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Having friends and family over for the holidays? Check out this trailer for the second issue of Kinfolk Magazine then visit www.kinfolkmag.com to learn more about the quarterly magazine of essays, interviews, art, and photography that caters to the growing community of artists with a shared interest in small gatherings.
Ruth Stone, a poet who received several major awards late in her decades-long career, has passed away. The poet, whose first collection, An Iridescent Time, was published in 1959, won the 2002 National Book Award for her collection In the Next Galaxy (Copper Canyon Press, 2002), and the 2000 National Book Critics Circle Award for Ordinary Words (Paris Press, 1999). Her most recent volume, What Love Comes To: New and Selected Poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2008), was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.
When she received the NBA nine years ago, Stone began her acceptance speech, "All of the poets on the panel are fabulous. I think you probably gave it to me because I'm old." She added, "I guess I should say I've been writing poetry or whatever it is since I was five or six years old, and I couldn't stop, I never could stop. I don't know why I did it. It was like a stream that went along beside me. And I really didn't know what it was saying. It just talked to me, and I wrote it down. So I can't even take much credit for it."
Stone, whose other honors include the Poetry Society of America's Shelley Memorial Award, a Whiting Writers' Award, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, has also inspired a prize to be created in her name. Hunger Mountain, published in Stone's longtime home state of Vermont, is holding its annual Ruth Stone Prize competition, open to groups of poems, until December 10.
In the video below, author Elizabeth Gilbert discusses the genius of Stone's process, describing the poet's attempt to capture a poem thundering toward her across the landscape of her Vermont farm.
P&W-supported poet/activist Kelly Harris, founder of GAP: Girls. Achieving. Possibilities., an empowerment program for African American girls, blogs about Pinkie Gordon Lane's legacy.
I know New Orleans has been the focus of this month-long blog, but I want to speak the name of an important poet who lived about 90 miles from the Big Easy.
Pinkie Gordon Lane. I'm told she was a gentle woman, a painter, a nature and dog lover, a writer, and a demanding instructor. Her poems walk a lyrical tightrope, never falling into sentimentality.
Her legacy includes being the state's first African American poet laureate. Lane travelled the state vigorously–reading, visiting classrooms, and promoting poetry. Some locals say her work as laureate has been unmatched. In 1967 Pinkie Gordon Lane became the first African American woman to earn a PHD from Louisiana State University, where her papers would be housed.
I never got the opportunity to meet Pinkie Gordon Lane, but lately I've been studying her poetic craftsmanship and quiet lifestyle. As a young poet, I often feel anxiety about not having a collection published as yet. It feels like a rat race sometimes, it's either publish or perish. Pinkie Gordon Lane came to poetry late in her life and I believe it afforded her patience in her work.
Her poem, "Lyric: I am Looking at Music," was featured in the 1997 motion picture, Love Jones. In a 1997 phone conversation with Dr. Jerry Ward, English Professor at Dillard University, she said actress Nia Long got the poem right in the film, "even the sniffles."
This year, the Pinkie Gordon Lane First Annual Poetry Contest Awards Program was held in April on the campus of Southern University and A&M College where she served as Chair of the English Department. The contest awarded local student writers with small prizes... her legacy continues to inspire and impact a new generation.
Photo: (top) Kelly Harris; (bottom) Pinkie Gordon Lane. Credit: The Archives and Manuscripts/John B. Cade Library/Sounthern university and A&M College/Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Support for Readings/Workshops events in New Orleans, is provided by an endowment established with generous contributions from the Poets & Writers Board of Directors and others. Additional support comes from the Friends of Poets & Writers.
Write a poem to or about a person close to you using any of the senses except sight.
In the latest installment of his Failed Writer series, Yuvi Zalkow talks about his love affair with failure and how it serves him as a writer. "If you haven't already, give it a try," he says. "Be a hell of a failure. See what you learn from it."
In this short film by Alessandro Novelli, each letter of the alphabet is illustrated based on the first letter of a font name.
P&W-supported poet/activist Kelly Harris, community outreach chair for the New Orleans chapter of the Women's National Book Association, blogs about her love for New Orleans.
Before moving to New Orleans for love in 2008, I was a writer who required complete silence to write. Often I'd find a corner of a library, pull my hoody over my head, and dig in. Sometimes I'd plug my ears with headphones without any music. I know, I know, weird, but I needed to tell myself (and show everyone around me) I was occupied.
New Orleans is not a quiet place. It occupies you. Since moving from the Midwest (Cleveland, Ohio) to the South, I've had to adjust how I write. Some family members have wondered how I could be a candidate for marriage because I seemed eerily comfortable as a loner. My husband is always amazed at how often I leave my phone at home on purpose. There's a reason... I'm easily distracted. With so many stimuli, I wonder how poets find useful silence.
By now you're asking, "Kelly, where is there a quiet place in New Orleans?" I don't know, but, strangely, I have found the daily commotion in New Orleans to be useful.
New Orleans Streetcars: Maybe it's the nostalgic wooden seats and clicks of the metal wheels against the metal tracks that inspire me as a writer. Riding a streetcar allows me the opportunity to sightsee, and overhear some of the most interesting conversations.
Rue De La Course on Oak Street: The café is an old, two-story bank with high ceilings. The way voices bounce off the walls create the feel of an old movie where two lovers reunite.
The Moonwalk: This paved sidewalk beside the Mississippi River has nothing to do with Michael Jackson. It's called the Moonwalk in honor of former mayor Maurice "Moon" Landrieu. From here you see the Crescent City Connection Bridge connect the east and west banks of the city. Café Du Monde is steps away.
The combination of music, history, and culture makes this a place where a poem waits to happen.
Photo: (top) Kelly Harris; (bottom) Marching band. Credit: L. Kasimu Harris.
Support for Readings/Workshops events in New Orleans, is provided by an endowment established with generous contributions from the Poets & Writers Board of Directors and others. Additional support comes from the Friends of Poets & Writers.
Christie Ann Reynolds reads "Revenge for the Shark Death I Deserve," the first poem from Revenge Poems, published by Supermachine in 2010. Sadly, Supermachine editors recently announced that they will be ending the small press and literary magazine at the end of the year.
Use Google translator (translate.google.com) to experiment with the text of an existing poem (yours or someone else's). Translate the text from English into another language, such as Finnish, Urdu, or Korean, and then translate the foreign-language text back to English again. Observe the metamorphosis of syntax and diction as the poem travels through the filter of another language. Then look for a particularly striking phrase, an odd construction or image, and use it to begin a new poem.
Midwestern indie press Milkweed Editions has recently launched a new prize for poetry, open exclusively to poets currently residing in Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.
The annual Lindquist & Vennum Prize will award ten thousand dollars and publication of a book-length manuscript.
This year's contest will be judged by poet Peter Campion, author of The Lions (2009) and Other People (2005), both published by University of Chicago Press. Campion is a regional resident himself, living in Minneapolis and teaching in the MFA program at the University of Minnesota.
The competition opened for submissions earlier this week and will continue to accept entries until January 31, 2012. A winner will be announced next April, just in time for National Poetry Month.
For complete guidelines and information about eligibility, visit the Milkweed Press website.
