10/12/2014 1 Comment Cross-Tie 10.13.14: Ploughshares
1 Comment
9/21/2014 0 Comments Cross-Tie 9.21.14: Judy HalebskySusan Kelly-Dewitt writes, "The poet I admire (one of the many! but I especially love her and her work) is Judy Halebsky--I wrote a blurb for her new book Tree Line which pretty much sums up how I feel about her poetry." Read Halebsky's poem, "Dark Matter, Pine Trees, Eternity, Room 205" at failbetter.com. A poet who has become a great source of inspiration to me is Francesca Bell. I met Francesca when she read two poems this past spring during the open mic portion of Rivertown Poets, a monthly series I host in Petaluma. After hearing a few samples of her work, I booked Francesca as a feature poet on the spot. Francesca's work is lean, honest, and tremendously powerful. Because it is consciously spare, it cuts close to the heart and bone. You can read some of her work at francescabellpoet.com. -- Sandra Anfang 8/31/2014 0 Comments Cross-Tie 8.31.14: Jeanine Stevens"Jeanine Stevens's poems drop the reader right into the space she creates with sound and texture. Jeanine's poems are smart, full, and precise. I chose "Moonshadow" for Yoga Stanza. More of her poems can be found at Innisfree, Tipton, and other journals. Jeanine's most recent collection is Sailing on Milkweed (Cherry Grove)." -- Alexa Mergen Carol Lee Sanchez was a poet, a teacher and activist. You will generally find her work in bookstores under Native American poetry, but stylistically she could best be described as a surrealist. She used to run the poetry readings at the Coffee Galleria in North Beach, San Francisco, and was the first person to put many of the old Beats on stage to read. She was my mentor and my hero, and when I miss her too badly I pull out one of her books and read and find her there. Carol Lee was Laguna, among other things, and was raised in Laguna territory, with all of those stories and languages and world views. Sanchez was never afraid of complexity and embraced all of her background, all of her languages, and all of her inspirations in a way that I try to bring into my work as well. She found herself in California where she led the Pegasus Project out of San Francisco State University, and into being a more fully formed program called California Poets in the Schools, which puts working poets into classrooms. Her writing, in which she tells her own stories, is available from Taurean Horn Press. Her other work moves forward in every student and mentee she worked with in her long and fruitful career. -- Kim Shuck 8/17/2014 0 Comments There's Gold in That There PoetryCathy Barber, WTR poet of the week, recommends work by Molly Spencer, whose recent poetry focuses on the narrative of a gold rush bride. Barber writes: Molly Spencer's poetry is complex and honest, and her blog is funny and informative. She lives in the San Francisco Bay area, and her recent work has appeared or is forthcoming in Beloit Poetry Journal, Cave Wall, Linebreak, and Heron Tree. Work from her chapbook of persona poems The Mail Order Bride Learns to Tie Knots is currently circulating. She blogs about poetry, the writing life, and parenthood at The Stanza and is a teacher-in-training for California Poets in the Schools. 8/11/2014 0 Comments Turn to Poetry"The first year, we were like paper, tearable yet unwritten." This week WTR recommends Turn by Wendy Chin-Tanner, published by Sibling Rivalry Press. Chin-Tanner's poems of girlhood, marriage, mothering, and overcoming are face-slappingly fresh. You can find a couple of her poems at Melusine and order Turn at Sibling Rivalry Press. 8/4/2014 0 Comments To Be Read: Cynthia Dewi OkaPoet of the week, Lizz Huerta, writes: "The poet I admire is Cynthia Dewi Oka. Her first poetry collection, Nomad of Salt and Hard Water came out in 2012. I met Cynthia in 2009 at the VONA workshop for writers of color. As soon as I heard her read a couple of her poems I knew I wanted to read more. Her work is an incredible dance between ferocity and vulnerability. She writes these beautiful pieces wrought with personal narrative, mythology and politics. There is a musicality to her work that is dizzying at times, and I find myself re-reading certain lines just for the sound of them. She is a important voice, one that sings, moves, transforms."
7/21/2014 1 Comment A Poet to Watch: Kathleen KilcupPoet of the week, Krista Lukas, suggests that WTR readers check out the work of up-and-coming poet, Kathleen Kilcup. Lukas writes, "Kilcup writes remarkable poems of personal and spiritual insight, poems that are by turns elegaic, reverent, and pensive. Having published many of her poems in literary magazines, she is at work on her first full-length collection, a book I most certainly look forward to!" Read Kilcup's poem, "Freedom," at The Poet's Billow. 7/14/2014 0 Comments Meet Nicole WilsonPoet of the week, Kristen Orser, writes: "Nicole Wilson's work asks strange questions. It asks those questions that creep up on you when you are starting to sleep or starting to wake, when you are between, and the world is blurry. In this way, Wilson's work is wondrous. She gives uncertainty as a twin to knowledge and works out formulas for the many ways knowing and unknowing happen all at once. As a reader of Wilson's work, I am stunned by what is packed into the space of her poems; and how, with all that packing, there is breathing, white space, room to spread out and think alongside the words as they happen. Perhaps that is the merit of Wilson's work: it's happening. It is living in the world—in the difficulty of coming to think and say something clearly—and in the presence of the reader. It is all very instant, very playful and difficult. " This week's contributor, Connie Post, is reading Lynne Knight. Knight is the author of four full-length poetry collections, most recently Again, published by Sixteen Rivers Press. Read her poem, "Body in Late Meditation" at Verse Daily. 6/30/2014 0 Comments Maria Hummel's House & FireOur poet of the week, Dana Koster, suggests you check out Maria Hummel's work. Koster writes, "I recently read Hummel's first book, House and Fire, and it utterly blew me away. Her work is spare and haunting, and I think anyone who loves poetry should pick up a copy."
Find a sampling of Hummel's poetry at Connotation Press. 6/21/2014 0 Comments francine j. harrisAt WTR, we ask our contributors to tell us about other women poets whose work our readers might enjoy reading. Arisa White suggests we all check out francine j. harris:
Harris's debut collection, allegiance, is fabulous: Strong images, surprising twists in narrative, long lines that remind me of Whitman, with an honesty that splits the world open. -- Arisa White Read harris's poem, "katherine with the lazy eye. short. and not a good poet" at Rattle. |
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