splattered earth makes its (triumphant?) return

FANFARE!!

I've finally printed new copies of my first chapbook, splattered earth. This means online sales are open again (the price will stay the same despite the bonus poem - what a steal).

They are $3.25 online (including S&H, North America only), $2.00 at Magpie Magazines and People's Co-op Bookstore (both on Commercial Drive), and $1.50 in person - a buck each if you want 3 or more.

Oh! And The Dalhousie Review provided me with a whack of copies of my poem "viciously in our throats", which appeared in their last issue. So, as a bonus item, the first nine sales will include a copy of "viciously". I'm planning on including the poem in my next chapbook, child of saturday, so it's a sneak preview of sorts...

Still not convinced that you should buy seventeen copies? Want more info on the chapbook? The details are here.

Oh, and now that I have a scanner, I can bring you a sample page. How exciting!

Click on the image to enlarge it (and thanks to iamb for originally publishing this poem waaay back in early 2006, when the top of my skull was still soft).

new issue o' red fez

The second issue of Red Fez with me involved on the editing side (17th overall) is now out. Take a look here.

My recommendations are all the kings horses by Jeff Van Den Engh, been down ta Las Cruces by Mike Marcellino, and Voracious by Ryan Dilbert.

Goooooooooo, Red Fez!

Newlove review

My review of the new John Newlove selected poems that I've been nattering on about is now online, and can be read here.

Thanks, Peak. Your website may look just like every other newspaper's now - but they don't have your mildly terrifying green backdrop!

the violet depths

i swim under the blankets to her
in what today is her ocean
(it is often only mine, my head
a solitary, bobbing tugboat
bellowing its foghorn and
peering through the dark
for shore)

but here in her aquamarine sea
she is a sunken galleon devoured
by coral - she is soft at the corners,
with barely a hint of human intention

unlike the tug with which i pull
the covers aside and transform
her into her ocean’s coastline,
her purple underwear an oil spill
i’d gladly spend a lifetime scrubbing
away (with a toothbrush)

which i tell her, causing her to laugh
and shake a wave upon her shore
where i’ve since nestled in, feet
buried in the sand, dreaming lazily
of the violet depths.


- from the Winter 07/08 issue of One Cool Word

the events are just pissing down right now

Well, it is Vancouver...

Here are four more things:


1. Submission Call for Rocksalt: An Anthology of Contemporary British Columbian Poetry

Like the Vancouver project I mentioned earlier, this is an idea that hasn't been tested out in a long time - so it's exciting to see. The e-mail/blog tree system is working well on this one, as I've heard about it from all over the place. Zach Wells has the submission guidelines on his blog, and the general info on the project can be found here.


2. High Altitude Open Mic

High Altitude Poetry is hosting an Open Mic on February 26th at 7 PM at the Highland Pub, SFU Burnaby Campus. It's free and fun. Be there.

They will also be running a Production Line in the residence buildings on Wednesday (the 13th) from 10 AM - 1 PM. They are always fun, so if you happen to be on campus...


3. Memewar issue launch + Short Line

The folks at Memewar are at it again. They are launching their fifth issue on Feb. 21st, 9 PM, at the Railway Club.

Five days later (the same night as the HAP event - these tough decisions...) they are hosting another Short Line reading at the same place. Here's the info on that one.


4. Pirates!

Not poetry-related, but a good friend is hosting this fan-damn-tastic party on the 22nd. Check it out.

i have a scanner!

I'm sure I'll find a practical use for it soon. Until then, here's Memewar's awesome design for my poem "The Next Great Proletarian Revolution"...



Mao playing Ping-Pong (look at that focus!), from my copy of the Little Red Book...



and, lastly, the back page of "Biography of Ghana Leaders" (worth every on of the fifty cents I payed for it). I have little clue what most of this has to do with Ghanaian political leaders, though I suspect the answer is somehow related to witchcraft...or dwarves...

last o' the dead poets

As I mentioned previously, Upstart Crow Books is closing down in March. Before then, however, they're gunna slip one more Dead Poets reading in. The last two were quite good, and this one looks to be, too - throw on top of that the 50% off on books and how can you refuse?

Here are the details:

The Night of the Dead Poets 3
Friday, February 15, 2008
7:30 PM

You’re invited to listen to six readers bringing poems from the past to your ears.

- Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins read by Elizabeth Bachinsky
- Poems of Pablo Neruda read by Fran Bourassa
- Poems of William Butler Yeats read by Harvey De Roo
- Poems of Robinson Jeffers read by Christopher Levenson
- Poems of Sylvia Plath read by Diane Tucker
- Poems of Gwendolyn MacEwen read by Sandy Shreve

Emcee: John Fisher

In each presentation you will hear a brief introduction to the poet followed by a reading of selected poems.

Upstart Crow Books, 238 Lonsdale Avenue, North Vancouver, is just a few blocks up from the Seabus. For more information, call 604-980-2769.

All books are 50% off the regular price.

keta month

This week marks the end of a five-week experiment over at One Ghana, One Voice. Our normal format is one poem, one profile per week - and it's usually fairly random stuff. We've mixed it up a couple times in the past, with a tribute issue and a roundtable discussion, but this is our first foray into a "theme issue" (of sorts).

Every week since the beginning of January we have been featuring poems on Keta, a town in South-Eastern Ghana that is slowly disappearing due to erosion from both the North (Keta Lagoon) and the South (the Atlantic). It's been disappearing for decades, and has only been kept alive through a series of only moderately successful government reclamation projects. Even so, when Marta and I visited last year, a good one-third of the town was under water.

Obviously, the image of Keta is loaded with metaphor, and most of Ghana's great poets have written about it, including Kwesi Brew, whose poem "The Sea Eats Our Lands" is this week's feature (and the first poem published by OGOV that wasn't specifically submitted to us).

It's been a very rewarding experience, and has produced two of the finest poems OGOV has featured to date:

Keta Stories by Prince Mensah
Without Roots by Edith Faalong

Future "months" on football, Kwame Nkrumah, and who knows what else, are already in the works, so if you like this, there's more to come.

Photo of Keta by Beth Knittle.

write. watch. listen.

Write:

This sounds awesome. Like Vancouver Poetry from way back in 1986, but with maps. The "Poems should ideally be a two-sonnet length" part is, well, strange, so who knows - but I still like the idea, and was once thinking of doing something similar myself...


Watch:

An all video poetry mag. Neat, eh?


Listen:

One Cool Word is launching its new issue - which apparently includes a poem of mine (not sure which...). Unfortunately, they are launching it at the same date and time as The Newlove-athon, which this kid has already pledged to attend.

They'll both be great events, so if you are in town, you should definitely take one of them in. In all likelihood the OCW party will involve more dancing, but I make no guarantees.

Here's a poster with the deets:



Listen 2:

Not only is this a second "Listen" entry, the poster is for two events. Incredible. Thanks to Commercial Drive - LIVE! for pointing this out: