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“Perfect disc of moon, huge / and simmering / low on the capital’s filthy horizon…” This installment from the Unamuno Poem Project video series features Francisco Aragón’s poem “City Moon,” recited in English by Joseph Fasano and in Spanish by Jorge García. Aragón’s new collection, After Rubén (Red Hen Press, 2020), is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
Submissions are open for the 2020 Catamaran Poetry Prize. Sponsored by the literary nonprofit Catamaran, whose mission is “to capture the vibrant and creative West Coast spirit,” the annual award is given for a poetry manuscript written by a poet living in California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, or Hawaii. The winning poet will receive $1,000 and their manuscript will be published by Catamaran.
Using only the online submission system, submit a poetry collection of 60 to 100 pages with a $35 entry fee by April 20. Poet, playwright, and translator Zack Rogow will judge. Visit the website for complete guidelines.
Finalists for the 2020 poetry prize will be announced on June 1. The winner will be announced by June 30, and their collection is expected to be published in November of this year. A book launch and reading, featuring the winner and finalists, will take place in the fall. Previous winners of the award are poets Susan Browne and Michelle Bitting.
“It was almost effortless. It was an amazing experience because it was as though the poems were writing me.” In this Poetry.LA interview from 2013, the late Wanda Coleman speaks about the moment she felt like a poet, her career as a soap opera writer, and how she finds enjoyment in writing. Wicked Enchantment: Selected Poems (Black Sparrow Press, 2020), a new collection of Coleman’s poetry edited by Joshua Bodwell and Terrance Hayes, is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
It gives me great pleasure to highlight the many aspects of the literary world that exist here in the Houston area through this blog. I feel it is important to keep this work going, especially now during this global crisis, to provide a sense of community as well as a little break from the news.
Starting this month, I’ll be writing about some of the publishing houses here in Houston, including Arte Público Press. Founded in 1979 by Nicolas Kanellos, Arte Público Press is the largest and most established publisher of Latino literature in the United States. Housed at the University of Houston, where Kanellos is a professor of Hispanic Studies, the press has helped launch the careers of notable authors like Sandra Cisneros, whose debut novel, The House on Mango Street, was published by the press; Miguel Piñero, who cofounded the Nuyorican Poets Café in New York City; and Obie Award–winning playwright Luis Valdez.
The press also launched the Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage Program to catalog lost Latinx writings from the American colonial period through 1960. They then branched out into bilingual books for children and young adults with their imprint Piñata Books.
Arte Público Press continues their mission to bring Hispanic literature to more audiences through their programs and books. They publish thirty books a year, so if you got the time, take a look at their massive catalog and consider ordering some of these wonderful books (including the recent release of Richard Z. Santos’s debut novel). Trust me, it’ll be worth your while.
Lupe Mendez is the literary outreach coordinator for Poets & Writers in Houston. Contact him at Houston@pw.org or on Twitter, @houstonpworg.“The shiver underneath / my ruined shirt, the worm / eating of things in the dirt / the dead and the living.” In this 2019 video taken during his residency at Further Troutbeck: The Poetry Society, Justin Phillip Reed reads “I Have Wasted My Life” from his second collection, The Malevolent Volume, out today from Coffee House Press.
“Caught in the rain today, I recall that couple kissing and holding each other infinitely close in the rain one dark evening under the nearly invisible trees,” wrote Paul Valéry in 1910, in a notebook included in The Idea of Perfection: The Poetry of Paul Valéry, translated from the French by Nathaniel Rudavsky-Brody and forthcoming from Farrar, Straus and Giroux this month. Draw inspiration from rainy scenes in poetry such as William Carlos Williams’s “Spring Storm,” Sara Teasdale’s “There Will Come Soft Rains,” and Emily Dickinson’s “Like Rain it sounded till it curved” and write a poem that captures a moment in the rain, one that seems quiet or private but also carries emotional weight. Is there something poignant, parallel, or contradictory between the subject of the poem and the themes of rebirth and renewal that are conventionally associated with springtime?
“The biggest challenge for me to accomplish any project is working to keep myself out of the way.” —Krista Franklin, author of Too Much Midnight
“I was so struck by ‘Snow Drops’—it became sort of my prayer toward healing.” Leila Chatti talks about her connection with Louise Glück’s Pulitzer Prize–winning collection, The Wild Iris, and reads the poem “Snow Drops” for the Poetry Foundation’s Ours Poetica video series.
Last week, I introduced the first half of my reading of How the Water Holds Me by Detroit poet Tariq Luthun. I am more than happy to say that I remained locked in as a reader all the way through and finished reading the collection. More memories pour out of this book from one poem to the next, and as I continued to read I began to notice the significance of parental figures. In reflection, this collection mentions the word “father” more times than any other collection I’ve read. The second half of this book is also where I felt I learned something about Luthun’s mother, who I found mentioned far less than his father.
“...she raises / her eyes from the dishes, / her hands up from the bath, / and gives / a gentle laugh, / a sigh, we make / du’a, we pray...”
I think this realization is very important to the entire collection and the concept of being “held” by water. It begs the question, “What is the water?” I am inclined to wonder if the water Luthun speaks of, in addition to the physical waters between Detroit and Palestine, are his family.
“I fear what becomes / of the family that feasts on pain.”
I highly recommend Luthun’s collection, which is forthcoming this month from Bull City Press and is currently available for pre-order. This has been a fantastic read to keep me company as the state of Michigan remains under a stay-at-home order.
If you are missing the sounds of live poetry, I am hosting a weekly virtual open mic for Citywide Poets on Instagram Live every Saturday at 3:00 PM EDT! Follow @citywidepoets to tune in or participate with a poem. Our Citywide Poets program focuses on teen writers, but we welcome adults to join in to share as we get through this pandemic together. Stay safe.
Citywide Poets Instagram Live Saturday Share Open Mic poster. Justin Rogers is the literary outreach coordinator for Poets & Writers in Detroit. Contact him at Detroit@pw.org or on Twitter, @Detroitpworg.“It looked like a pancake, / but it was creation flattened out— / the fist of God on a head of wheat.” This Motionpoems short film, directed by Dan Sickles, features the titular poem from Melissa Studdard’s debut collection, I Ate the Cosmos for Breakfast (Saint Julian Press, 2014).
