broader selections.

This year I have two main recommendations. My favorite book of poems from 2011 is the very inexpensive anthology The Best of Poetry Hickory ($5, available at Taste Full Beans Coffeehouse in downtown Hickory). Yes, I am the Founder of Poetry Hickory, but I would want this book more than any other from this year even if I weren’t. This anthology contains numerous poems that are my personal favorites of some of my favorite poets -- poems that I believe will be further anthologized and read for years to come. Robert Abbate’s “Ecco Homo,” Rhett Trull’s “The End of the Hour,” Tony Abbott’s “Blood Red of Late October,” Richard Allen Taylor’s “Playing Catch,” Ron Moran’s “A Blessing,” and others in this collection are among the best poems I’ve read in the last decade.

The single author collection of poetry I deem to be the best from this year is John Lane’s Abandoned Quarry: New & Selected Poems (Mercer University Press). Lane is widely known as an environmental writer, and these poems will not disappoint the reader looking for such work, but as they encompass Lane’s career they also dynamically explore the nature of humanity and the development of the individual. I have said of this collection that “among the thousands of books of poems I own, there is not a single one I will more often take from the shelf to reread.”

Now, for my many poet-friends whose new books I didn’t name in my two primary recommendations, please note that I also didn’t include my own new book, Something Knows the Moment (available at Taste Full Beans or through Main Street Rag), which I like a great deal but don’t feel measures up to the anthology or Lane’s collection. In the event your poetry lover already owns those two books, and mine, here are some others from this year that I strongly recommend:
If Words Could Save Us, by Tony Abbott (Lorimer Press);
Spill, by Malaika King Albrecht (Main Street Rag);
How Language Is Lost, by Celisa Steele (Emrys Press);
The Jane Poems, by Ron Moran (Clemson University Press); and
An Innocent in the House of the Dead, by Joanna Catherine Scott (Main Street Rag).

If you need additional choices, check out the available titles on the websites for NC presses like Main Street Rag, Lorimer Press, Press 53, and Jacar Press.

Review of The Best of Poetry Hickory

Review
by Pris Campbell

The Best of Poetry Hickory Anthology

From my distant perch in Florida, I’ve long been convinced that something in the Carolina water breeds especially good poets. This anthology, packed with well-written, spell-binding poems, more than confirms my suspicions. These poems speak in an engaging voice to the reader rather than announcing ‘look at how good I am” by way of contrived metaphors or other poetic devices inserted simply for the sake of having them there. These poems are good. It’s not necessary for them to preen or crow to let us know it.

I like to read poems I can relate to, poems that move me, poems that give me a way of seeing the familiar in a new light. This book did all of that in spades.

I could easily quote lines from every poem but space allows only a few. Those chosen were a difficult call but they give an idea of the range of themes covered in the anthology.

Robert Abbate asks in “Ecce Homo”:

What would Jesus do
once he could be lured
to the place of the fractured
pistol-whipped skull
and once, in the freezing air
he could be lashed to a barbed
wire fence outside Laramie

Maureen Sherbondy continues the theme in a different way in “Praying at Coffee Shops in the South”:

What are those public interludes with God?
Two men at Starbucks holding hands
bent over in prayer leaning into the invisible

Tony Ricciardell brings us back home as he speaks to his now helpless father in “Sins of My Father”:

If I spoke to your mother the way you speak to your wife you would have crippled me, wouldn’t you? If I called your mother bitch or whore, if I curled curses at her the way you hurled curses at my mother, you would have kicked me down the stairs, wouldn’t you?


Malaika King Albrecht’s poem, “The Riddle Song” brings tears as she writes of her father singing “I gave my love a cherry’ as he massages her mother’s useless limbs, hoping her mother is able to hear him, hoping she is looking at him as he sings.

Ted Pope views family from the other direction in “Bright Child” as he watches his daughter move swiftly from infant to adulthood:

….bright child holy child child of all my hope and reverence I
saw her coming down 4th St again today and today would not
be like any other day oh no today I’m going to follow her to
see where she goes to get that glowing external primal essence…

And Joseph Bathanti offers a bawdier view of the South in “Peaches”:

On a roadhouse bathroom wall
in the peach town of Gaffney, South Carolina
a woman’s body laminates itself
across the face of a condom machine

These poems are jewels. If I could I would string them around my neck so I could reach up and feel their glow whenever I liked. Needless to say, I highly recommend this book.


The Best of Poetry Hickory is available at Taste Full Beans Coffee House or from Scott Owens (asowens1@yahoo.com) for just $5 -- All proceeds to Taste Full Beans in gratitude for hosting Poetry Hickory for four years. A reading from the anthology will take place on September 13, 5:30, at Taste Full Beans, and will feature 27 of the poets selected for the anthology.

Best of Poetry Hickory News

I proofread the Best of Poetry Hickory manuscript today, and I am nearly overwhelmed by the quality of work it includes. So many of the poems are ones that I could easily call my favorite of the year, my favorite by a particular author, in many cases one of my all-time favorites. Here is a short list of poems in the anthology that I just can’t stop reading.

Rob Abbate’s “Ecco Homo”

Maureen Sherbondy’s “Praying at Coffee Shops in the South”

Rhett Trull’s “The End of the Hour”

Tony Ricciardelli’s “Sins of My Father”

Tony Abbott’s “Blood Red of Late October”

Malaika Albrecht’s “The Riddle Song”

Richard Allen Taylor’s “Playing Catch”

And there are many, many more. Main Street Rag is printing 250 copies of The Best of Poetry Hickory. 84 of those copies will go to contributors, and a dozen or so to libraries, collectors, etc. That will leave only about 150 for “public consumption.” They will be on sale for just $5 each at Taste Full Beans Coffeehouse in downtown Hickory starting Sep 13 until they sell out. If you can’t get there but really want one, let me know, and we’ll work out the shipping.

Thanks to all of the wonderful poets who have come to Hickory and shared their work with us this year. And thanks to Scott Douglass and Main Street Rag for supporting Poetry Hickory and for this generous contribution to the series.

Here is an excerpt from Robert Abbate’s “Ecco Homo” just to give you a taste of what’s coming:

The religiously
intolerant would not see
the Crucified in disguise.
They would not hear
the gentle spirit’s refrain:
Forgive them even when
they know fully what they do.

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Best of Poetry Hickory Anthology
August 18, 2011 by wildgoosepoetryreview

POETRY COUNCIL COMPLETES WORK, PREPARES FOR POETRY DAY

The Poetry Council of North Carolina, an organization that for 58 years has worked to foster a greater appreciation for and appreciation of poetry in NC by sponsoring contests and events for adults and children, has concluded its work on this year’s competitions and is preparing now to highlight the winners of those competitions at its annual Poetry Day, to be held October 16 at Catawba College in Salisbury.

This year’s big winners include Greensboro’s Rhett Iseman Trull, recipient of the Oscar Arnold Young Award for the best book of poems published by a North Carolinian, for her book, The Real Warnings. Trull will be spending a great deal of time in Hickory this year, appearing at Lenoir Rhyne as part of their “In Their Own Words” visiting writer series on September 16 with NC Poet Laureate Cathy Smith-Bowers, returning in the spring as Lenoir-Rhyne’s writer-in-residence, and reading at Poetry Hickory on March 8.

A recent visitor at Poetry Hickory, Tony Abbott, who read here on September 14, received second place in the book competition for his New & Selected Poems. Other finalists in the book competition who have read at Poetry Hickory in the past year include Linda Annas Ferguson and Alex Grant. Award recipients in other categories also include recent and upcoming Poetry Hickory readers: Sara Claytor and Bill Griffin, both of whom read last year; Richard Allen Taylor, who is part of November’s event; and Malaika King Albrecht, who will read with Trull on March 8.

Poetry Day events begin on October 16 with registration at 9:20, followed by the dedication of this years’ awards anthology, Bay Leaves, honoring Main Street Rag Publisher and Editor, M. Scott Douglass, for his unparalleled contributions to the NC poetry community. The highlight of the event will be the recognition of category winners and readings from those winners. Following lunch, entertainer Bob Whyte will perform. Poetry Day is open to the public. Lunch can be reserved for $8 at www.poetrycouncilofnc.wordpress.com. A complete list of this year’s winners and sample poems from Trull and Abbott can also be seen there.

The Catawba County area is well-represented on the Poetry Council by locals Scott Owens (Vice President), Bud Caywood (Free Verse Contest Manager), Nancy Posey (High School Contest Manager), and regular Poetry Hickory attendee, Jessie Carty of Charlotte (Humorous Verse Contest Manager). The Poetry Council is a 501c3 non-profit organization. Further information on Poetry Day, or the Council’s annual contests, or details on how to support the Council is available on the website or by contacting President Ed Cockrell at edcockrell@hotmail.com or Scott Owens at asowens1@yahoo.com.

Review of Malaika King Albrecht's "Lessons in Forgetting"

Review of Lessons in Forgetting
by Malaika King Albrecht
Main Street Rag, 2010, 48 pages, $7
ISBN: 9781599482453

First published in Wild Goose Poetry Review (www.wildgoosepoetryreview.wordpress.com)

Reviewing Malaika King Albrecht’s debut collection of poems, Lessons in Forgetting, feels a bit self-congratulatory. After all, I helped her revise some of these poems; I published three of them in Wild Goose Poetry Review; I helped her determine the arrangement of the poems; and I was the author who recommended the collection for Main Street Rag’s Author’s Choice Chapbook Series. I am certain that somewhere someone will say that it is inappropriate, maybe unprofessional, for me to write this review. The truth is, however, I don’t care, and if you read the book, neither will you.

Considering how strong these poems are and how vital this collection is, it would be a disservice to poetry readers not to recommend it. Poetry, it could be said, is the perfect blending of sound, imagery, meaning, and emotion. And each of the poems in Lessons in Forgetting succeeds on each of these levels. As a teacher of contemporary poetry and creative writing, one of the most difficult questions I face, repeatedly, is what makes a contemporary poem good. It’s a complicated question that can only be answered in sentences containing phrases like “yes, but” or “that, and.” It is easier and probably more useful to simply provide examples, and virtually all of the poems here can used for that purpose.

Take, for example, the poem “Riddle Song:”

Grocery bags in my arms,
I hip the front door open
and hear my father singing
to my mother,
I gave my love a cherry
that had no stone.
He stretches her right leg,
then slowly rotates it in circles.

She hasn’t walked in three years
or gotten out of bed in two.
I gave my love a baby
with no crying.
Her legs resist, the muscles
tight as fists. He massages
her leg nearly straight, moves
to the next one still singing.
A baby when it’s sleeping
it’s not crying.
The story of how I love you
it has no end.

Of course I’m crying
in the kitchen doorway.
I can’t see her from here,
but I’m hoping that she’s awake,
looking directly into his eyes.
He moves to her left arm,
tucked beside her body
like a broken wing,
and gently spreads it out.

The first thing one notices about this poem is the careful, methodical pace of the words, created by a preponderance of stressed syllables (typically 4 in as few as 6 syllables, lines 2 and 15 for example), and the precise attention to detail, which echo the patient gentleness of the father in the poem. One might also note the pointed alliteration in places, such as the beginning of the third stanza where the repetition of the velar “k” creates a sense of broken speech as the speaker struggles with her emotions. And finally, any reader would sense the almost-magical, gentle lyricism of the last line whether or not they could explain that it is created by the use of the word “gently,” the sounds (three alveolars--“g” and “s” twice and a final diphthong--unique as an endsound in this poem), and the fact that this line is the only perfectly iambic line in the poem.

Such subtle technical mastery is common throughout the poems in this book. There is, for example, the subtle separation of an adjective from its noun in “Winging It” (“she struggled to find the bird’s / name.” The extra moment the reader spends returning to the beginning of the next line to complete the thought seems to mimic the hesitancy and uncertainty of Alzheimer’s. There are clever internal rhymes, like “Benadryl pills” in “One Last Time,” and vital assonances that link one stanza to the next, “unsweetened tea / / She reaches . . . retrieves,” from that same poem.

Thus, any of these poems could be used as illustration of good contemporary poetry. What is more, however, confronted with the question, “What makes a good contemporary book of poems,” one need only extend one’s arm with Lessons in Forgetting held in their hand and say, “This,” this cohesiveness, this relevance, this intentional alternation of dark and light, this manipulation of emotion, surprise, and contrast, this chill and chuckle of recognition, this recording of the challenges of being human with such immediacy, such clarity, and such refusal to look away from the difficult moment that it deepens our experience and understanding of what it means to be human.

Malaika King Albrecht’s Lessons in Forgetting is an important collection because of its subject matter, dealing with Alzheimer’s, but it is an impressive collection because of the poetic mastery with which Albrecht records her experiences with and reflections upon that subject.

A Note from Malaika King Albrecht

Here is a note from Malaika King Albrecht about her upcoming book. This is one I recommended to Main Street Rag. Obviously, I'm convinced it's a good book. Click on her link to read my comments which will be on the back of the book.

From Malaika King Albrecht:
Thank you to everyone who has encouraged my writing! My poetry book is being published by Main Street Rag Publishing Company.

Lessons in Forgetting is scheduled for release in early May and is available for advance order right now. The advantage of ordering in advance is that you can buy it at a discount. The cover price will be $7, but by ordering it online from the publisher's website, you can get it for $3.50 plus shipping.

Here is a link that will take you directly there: http://www.mainstreetrag.com/MAlbrecht.html or the book can be ordered from the Coming Soon page of the MSR Online Bookstore.

Print run is based entirely on advance sales. Advance Sale Discount price of $3.50 (+ shipping) will be available until April 27. Release/ship date will be May 4.

Please note: For those who would rather not order online, Lessons in Forgetting may also be ordered by check or credit card directly from the publisher; however, the discount is not as much if ordered this way. Send to: Main Street Rag, PO BOX 690100, Charlotte, NC 28227-7001. Credit card orders, call 704-573-2516 (M-F 9am-5pm EST).