If you’re in California, you might be able to hear my radio interview tomorrow night (Wednesday Sept. 6th at 8 PM) with JP Dancing Bear on his “Out of Our Minds” radio show on 91.5 FM out of Cupertino. Exciting! My first ever live radio interview. Tune in for scintillating revelations!

Last night, I got to go to Bumbershoot to see some readings from Wave Books and Copper Canyon (Erin Belieu, Matthew Zapruder, Arthur Zhe, and Eileen Myles) and hang out a little bit with the famous Poetry Bus Tour folks. A set of brave souls going by bus to fifty cities to do readings, picking up and dropping off poets along the way. Erin read from her new book, Black Box, and Eileen really blew me away with the new work she read, especially with a faux-sestina at the end. Good luck on your tour guys! Erin said she may be blogging about the tour for The Poetry Foundation’s journal-thing. She promised gossip!

A reminder for those of you females under 40 – the book prize just for you – Switchback Books’ Gatewood Contest has their final deadline on October 1, so submit!
Thanks to Editor-in-Chief Brandi Homan who has been graciously answering my many questions, I feel much more confident about launching my own little press in 2007.

And, fellow blogger poet Steve Mueske has his First Book Interview with Kate up now!

In other news, in the last seven days I have a. tripped and fallen down my stairs (damn flip-flop sandals!) b. seen the hilarious Little Miss Sunshine (go see it!) c. fallen even more in writer-crush with Margaret Atwood because of her interview in the September 2006 issue of British Harper’s Bazaar – she’s got a great answer to the interviewer’s question about why men feel comfortable reading her books.

Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter has passed away. It was very sad. He was only 44, about the age of my oldest brother. It was also one of the first times I ever saw the usually profane and insulting guys on the Aintitcool talkback boards actually write kind and moving words about another person. On the news, people kept announcing his death with a sort of “I told you so” sneer.

Good News Abounds!

Check out Aimee Nezkumathil’s interview in Kate’s First Book series – here’s a great quote – “I think little girls, especially, are trained early on to say sorry for everything: for being loud or too quiet, for being first, being last, for winning, for losing. But on the page, I know I can be as bold (or as nuanced) as I want to be. No apologies needed (unless they are to myself, during revision!).”

Tom C. Hunley (publisher of Steel Toe Books and a darn fine poet) and Steven Schroeder will both be featured on Verse Daily this week! (Tom’s poem Here!) (Steven’s poem Here!)

My friend Kathleen Flenniken will have a poem from her new book, Famous, on Poetry Daily this week on Friday.

Lana Ayers, another good friend, has a chapbook, “Love is a Weed,” now available from Finishing Line Press: http://www.finishinglinepress.com/2006newreleasesandforthcomingtitles.htm

Congrats to all of these great poets! We’ve got to celebrate 🙂

All right, friendly readers: I need your help. I’ve finally got myself organized to send out some submissions, but I’m flipping through my bookcase-o-lit-mags and wondering:
What are the best journals for prose poems? I haven’t really dallied with this form before but notice that many journals don’t publish these at all, or at least not often. I’ve already got Sentence on my list.
Tell me your picks! And a big thanks in advance!

I’ve got some new and welcome company at Steel Toe Books! Everyone congratulate Mary B!

The very cool Kate has an interview up with me at http://www.kickingwind.com/82006.html, where she has been interviewing poets about their first books. I’ve been following the interviews avidly for a while now, so I felt honored to be in the other poets’ company. I do think I sound much less sophisticated than the other poets. Read if you dare! (Warning: Anyone claiming there’s no such thing as robots may be a robot themselves.)