Poems in Prairie Schooner, Poets in the Park, A Summer Twitter #PoetParty and More

Sylvia poses with Prairie Schooner

Taking a Break for Poetry

It’s been such a terrible week, I’ve been so frustrated I’ve not only called my representatives and donated but have been posting political things on Facebook (a recipe for disaster, eh?) in the hopes some of the people in my family and circles who are republicans or moderates might see “the light.”

Poems in Prairie Schooner

But there are still good things. A wonderful new issue of Prairie Schooner came in the mail. The issue starts with wonderful poems by Alicia Ostriker, and if you look, it has two poems from me as well in there somewhere (“Self-Portrait as February Morning,” and “When I Thought I Was Dying It Was Easy”) I really enjoyed reading the whole issue, which contained some truly inspired work (and a few pieces from friends – always welcome!)

Strawberry Moons and Poet Parties on Twitter

Yesterday there was a beautiful full moon and sunset over Mt. Rainier. I didn’t catch the Strawberry moon early enough to get its rosy hue but it was still ghostly in the clouds. It’s been gloomy – like my mood, like the news – the last few days, I’ve been fighting off a virus going around, and catching up on reading and writing after last week’s debacle.

This upcoming Sunday I’m hosting a special Twitter #PoetParty (6 PM Pacific, 9 PM Eastern) with guest Dr. Erika Dreifus of the Practicing Writing Blog, where we’ll be talking about places to send in the summertime (and more!) So bring your questions, follow the hashtags and we’ll lose ourselves in poetry talk for a few minutes.

Poets in the Park 2018

And speaking of losing ourselves in poetry for a while, Redmond’s Poets in the Park festival is coming up July 7 at Anderson Park! I’ll be giving a talk at 1 PM on PR for Poets, and I’m part of a reading at 3 PM with Jack Straw current poets and alumni. It should be fun – see here for more information!  It is one of the best events that happens on the East side of Seattle, just for poetry. If you’ve never been come out! Redmond’s full of trendy ice-cream and indie coffee shops now.

PR for Poets And America and Poetry and All

Besides giving a talk on the subject next week at the Poets in the Park festival, in the new issue of Poets & Writers (the one with Terrance Hayes on the cover) which also features a fascinating interview with fiction writer Lauren Groff, there is hidden inside a real-live ad for PR for Poets.

And I also had a nice feature on The Book Connection with a little excerpt from PR for Poets.

I’m still waiting to hear about my sixth book manuscript which is still out with a few publishers. (It has been out with one publisher for a year and six months now!) I had a few acceptances for poems that came in to balance out a month or so of straight rejections. I know this is not the most important thing on the landscape – not even on my own landscape. My father’s still slowly recovering from pneumonia, my own MS likes to act up every time it gets hot, reminding me “I’m still here,” the news is full of shootings again, of bad men being in power doing bad things. It made me think of Langston Hughes “Let America Be America Again” with its powerful refrain “America never was America to me.” Can America be made better? Can we get good people to care and to vote for good people? Can some kind of conscience spring up and be stronger than the lowest common denominator, prejudice and money? Maybe America was never that great. But I know it can be better than it is right now.