It’s going to be a festival for sure. The best kind, a small press poetry festival! Following on the heels of last year’s successful event, the Midwest Small Press Festival is back with year #2. Kicking things off this year are our friends Cathy Wagner and Dana Ward (who, coincidentally, are standing right here at [...]

True story! The archives of famed songwriter, social activist, and one of our favorite poets, Woody Guthrie, have migrated from Mount Kisco, New York, to Tulsa, Oklahoma, as reported on National Public Radio today. The move is owed, in part, to a phone call from a nurse who worked in the State Hospital for the [...]

Part 2 Ganga was sunken, and the limp leaves Waited for rain, while the black clouds Gathered far distant, over Himavant. The jungle crouched, humped in silence. Then spoke the thunder DA –T.S. Eliot, from The Waste Land In the Brihadaranyaka from the Upanishads, the syllable DA, uttered by Brahma, is a profound lesson to [...]

The current issue of Typo Mag, #18, features all Venezuelan writing in translation, thanks to the efforts of guest editor Guillermo Parra. Spanning the years from 1921 to 2001, and with the aid of translators Sara Bilandzija, Anne Boyer, Parra himself, and Cedar Sigo, it’s a diverse and amazing heap of material. An excerpt from [...]

How did we only now see this? A good one: Vancouver poet, novelist, and scholar Clint Burnham (we’ve been digging his book on the Kootenay School, The Only Poetry That Matters) has reviewed Laura Elrick’s Propagation (Kenning Editions 2013) for Lemon Hound. “It seems to me that the messing that Laura Elrick does with words [...]

The Poetry Foundation is pleased to announce Don Share as the next editor of Poetry magazine. Share will begin his tenure July 1, 2013, as the magazine’s 12th editor in its 101-year history, following the departure of his longtime colleague, outgoing editor Christian Wiman. Currently senior editor of the magazine, Share, 56, brings 25 years [...]

We’re not the only ones curious about how poets get their read on. Over at the Drunken Boat, Graham Foust is dishing out titles he’s been reading lately. For instance: While the retrograde formalist in me resists the idea of biographies, I do tend to read a lot of them. I’ve got two going right [...]

That’s right! Acclaimed playwright Sarah Ruhl’s newest play opens this weekend at Berkeley Repertory Theatre and it’s based on the three-decades-long letter correspondences between poets, Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell. As Berkeley Repertory Theatre states on its website: Sarah Ruhl and Les Waters, acclaimed collaborators who created Eurydice, In the Next Room (or the vibrator [...]

Put down your cheese danish: William Fuller’s latest book, Quorum (Seagull Books 2013), is out! And the reviews are in. At The Quietus: “Where in the World is Quorum? On the Poetry of William Fuller,” by Maya Osborne, “Fuller is not interested in shouting a political message to the world; his writing is measured, restrained [...]

On Friday, April 5th I found myself in the wrong rust belt city, surrounded by the wrong group of rust belt poets. I was in Cleveland when I was supposed to be getting ready to write an “Open Door” feature on the 2013 Buffalo Small Press Book Fair. Like John Carter of Mars, I found [...]

Yes, our Harriet summer reading series is popping off starting tomorrow with Cathy Wagner and Dana Ward! We’re opening the doors at 6:30 pm at the PoFo, reading to commence at the strike of 7:00. All ye need to know can be found here.

This just in: a new exploratory work from Jennifer Karmin, entitled 4000 Words 4000 Dead & Revolutionary Optimism / An American Elegy: 2006-2012. It’s not solely authored, however, and is a companion piece to Revolutionary Optimism, “a response to Abu Ghraib based on confessions from Iraqi prisoners, sympathy cards, and The Tibetan Book of the [...]

The New York Times reports on the passing of Kim Merker, publisher of fine-press poetry editions and champion of emerging poets, some of whom would go on to receive major literary awards. From the Times: For four decades, using presses he operated with his own inky hands, Mr. Merker was a designer, typesetter and printer [...]

Part 1 Brahma, the Creator, had three groups of offspring: gods, human beings, and demons. After observing great penance and austerity necessary for their spiritual practice, the three groups went to Brahma seeking instruction. The Great Creator instructed them to listen carefully. He uttered the syllable da. He asked if the gods had understood his [...]

What to read next? Check out Patrick James Dunagan’s gorgeous review of Joanne Kyger’s fantastic new chaplet, 2012. Published by Blue Press in 2013, Kyger’s “journal-like suite of nine poems” exists in a meticulously organized grounded-ness, presenting stunning variations on the everyday, as it exists surrounding her home in Bolinas, California. Dunagan’s review sheds light [...]

Michael Robbins describes his experience writing an alternative inaugural poem for Yahoo! News on the eve of Barack Obama’s second term in this piece published on the Los Angeles Review of Books site. When Robbins sent his inaugural poem to Yahoo! News, editorial’s responses said more about the state of politics in the United States [...]

Before we sign off for the Memorial Day long weekend (yes, we get away from the internets from time to time), we wanted to end the week with a little love, that is, some BJ Love! Episode 5 of his Pretty Lit podcast series features a mash-up of poetry and tunes (perfect beach material). Cutting [...]

Poetry and theater are necking in the coat closet again–if you’re in New York on June 3, check out the CUNY Graduate Center Segal Theatre’s latest extraordinary programming, “Poetry in Theatre: Early Frank O’Hara + Plays by Contemporary Poets, with Judith Malina,” which features Ariana Reines & Jim Fletcher, Kenneth Goldsmith, Bob Holman, Yusef Komunyakaa; [...]

Every poet’s favorite story writer, Lydia Davis, has won the Booker International Prize, reports the New York Times: Lydia Davis, the American writer known for her very short stories, has been awarded the Man Booker International Prize. The award, announced in London on Wednesday, is given every two years to a living author for “an [...]

Poets and publishers, CJ Martin and Julia Drescher, are two of many currently experiencing the aftershocks of last week’s tornado that ripped through Oklahoma and Texas. Martin and his partner, Julia Drescher, are asking for your help as they assist CJ’s mom, who is uninsured and suffered life-threatening injuries as a result of the storm, [...]