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
Showing posts with label Richard Allen Taylor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Richard Allen Taylor. Show all posts
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
2011 Litchfield Tea & Poetry Series
2011 Litchfield Tea & Poetry Series
Please join us for these four free events,
our fifth year featuring a whole slate of talented poets.
Litchfield Tea & Poetry Series
First Thursday, Jan. – Apr.
3 - 4 p.m.
Waccamaw Higher Education Center
160 Willbrook Boulevard
Pawleys Island, SC 29585
Book signing after the reading
Refreshments: homemade confections by Deloris Roberts
Free & open to the public
843-234-3422
Jan. 6 Launch of Poetry Anthology – Kickoff reading for OLLI at CCU anthology
Join us for a reading by contributors of the newly released OLLI at CCU poetry anthology, Journey-Work of the Sea. Foreword by poet Dan Albergotti, cover art by photographer Phil Wilkinson. A wide range of poems written by students from recent classes and workshops taught by Libby Bernardin and Susan Meyers. Good reason to celebrate!
Contributors: Patricia Tanner Candal * Suzy Clancy * John Eveleigh * Sally Z. Hare * Charlotte E. Hedler * Helen Hilliard * Robert O. Jones * Michelle M. Ott * Sherby McGrath * Carol Peters * Annie Pott * Susan A. Scheno * George R. Sharwell * James M. Siegrist * Nancy Dew Taylor * Libby Bernardin * Susan Meyers
Feb. 3 Ken Autrey, Debra A. Daniel
Ken Autrey, of Columbia, is the author of the chapbook Pilgrims (Main Street Rag). His poems have appeared in Atlanta Review, Cimarron Review, Poetry Northwest, and elsewhere, including various anthologies. He teaches English at Francis Marion University. Previously, he served as a Peace Corps teacher in Ghana and a visiting professor at Hiroshima University in Japan.
Debra A. Daniel is the author of As Is (Main Street Rag, 2009). She was twice SC Arts Commission’s Poetry Fellow. She has also won the Guy Owen Prize and awards from the Poetry Society of SC and has been a Pushcart nominee. Her work has appeared in Smokelong, Kakalak, Emrys, Pequin.org, Inkwell, Southern Poetry Review, Tar River Poetry, and The Poetry Society of SC Yearbook. She and her husband Jack McGregor will also entertain us with their music.
Mar. 3 Ann Herlong-Bodman, Richard Allen Taylor
Ann Herlong-Bodman, of Mt. Pleasant, is the author of the chapbook Pulled Out of Sleep (Pudding House Press, 2010). She taught journalism and composition at USC and Lander University. She has also taught ESL in East Europe for the U.S. State Department, and she currently volunteers as an ESL teacher when she is not traveling and writing.
Richard Allen Taylor, of Charlotte, NC, is the author of Punching Through the Egg of Space (2010) and Something to Read on the Plane (2004), both from Main Street Rag Publishing Company. His poems have appeared in many literary journals and anthologies. He is a former co-editor of Kakalak: Anthology of Carolina Poets.
Apr. 7 Scott Owens, Susan Finch Stevens
Author of six collections of poetry, Scott Owens is editor of Wild Goose Poetry Review, Vice President of the Poetry Council of NC, and recipient of awards from the Pushcart Prize Anthology and the Academy of American Poets, among others. He holds an MFA from UNC Greensboro and teaches at Catawba Valley Community College.
Susan Finch Stevens, of the Isle of Palms, is the author of the chapbook Lettered Bones, a winner in the 2008 Poetry Initiative of South Carolina Competition. She has been awarded The Poetry Society of South Carolina’s Marjorie E. Peale Prize and Kinloch Rivers Memorial Prize. Her poems have appeared in several anthologies.
Cosponsored by
Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Coastal Carolina University &
The Poetry Society of South Carolina
___________________________________
For further info about the featured poets, contact Susan Meyers, bardowl2@aol.com
Check out the Litchfield Tea & Poetry Series group on Facebook.
Please join us for these four free events,
our fifth year featuring a whole slate of talented poets.
Litchfield Tea & Poetry Series
First Thursday, Jan. – Apr.
3 - 4 p.m.
Waccamaw Higher Education Center
160 Willbrook Boulevard
Pawleys Island, SC 29585
Book signing after the reading
Refreshments: homemade confections by Deloris Roberts
Free & open to the public
843-234-3422
Jan. 6 Launch of Poetry Anthology – Kickoff reading for OLLI at CCU anthology
Join us for a reading by contributors of the newly released OLLI at CCU poetry anthology, Journey-Work of the Sea. Foreword by poet Dan Albergotti, cover art by photographer Phil Wilkinson. A wide range of poems written by students from recent classes and workshops taught by Libby Bernardin and Susan Meyers. Good reason to celebrate!
Contributors: Patricia Tanner Candal * Suzy Clancy * John Eveleigh * Sally Z. Hare * Charlotte E. Hedler * Helen Hilliard * Robert O. Jones * Michelle M. Ott * Sherby McGrath * Carol Peters * Annie Pott * Susan A. Scheno * George R. Sharwell * James M. Siegrist * Nancy Dew Taylor * Libby Bernardin * Susan Meyers
Feb. 3 Ken Autrey, Debra A. Daniel
Ken Autrey, of Columbia, is the author of the chapbook Pilgrims (Main Street Rag). His poems have appeared in Atlanta Review, Cimarron Review, Poetry Northwest, and elsewhere, including various anthologies. He teaches English at Francis Marion University. Previously, he served as a Peace Corps teacher in Ghana and a visiting professor at Hiroshima University in Japan.
Debra A. Daniel is the author of As Is (Main Street Rag, 2009). She was twice SC Arts Commission’s Poetry Fellow. She has also won the Guy Owen Prize and awards from the Poetry Society of SC and has been a Pushcart nominee. Her work has appeared in Smokelong, Kakalak, Emrys, Pequin.org, Inkwell, Southern Poetry Review, Tar River Poetry, and The Poetry Society of SC Yearbook. She and her husband Jack McGregor will also entertain us with their music.
Mar. 3 Ann Herlong-Bodman, Richard Allen Taylor
Ann Herlong-Bodman, of Mt. Pleasant, is the author of the chapbook Pulled Out of Sleep (Pudding House Press, 2010). She taught journalism and composition at USC and Lander University. She has also taught ESL in East Europe for the U.S. State Department, and she currently volunteers as an ESL teacher when she is not traveling and writing.
Richard Allen Taylor, of Charlotte, NC, is the author of Punching Through the Egg of Space (2010) and Something to Read on the Plane (2004), both from Main Street Rag Publishing Company. His poems have appeared in many literary journals and anthologies. He is a former co-editor of Kakalak: Anthology of Carolina Poets.
Apr. 7 Scott Owens, Susan Finch Stevens
Author of six collections of poetry, Scott Owens is editor of Wild Goose Poetry Review, Vice President of the Poetry Council of NC, and recipient of awards from the Pushcart Prize Anthology and the Academy of American Poets, among others. He holds an MFA from UNC Greensboro and teaches at Catawba Valley Community College.
Susan Finch Stevens, of the Isle of Palms, is the author of the chapbook Lettered Bones, a winner in the 2008 Poetry Initiative of South Carolina Competition. She has been awarded The Poetry Society of South Carolina’s Marjorie E. Peale Prize and Kinloch Rivers Memorial Prize. Her poems have appeared in several anthologies.
Cosponsored by
Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Coastal Carolina University &
The Poetry Society of South Carolina
___________________________________
For further info about the featured poets, contact Susan Meyers, bardowl2@aol.com
Check out the Litchfield Tea & Poetry Series group on Facebook.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Review of Richard Allen Taylor's "Punching through the Egg of Space"
Review of Punching through the Egg of Space, by Richard Allen Taylor
Main Street Rag, 2010, 75 pages, $14
ISBN: 9781599482385
Sometimes it’s easy to make singular statements about a book of poems. Perhaps the poems in the book cohere around a single narrative, theme, or style. Such singular statements, however, while convenient, usually accurate, and sometimes even helpful, often belie a vital variety and richness in the poems that make them much less artificial than the critical singular statement suggests.
The poems in Richard Allen Taylor’s new collection, Punching through the Egg of Space, vigorously resist any such singular classification, which is not to say that the volume lacks cohesion. There are several currents that run throughout the poems. There are, for example, a significant number of poems about food, writing, and aging. But it would be grossly misleading to say that the book is about any one or even all three of these topics. There are also a number of poems about being Richard Allen Taylor, which within the literary historical context of Confessionalism the reader understands as being about being human. In fact, one of the many strengths of this text is the seamlessness with which Taylor makes us recognize ourselves in poems that seem to be about him. Nevertheless, to say that Punching through the Egg of Space is Confessionalist would also be unfairly and unnecessarily reductionist.
Tony Abbott says this “is a book of joyous affirmation.” Ann Campanella says it is “a song of joy.” And Anne Hicks says “these poems contemplate the role and responsibility of the individual in this world.” They are all right, of course, but neither life nor these poems are simple enough to be described in such singular statements, and recognizing this, Campanella adds that the book is about “the paradox of the human heart” and presents “a constellation of humor, gravity, and exuberance.” It is exactly this combination of qualities that makes Punching through the Egg of Space such an enjoyable read. These are poems written about what it feels like to be alive in the 21st century, a topic immediately relevant to any reader today. As such there is often humor, sadness, irony, philosophical musing, conviction, the loss of conviction, complete uncertainty, surprise, sentimentality, and throughout it all an unmistakable humanity.
Speaking of one friend to another recently I said of the former that he is “a real guy.” I couldn’t possibly explain what I meant by the phrase, but from these poems I suspect Richard Allen Taylor embodies exactly that quality, a real guy who happens to be very good at finding the perfect word and the perfect image to help the rest of us understand what he means.
I thought I would quote a number of poems to make my points in this review, existential lines about the value of effort in “Landing” and “Outbound,” about the irony of success in “After the Moonwalk,” lines illustrating Taylor’s remarkable imagery in “Moonrise -- North Buncombe County, NC” or “Fancying I Know More about Soil Erosion Than the Artist,” lines revealing Taylor’s perspective on writing in “Obscurity,” “White,” or “Token Rebellion,” but lacking the space to give all the deserving poems, lines, and images their due, I will instead conclude with an excerpt of “Playing Catch,” my own favorite poem from the collection and allow it to serve as a teaser to encourage you to read more:
Watch this kid. He throws the ball
across the plate, chases it to the backstop,
hurries back to the pitcher’s mound,
throws the ball again and again, shouting
gentle encouragements.
A munchkin in a Yankees cap, she just stands there,
never swings the bat, shows no interest in hitting.
. . . . . . . . . . //
I try to remember what it was like
to be learning the fundamentals--
love, heartbreak, sacrifice.
This kid makes all his errors
on the giving side, and I root for him.
Main Street Rag, 2010, 75 pages, $14
ISBN: 9781599482385
Sometimes it’s easy to make singular statements about a book of poems. Perhaps the poems in the book cohere around a single narrative, theme, or style. Such singular statements, however, while convenient, usually accurate, and sometimes even helpful, often belie a vital variety and richness in the poems that make them much less artificial than the critical singular statement suggests.
The poems in Richard Allen Taylor’s new collection, Punching through the Egg of Space, vigorously resist any such singular classification, which is not to say that the volume lacks cohesion. There are several currents that run throughout the poems. There are, for example, a significant number of poems about food, writing, and aging. But it would be grossly misleading to say that the book is about any one or even all three of these topics. There are also a number of poems about being Richard Allen Taylor, which within the literary historical context of Confessionalism the reader understands as being about being human. In fact, one of the many strengths of this text is the seamlessness with which Taylor makes us recognize ourselves in poems that seem to be about him. Nevertheless, to say that Punching through the Egg of Space is Confessionalist would also be unfairly and unnecessarily reductionist.
Tony Abbott says this “is a book of joyous affirmation.” Ann Campanella says it is “a song of joy.” And Anne Hicks says “these poems contemplate the role and responsibility of the individual in this world.” They are all right, of course, but neither life nor these poems are simple enough to be described in such singular statements, and recognizing this, Campanella adds that the book is about “the paradox of the human heart” and presents “a constellation of humor, gravity, and exuberance.” It is exactly this combination of qualities that makes Punching through the Egg of Space such an enjoyable read. These are poems written about what it feels like to be alive in the 21st century, a topic immediately relevant to any reader today. As such there is often humor, sadness, irony, philosophical musing, conviction, the loss of conviction, complete uncertainty, surprise, sentimentality, and throughout it all an unmistakable humanity.
Speaking of one friend to another recently I said of the former that he is “a real guy.” I couldn’t possibly explain what I meant by the phrase, but from these poems I suspect Richard Allen Taylor embodies exactly that quality, a real guy who happens to be very good at finding the perfect word and the perfect image to help the rest of us understand what he means.
I thought I would quote a number of poems to make my points in this review, existential lines about the value of effort in “Landing” and “Outbound,” about the irony of success in “After the Moonwalk,” lines illustrating Taylor’s remarkable imagery in “Moonrise -- North Buncombe County, NC” or “Fancying I Know More about Soil Erosion Than the Artist,” lines revealing Taylor’s perspective on writing in “Obscurity,” “White,” or “Token Rebellion,” but lacking the space to give all the deserving poems, lines, and images their due, I will instead conclude with an excerpt of “Playing Catch,” my own favorite poem from the collection and allow it to serve as a teaser to encourage you to read more:
Watch this kid. He throws the ball
across the plate, chases it to the backstop,
hurries back to the pitcher’s mound,
throws the ball again and again, shouting
gentle encouragements.
A munchkin in a Yankees cap, she just stands there,
never swings the bat, shows no interest in hitting.
. . . . . . . . . . //
I try to remember what it was like
to be learning the fundamentals--
love, heartbreak, sacrifice.
This kid makes all his errors
on the giving side, and I root for him.
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