The Shout-Outs Cometh April 15, 2010: It’s the middle of Poetry Month, so I think we’re obligated to send some love to the poets and their books. This was always one of my favorite posts when I did Harriet back in the day: it’s not exactly like getting singled out from the general audience on The Price is Right, but hey, people of the profession with few monetary rewards are [...] by Rigoberto González

Empty Theaters Not Yet Swept April 13, 2010: I remember running into a review copy of Robin Robertson’s Mortification: Writers’ Stories of their Public Shame a few years back and R.O.F.L.M.A.O. It was a hilarious read--poets and writers with very recognizable names told their ultimate tales of woe: no one showed up to the reading, co-readers over-read or had considerably longer lines [...] by Rigoberto González

Tings April 13, 2010: Emerson apparently wrote to a student or former student of his and instructed him not to get overly involved with his reading so as to be able to move with enough rapidity through any number of other reading possibilities, to go into books looking for the material needed, get it and get out, often enough, so as to keep moving. (more...) by Anselm Berrigan

April 11, 2010: Allison Cobb has written a terrific book on, through, and with the Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn. The book, Green-Wood, an instantly compelling and fluid read I’m finding thus far, made of prose and poetry driven by a thoroughly researched and idiosyncratic historical sensibility in combination with six years’ worth of daily walks through [...] by Anselm Berrigan

BURN THIS February 7, 2010: I threw the book into a dark garden and let it, all that winter, rot; retrieving it before the weather turned, to transcribe what was legible.  Though I considered burning it, I threw the notebook, instead, into the bin.  (Then, feeling guilty, plucked it out and put it in the recycling instead.)  Some notes on retrieval, on the circulatory and [...] by Bhanu Kapil

Two more (cups of coffee then I’ll go) January 11, 2010: Why do so many readers at poetry readings announce having two poems left to read? When I signed my contract to become a poet there was no clause as to this matter, (more...) by Anselm Berrigan

“She is mirage I feverishly address as specific” November 20, 2009: Spent some time in a clinic today, the waiting turning into an interesting duration (every time I encounter the word duration I think of Kenneth Koch staring off into space during an interview saying, “everything lasts a certain period of time….that’s very odd”) (more...) by Anselm Berrigan

Buffer Zone Galactica November 6, 2009: Reading with Will Alexander at the Poetry Project recently was a fabulous experience. One of the layers I walked away with was his between-poem chatter-as-parable. (more...) by Edwin Torres

a question on hearing November 4, 2009: I’ll be heading to Tulsa, Oklahoma tomorrow to take part in The Tulsa School Conference & Literary Festival that Grant Jenkins has organized through The University of Tulsa. Never been there, but my father, Ted Berrigan, was stationed in Tulsa after the Korean War and wound up enrolling in TU via the G.I. Bill. (more...) by Anselm Berrigan

Poetry and Narrative in Performance, part II October 31, 2009: (note: this is part II of a 1996 letter from the late Doug Oliver on his book Poetry and Narrative in Performance) So we can say: “The ‘neutral’ or ‘unmarked’ tune is that which the words would assume for an average voice in a given dialect when no special emphasis is given to the line, providing there were absolute agreement between [...] by Anselm Berrigan