Tomorrow!

Please join us for…

POETRY in EDMONDS

Jennifer Bullis

Dennis Caswell

David D. Horowitz

Erika Michael

Bethany Reid

 

Thurs., Apr. 16th, 6:30 p.m.

Edmonds Bookshop

111 Fifth Ave. S., Edmonds, Washington

425-775-2789

E-mail: David, rosealleypress@juno.com

URL: http://www.edmondsbookshop.com

http://www.rosealleypress.com

Jennifer Bullis: Impossible Lessons (MoonPath, 2013)

Dennis Caswell: Phlogiston (Floating Bridge, 2012)

David D. Horowitz: Cathedral and Highrise (Rose Alley, 2015)

Erika Michael: art historian, poet, taught at OSU and UPS

Bethany Reid: Sparrow (Big Pencil, 2012)

 

This reading is free and open to the public.

Readings During National Poetry Month

Hello! I get to join two amazing lineups of poets for April readings in the Seattle area. I plan to read some bird and horse poems, some Amanda Bubble poems, some mythological persona poems, and possibly a new prose poem about a goat named Derrick. Please come if you can!

April 6, I’ll be part of a Floating Bridge Press reading at the Fremont Library featuring Dennis Caswell and Michael Schmeltzer. Their manuscripts were among the finalists for last year’s Floating Bridge Press Chapbook Award, and somehow my manuscript, Amanda Bubble Is Nearly on Fire, was also one of them. Dennis Caswell’s 2012 collection Phlogiston was published by Floating Bridge, and Michael Schmeltzer’s poetry manuscripts have had near brushes with winning a number of highly competitive awards. I’ve had the pleasure of reading with Michael twice this past year, and this month, I’ll get to read twice with Dennis!

…because on April 16, when I read at Edmonds Book Shop, the lineup again includes Dennis, along with Bethany Reid (one of my other favorite poets to read with and author of Sparrow, one of my favorite poetry books of 2012), Erika Michael, and David Horowitz, editor at Rose Alley Press and author of the brand-new collection Cathedral and Highrise. So much poetry to enjoy!

Here are the relevant particulars:

Monday, April 6: Floating Bridge Press reading at the Fremont Library, 731 N. 35th St., Seattle, 6:30 p.m. (here are directions and map)

Thursday, April 16: Poetry in Edmonds at Edmonds Book Shop, 111 5th Avenue South, Edmonds, WA, 6:30 p.m. (here are directions and map link)

Please help me to spread the word, and I hope to see you around during Poetry Month!

Gratitude for Words of Encouragement

Joannie Stangeland’s latest collection of poetry (Ravenna Press, 2014)

Many, many thanks to Seattle poet, editor, and winemaker Joannie Stangeland for her write-up of Impossible Lessons as her Saturday Poetry Pick yesterday! Her lovely words are here.

In a wonderful coincidence, I’ve been reading her new book, In Both Hands. The poems there are haunting, replete with precise images of beauty and loss. I’m falling in love with, and going to school on, these incredible poems.

Be sure to read another recent post of Joannie’s, in which she describes her current writing projects.

Poetry Readings This Week

Heather Curtis, Jennifer Bullis, Shannon Laws at Village Books, Fairhaven

I get to do two readings in the next four days. With five other poets! Please join us for one or both of these events:

Saturday, April 5, 7:00 p.m. at Village Books, Bellingham. This will be the Bellingham launch of Anacortes poet Heather Curtis’s first collection of poems, Upon Waking. To join Heather in celebrating her book during National Poetry Month, Village Books has invited Shannon Laws, author of the poetry collection Madrona Grove, and me to read with her.

Monday, April 7, 6:45 p.m. at Seattle Public Library, Fremont Branch. Sylvia Byrne Pollack, Michael Schmeltzer, and I will participate in this reading organized by Floating Bridge Press.

Hope to see you there!

Cheers,
Jennifer

Readings During National Poetry Month

I’ve been invited to participate in three different poetry events in April, all within the span of 12 days! I’m very excited to get to share poems from Impossible Lessons, as well as some new material, at the following readings:

Saturday, April 5, 7:00 p.m. at Village Books in Bellingham. This will be the Bellingham launch of Anacortes poet Heather Curtis’s first collection of poems, Upon Waking. To join Heather in celebrating her book during National Poetry Month, Village Books has invited Shannon Laws, author of the poetry collection Madrona Grove, and me to read with her.

Monday, April 7, 6:45 p.m. at Seattle Public Library, Fremont Branch. Sylvia Byrne Pollack, Michael Schmeltzer, and I will participate in this reading organized by Floating Bridge Press.

Thursday, April 17, 7:00 p.m. at Cafe Zippy in Everett. I’ll be the featured reader at Everett Poetry Nite, which includes music and open mic.

More details to follow!

Cheers,
Jennifer

Poetry on the Radio

Poetic Moments at KMRE 102.3 Bellingham

Bellingham, WA poet Shannon Laws, under her radio name Boosie Vox, has added a new feature titled “Poetic Moments” to her radio show on the local KMRE station. In between “Golden Age of Radio” music segments, audio recordings of local poets reading their work are randomly aired. Shannon devoted countless hours during November and December recording Bellingham-area poets. Shannon produced the recordings and prepared them for broadcast. All of them are assembled here on Boosie Vox’s Sound Cloud; please have fun browsing this large and wonderful sample of poetry audio by many poets dear and near to me!

I’m honored that Shannon recorded four of my poems from Impossible Lessons. Here’s “Strange Bird,” which originally appeared in Cascadia Review. For some reason, I can’t embed the audio in this post, so please click on the fifth recording down to listen!

STRANGE BIRD

What bird are you? Hawk-shaped, gray,
tail striped and neck ringed in white,
you hover and swoop, low, a few feet above
the hay stubble, spying for mice.

Once, you dart down,
scramble in the grass, lost to my view
as you sate your raptor’s appetite on some
ground-bound creature.

But if hunting’s your purpose, why
do you round me in your orbits,
line me in your sights, between flights
to the field’s far corners? What am I to you?

I wonder further, amble the field—
then you return again, hover,
and drop this poem
into my mouth.

Recap of Reading at SoulFood Poetry Night

Bethany Reid at SoulFood
January 16, 2014

I had a wonderful time co-featuring with Bethany Reid at SoulFood Poetry Night last Thursday. Many thanks to series co-curators Michael Dylan Welch and Tanya McDonald, who created a wonderful atmosphere for sharing poetry. Thanks, too, to SoulFood Coffee House, home of Victoria the Espresso Machine. And much gratitude to Bethany, who provides the play-by-play and many kind words here. Have I told you how much I adore her collection, Sparrow?

Tomorrow! Reading with Bethany Reid at SoulFood in Redmond

Bethany Reid

For my friends in the Seattle area and East Side, a reminder that I’ll be reading with Bethany Reid at SoulFood Poetry Night–tomorrow, Thursday, January 16–in Redmond, WA, at 7:00 p.m.

Bethany is the author of Sparrow, winner of the 2012 Gell Prize. Her poems are beautiful, and she reads them with loveliness and warmth.

SoulFood Coffee House is at 15748 Redmond Way (click here for directions). Please join us there for an evening of poetry! Bring a poem of your own, too, for the open mic, which begins at 8:00.

Tomorrow! Reading at Village Books with Kathryn Hunt, 7:00 p.m.

Kathryn Hunt, Author of Long Way Through Ruin

One more reminder: tomorrow, Saturday the 11th, is the evening I’ll be reading with Port Townsend poet and filmmaker Kathryn Hunt. I hope to see you there!

Also at Village Books, at 4:00 p.m., Ann Gerike and Hannah Faith Notess will be reading from their new poetry chapbooks published by Floating Bridge Press. There’ll be time between their reading and ours for conversation, book browsing, and dinner in Fairhaven. Why not make an evening of it?

Village Books
1200 11th Street
Bellingham, WA 98225
(360) 671-2626
www.villagebooks.com

Reading with Bethany Reid on Thursday, January 16, in Redmond

Sparrow: Poems by Bethany Reid

I’m thankful for an abundance of opportunities to share poetry in the New Year. Next week, I get to participate in the SoulFood Poetry Night at Soul Food Coffee House in Redmond, Washington. I’ll be reading with Bethany Reid, whom I also had the privilege of interviewing for the Blog Hop last February. She’s author of the poetry collection  Sparrow, which won the Gell Prize in 2012.

The poems in Sparrow are gorgeous. Bethany writes about growing up on her family’s cattle farm, about her daughters and horses (I especially love her poems about horses)–and in language that’s precise, original, and felt by the body. I got to hear her read some of the poems in Bellingham last October, and her voice lends these poems an even-more pleasurable presence.

SoulFood Coffee House is located at 15748 Redmond Way; click here for map and directions. Our reading will start at 7:00, followed by an open mic at 8:00. Please join us if you can!