A TWIN PEAKS SLICE OF CHERRY PIE

This anthology, edited by Ivy Alvarez, is a rather unique collection of poems inspired by "Twin Peaks" and then offered as a slice of cherry pie.  I have no idea what that means -- but if you are inspired to read it viz Amazon Kindle, the collection originally published in print in 2006 has just been reissued as an e-book.  Check it out HERE!

Poets featured are  Emilie Zoey Baker, Jilly Dybka, Collin Kelley, Elena Knox, Jared Leising, Daniel Lloyd, Siobhan Logan, Eileen Tabios, Maureen Thorson, Andrew J Wilson and Maike Zock.  (My featured poem is part of my book THE SECRET LIVES OF PUNCTUATIONS, VOL. I.)

SUN SHINES!

Okay. Here are the obligatory photos from the category, MY NEW BOOK JUST ARRIVED!!!

THE BOOK about which these two master poets say:

"Eileen Tabios's poems twist like silk scarves caught in the wind, offering ardent calligraphies and sly subversions of the passions, so many ways of naming lucidity." —Andrew Joron "In her new collection, SUN STIGMATA, Eileen Tabios has sculpted poems of light and shadow by using the blade of time to cut through stone. What is revealed as “through a ripped hole in space,” is rendered “as unforgiving as a sniper’s eye…” With lapidary precision, Tabios links the personal to the eternal while deepening what is essentially human: “…did the Greeks attain/ Purity? / Did I earn the moments/I made my mother cry…’ Whether she is probing Rimbaud in the act of assigning colors to vowels, or recalling a lost generation of women in Manila “hugging ashed corners of hopeless streets,” the voice is urgent and oracular, riding the radar between orders, implicit and explicit, in time and space. “The most implacable border/ can be the invisible/so that nothing is hidden from sight.” SUN STIGMATA reminds us of what art can do when it rises to the level of Mystery in which the initiates are transformed: the stigmata incarnated on these pages bleed spirit and awaken soul."  —Paul Pines

CHICAGO BOOK LAUNCH FOR VERSES TYPHOON YOLANDA

A Chicago launch for VERSES TYPHOON YOLANDA was part of a typhoon memorial event--"Typhoon Haiyan, One Year Later: Remembrance and Reconstruction"-- this weekend at International House at University of Chicago.

The event began with a reception and included an art display, readings from the book, a musical performance, a dance, and a panel discussing reconstruction efforts. The panel consisted of UNICEF, a Tacloban medical mission, and a university professor.

The event is sponsored by the Filipino American National Historical Society--Midwest Chapter, the Chicago Arts Coalition, and U Chicago departments (Center for International Studies, Program for the Global Environment, and International House).

Fun information about the event is available on its Facebook page.

During the event, this video was played; VTY is noted at about 2:40:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BxqriDnEsGpiUkdhN0prOGxKaE0/edit

Thanks to VTY contributor Almira Gilles for coordinating!

"IS YELLOW BLACK OF WHITE?"

Poet-scholar Sheila Bare has curated an exhibition and reading series ongoing through the end of the year at The Sitting Room (Santa Rosa, CA), entitled "IS YELLOW BLACK OR WHITE? AN ASIAN AMERICAN LITERARY * CULTURAL EXHIBIT." I  appreciate that much of my books and projects is part of the exhibit.  Here are pics!

Close-up of where some of my books are displayed

Go HERE for more information about the Treasure Trove called "The Sitting Room," founded by Virginia Woolf scholar (among other things) J.J. Wilson.

SESTETS?

Here's Achilles beginning to read Garrett Caples' essay collection, RETRIEVALS (Wave Books):

Meanwhile, I recently bought Charles Wright's SESTETS recently as I'm thinking to explore that form.  Which reminds me to post an update on moi Recently Bought Poetry List of books by poets or about poets/poetry.  I buy poetry.

RETRIEVALS, essays by Garrett Caples

THE POETRY DEAL by Diane di Prima

FOR by Carol Snow

GOOD HOPE ROAD by Stuart Dischell

BINDWEED by Christianne Balk

EURYDICE’S SONG, poems by William Borden and monotypes by Douglas Kinsey

STRANDS, poems by Keri Hulme

ASTONISHMENTS: SELECTED POEMS OF ANNA KAMIENSKA, Edited and Translated by Grazyna Drabik and David Curzon

SMALL WORKS by Pam Rehm

PRESENTATION PIECE by Marilyn Hacker

NOTEBOOKS OF A CHILE VERDE SMUGGLER by Juan Felipe Herrerra

THE LOST LUNAR BAEDEKER: POEMS OF MINA LOY

AGAINST THE EVIDENCE: SELECTED POEMS 1934-1994 by David Ignatow

A FORM OF OPTIMISM by Roy Jacobstein

CONSTANCE: POEMS by Jane Kenyon

THE COUNTRY I REMEMBER by David Mason

SOMETHING PERMANENT, photographs by Walker Evans and poetry by Cynthia Rylant

NOTHING MORE TO LOSE by Najwan Darwish, Translated from the Arabic by Kareem James Abu-Zeid

AUTOBIOGRAPHIES by Alfred Corn

SESTETS by Charles Wright

NEAR CHANGES: POEMS by Mona Van Duyn

DOUBLESPACE: POEMS 1971-1989 by Hank Lazer

MIDNIGHT PEACHES, TWO O’CLOCK PATIENCE, essays, poems and short stories by Janet Stickmon

CRUSHING SOFT RUBIES, memoir by Janet Stickmon

WHAT IS ARDUOUS ABOUT MY POETRY

I’m interviewed by John Bloomberg-Rissman for ARDUITY. Grateful to him and editor John Armstrong for the extremely generous space and introduction to the interview.  It’s the first time an interview has asked me the EXACT right question about my poetry, to wit, “What is hard—arduous—about your poetry?”

And because, for me, that was the right question, my answer reveals certain things I’ve never shared before in public.  Like, apologies (but not really) for the misanthropy… Anyway, here’s an excerpt:

I love humanity for how it's created its libraries. But if one reads all the books available and extrapolate knowledge from what's not written, surely the conclusion is that nearly all of human history after our hunter-gatherer stage has been consistent in manifesting a suicide pact. 

Interview ends with a poem-excerpt from my forthcoming AMNESIA: SOMEBODY'S MEMOIR.  

Full interview HERE.  And the interview also includes my latest "author photo" which is, but of course, the one of me mothering Athena:

LINK IN TO POETRY!

I do a nota bene every 50 books. So my LinkedInPoetry Recommendation list just hit #150 with a poet's memoir, CRUSHING SOFT RUBIES by Janet Stickmon. If you must know, #100 was REVELATOR by Ron Silliman, #50 was BIG BAD ASTERISK by Carlos Matos, and the inaugural #1 was HE LOOKED BEYOND MY FAULTS AND SAW MY NEED by Leonard Gontarek. Of these four, only one was anticipated -- the benefits of reading randomly and widely. For more recommended poetry books (since mid-2013), you're invited to LinkedInPoetry Recommendations!