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I had the great honor of interviewing one of my all-time favorite poets, Naomi Shihab Nye. 

Naomi Shihab Nye was born on March 12, 1952, in St. Louis, Missouri, to a Palestinian father and an American mother. During her high school years, she lived in Ramallah in Jordan, the Old City in Jerusalem, and San Antonio, Texas, where she later received her B.A. in English and world religions from Trinity University. [Click read more below.]

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Just as it says, it's part one of the party to launch Raven Garland's new website:

Starts off with Bill Godfrey telling me all about life and poetry.  Not to be missed.  

Then there are the noises of people eating food stuffs that all begin with the letter "P."  Peppermint Patties, Pineapples, you get the idea.  

And then Raven speaks and a whole slew of poets reads.  This will not all be done in one episode, so tune in at a later date (TBA) to hear the rest.

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John FitzGerald is an attorney for the disabled who writes in every spare moment. His three books of poetry are Spring Water (Turning Point, 2005), Telling Time by the  Shadows (Turning Point, 2008), and The Mind (Salmon  Poetry, 2011).

John also contributed to the anthology Poetry: Reading it, Writing it, Publishing it (Salmon Poetry, 2010).

John has worked as Development Director for Red Hen Press and as the Associate Book Editor for Cider Press Review.

 

Here are some links to his work:

3 poems at Moonday:
Precision
Descended of Thieves
Tooth Fairy
http://home.earthlink.net/~pero/john-m-fitzgerald.html

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JOHN MELLA came up through the ranks of the littles in the sixties and seventies (CAROLINA QUARTERLY, PRAIRIE SCHOONER, CHICAGO REVIEW), culminating in a flurry of awards from the Illinois Arts Council and the publication, in 1976, of a novel, TRANSFORMATIONS. Having made his tiny splash, he vanished within it, emerging only to field such arcane as an an article on printed spoonerisms and another on Canto Three of Nabokov’s PALE FIRE. He constructed crosswords impossible of solution. Ennui gripped him. To appease his indolence, he commenced publication of a lexicographical newsletter. It, too, found its way into the Lethean Library. Sanity beckoned. In 1992, over egg-rolls and some very palatable pot-stickers, at a luncheon with his long-enduring mother, the sunlight glancing among the jumbled cutlery, LIGHT was born.

 

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I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Helene Cardona for my KRUU radio show, Irving Toast, Poetry Ghost. Not only is Helene a fine poet, you've also seen her on-screen in popular movies like CHOCOLAT. Tune in  to hear this fascinating interview.

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It was a blast having Sharon Bousquet in the studio, hearing her new poems (which totally kick the proverbial @#$%, by the way) and hearing her mesmerizing way with the guitar and voice. New poems, new songs, great company. Grab a scone and a cup of coffee and tune in to some fine music AND poetry, and find out what Sharon has been up to lately.

Sharon Bousquet is an award-winning songwriter/fingerstyle guitarist, and a seminar leader of The Singing Body – a system combining yoga, singing, breath and integrative movement to free your natural voice.

With 5 CDs to her credit spanning a stylistic range from contemporary folk to pop to bluesy a cappella rants, Bousquet's work continues to deepen and reward repeat listening.

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A live broadcast featuring the creator and contributors of this "glowing, historically important anthology of poets who live, or have lived, in Fairfield, Iowa."

THIS ENDURING GIFT, selected and introduced by Freddy Fonseca, features a total of 76 poets and is arranged in 16 chapters covering these topics:

Chapter 1: The Poetry of Remembrance and Renewal

Chapter 2: The Poetry of Nature, the Cosmos, and the Soul

Chapter 3: The Poetry of Mysteries and Imagination — View introduction

Chapter 4: The Poetry of Whimsicality and Simple Things

Chapter 5: The Poetry of Darkness and the Eerie Nocturnal

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Amy MacLennan grew up on the peninsula south of San Francisco, and she now makes her home in Oregon's Rogue Valley. Amy received a Master of Arts in English from Notre Dame de Namur University in Belmont, CA. She has appeared at the Petaluma Poetry Walk, the San Luis Obispo Poetry Festival, the Art & Soul Festival's Oakland Literature Expo, Bloomsbury Books in Ashland, Looking Glass Books and Broadway Books in Portland, the Sacramento Poetry Center and Cody’s Books in Berkeley. Amy has taught poetry workshops through the Sequoia Adult School. She is currently the Managing Editor of The Cortland Review. One of her poems is featured as a downloadable broadside by Broadsided Press. She has also been published or has poems forthcoming in River Styx, Hayden's Ferry Review, Linebreak, Rattle, Wisconsin Review, Folio, South Dakota Review, Cimarron Review, and Gingko Tree Review.

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Steven P. Schneider is a Professor in the Department of English at the University of Texas-Pan American, where he also serves as Director of New Programs and Special Projects for the College of Arts and Humanities. Steven is a founding member of the South Texas Literacy Coalition in the Rio Grande Valley and is the recipient of two Big Read grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. He has used the "Borderlines: Drawing Border Lives" traveling exhibit to promote the teaching of culturally relevant literature and creativity. Steven offers a variety of workshops on these topics to both high school and college students and teachers.

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Richard Robbins was born in Los Angeles and grew up in Southern California and Montana. He studied as an undergraduate with Glover Davis and Carolyn Forché at San Diego State University, and as a graduate student with Richard Hugo, Madeline DeFrees, and Tess Gallagher at the University of Montana. His first collection, The Invisible Wedding, was published by the University of Missouri Press in 1984 as part of its Breakthrough Series. This was followed by Famous Persons We Have Known, published in 2000 by Eastern Washington University Press, and The Untested Hand, released in 2008 by The Backwaters Press. Radioactive City was published by Bellday Books in 2009.

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Stephen Oliver is the author of fifteen titles of poetry. His work has appeared in innumerable international literary publications. A number of his creative non fiction works feature in Antipodes, A North American Journal of Australian literature.

Stephen has lived in Paris, Vienna, London, San Francisco, Greece and Israel. Signed on with the radio ship The Voice of Peace broadcasting in the Mediterranean out of Jaffa, Israel. Freelanced as production voice, narrator, newsreader, announcer, voice actor, vocal coach, journalist, radio producer, copy and feature writer. Lived in Australia for the last two decades. Currently resides in NZ .

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Keith Ratzlaff's books of poetry are Dubious Angels: Poems after Paul Klee; Man Under A Pear Tree; and Across The Known World. His awards include the 1996 Anhinga Prize for Poetry, the Theodore Roethke Award, and a Pushcart Prize. He is Professor of English at Central College in Pella, Iowa, where he teaches writing and literature.

His most recent book published by Anhinga Press was Then, a Thousand Crows (2009).

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The true measure of one's success as a poet is not the size of the auditorium in which one reads, nor the poshness of the hotel room, nor the size of the paycheck; it is instead measured by the size and quality of the linguine one is served, and whether or not it comes with a salad and breadsticks.

This is the third installment of the La Crosse trilogy: my (Rustin Larson's) reading at The Pump House Regional Arts Center on the evening of March 18, 2010.  What a night!  Up against Willie Nelson, who was performing in an auditorium about a block away, I still managed to draw together a nice gathering.  And afterwards there was ... LINGUINE!  La Crosse, I love you!

***

BREAKING NEWS

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Glenn Watt is one of those outstanding American voices living right amongst you.  His poetry has the warbling, liquid clarity of a rare songbird I'm not informed enough to give a name to.  He could, though.  He walks among the filtered light of branches and the trill of the songbirds on a daily basis, and these things form a vibration or a pulse in his writing.  

Author of a chapbook, Glad Music (The Contemporary Review, 1996), and contributor to magazines such as Passages North, The MacGuffin, The Iowa Source and others, Glenn Watt has a small collection of poems forthcoming in the anthology, This Enduring Gift.  He lives in Fairfield.

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Synonymous with elegance, refinement and real sophistication, La Crosse, Wisconsin are the two words (or are they three?) which led Irving Toast upon a small cross-region trek to find poetry alive and thriving in its natural habitat.  This open mic, recorded on March 18, 2010 at The Pump House Regional Arts Center, is filled with the strong, the strange and the pure strombolic elements of poetic achievement.  Featuring National Poetry Series winner, William Stobb; Ruth Lily Prize winner, David Krump; and a cast of characters culled from the students and faculties of Viterbo University and The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, this program is sure to tickle the teleportation unit of the muse.  Give a listen and a half.  Yours, clear, cold and fire-brewed, Irving Toast.

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Kim Groninga was born in Cedar Falls, Iowa in 1970. She attended the University of Northern Iowa where she studied music, dance, philosophy, journalism, and creative writing. She graduated in 1993 with a BFA in individual studies in creative expression then moved to Iowa City and completed three semesters of coursework at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Along the way, Kim traded her maiden name, Huebner, for her husband's name, Groninga, and has published under both names. Kim has worked as a waitress, tree trimmer, art class model, veterinary assistant, flute teacher, and editor. A few years ago, she moved back to Cedar Falls with her husband, Tim; daughter, Carly; and two cats, Socrates and Wesley Crusher.

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Raven Garland is an active performer and teacher of music, poetry and eurythmy. She holds a Bachelor and Master Degree in Music from the University of Massachusetts and an Artist Diploma from the Eurythmy School of Spring Valley New York. Raven is community minded and a long time advocate for the arts in everyday life. She has extensive experience performing as a past member of the Eurythmy Spring Valley Threefold Ensemble, a puppeteer for the New England Marionette Opera Theater, a pianist, a poet and eurythmist.

Her newest endeavor is the founding of http://Offthepagepoetry.com, a website dedicated to the living performance of poetry.

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David Krump received the 2006 Ruth Lilly Fellowship from Poetry and The Poetry Foundation. He is a graduate student at University of Oxford, and he divides his time between the UK and La Crosse, Wisconsin, where he is the literary coordinator for The Pump House Regional Arts Center. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in such journals as Colorado Review, Disquieting Muses Quarterly Review, and Verse.  His chapbook Night is a Good Child received the Florence Khan Memorial Award.

He recently wrote a play called 5000 pounds: seven soldiers’ stories, which debuted at The Pump House in La Crosse, Wisconsin, and will be appearing on Wisconsin Public Television in 2010.

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Gladys Swan joins the circus and writes about it in her new poetry chapbook; a couple of Diane Frank singles are ready to spin; an original musical composition from the hosts of The Pocky Talky Music Mystery Show will make you scream; cool surf-drunk-punk vibes from The Lear Jets; and more on the next episode of Irving Toast, Poetry Ghost, Sunday, February 28th at 10:30 am, and Monday, March 1st at 1:30 pm.

Blue Chord

from baby to mother

from guitar to amp

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Marge Piercy is the author of seventeen novels including The New York Times Bestseller Gone To Soldiers; the National Bestsellers Braided Lives and The Longings of Women and the classic Woman on the Edge of Time; seventeen volumes of poetry, and a critically acclaimed memoir Sleeping with Cats. Born in center city Detroit, educated at the University of Michigan, the recipient of four honorary doctorates, she has been a key player in many of the major progressive political battles of our time, including the anti-Vietnam war and the women's movement, and more recently an active participant in the resistance to the war in Iraq.

A popular speaker on college campuses, she has been a featured writer on Bill Moyers’ PBS Specials, Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion, Terri Gross’ Fresh Air, the Today Show, and many radio programs nationwide including Air America and Oprah & Friends.

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Have you ever sat down to lunch with someone and felt like you’ve become a memory sandwich? Say your present is a slice of multi grain and the sandwich goes down through strata of deviled whatever, shredded cheddar, a cool crisp year of Romaine, an autumn of roasted garlic till you hit that subtly spicy bit of sweet relish that’s been haunting you all along. She was hard to forget, wasn’t she? And equally hard to forgive.

Such entrées veteran fiction writer Gladys Swan (who, by the way, is a major presence in The Iowa Source’s recently released poetry anthology, Leaves by Night, Flowers by Day) serves us in her short story collection, A Garden amid Fires, released in 2006 by BkMk Press.

 

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