Copper Canyon Parties, Dean Young’s Robots, and New Anthologies

I missed some of my favorite holiday parties this year, but did manage to arrive (if slightly sleep-deprived and bedraggled due to heavy rain) at the year-end Copper Canyon party, where I got to see one of my poetry heroes, Dean Young, read, as well as Deborah Landau, and say hi to some of the people that make Copper Canyon Press and Hugo House what it is. Dean Young read at least two poems mentioning robots, and drew a robot in the book he signed for me, thereby procuring my admiration for all time. Seriously, his reading flew by, leaving all of us wanting more. I remember reading his poems years ago and thinking, what a weird (and wonderful) brain! I feel very lucky to have such vital organizations in my town (plus I got to hear the inside scoop from one of the interns on Dana Levin’s new apocalypse themed book coming out in 2016!)  Here’s a pic of Glenn and I on our way out the door and me with fellow East-side poet Sarah Jones!

Two anthologies recently came out – so recently I don’t even have the contributor copies in my hands yet – that I thought you might like to know about for the holidays. One is an anthology of poems related to television, Rabbit Ears: TV Poems
which includes a poem of mine about engineers and Wile E. Coyote as well as work by Dorianne Laux and Billy Collins, and the other is an anthology of speculative fiction and poetry from Mythic Delirium, Mythic Delirium: Volume Two: an international anthology of prose and verse, recently reviewed by Publisher’s Weekly, and containing a poem from me but also work from spec stars like Jane Yolen. Anyway, both would make great gifts!

I finally slept all the way through the night last night – and by that I mean, from 1:30 AM to 7 AM – for the first time in over two weeks. I was telling a friend that this virus has been like having a really evil, uncute baby that wakes you up every forty-five minutes. So I’m hoping that by the time actual Christmas rolls around I’ll be all recovered and hearty! I’ve got tickets to see the new Star Wars right before the new year (don’t buy your movie tickets late in a geek-driven town like mine, or you’ll wait a week to see the movie!) and got all the Christmas presents for faraway family out the door yesterday, so I think I’m ready for the holidays! 2015 has been a tough year for a lot of us, so I’m wishing us all a happier 2016!