A Wall in Philadelphia
Yellow stenciled
digits slashed
red with spray
paint, an asemic
text November
sun comprehends
as the limit of
its reach. Deep
green weeds
glow in the rift
where asphalt
meets wall—
arched leaves
wide as any
tire in the lot
drip light, but
the lines lead
the eye:
white oval
remnant
of a name
beneath
a square
cement patch.
The poem, all
that wants
to be said,
is said—there. Read More >
COMEDY
We were still drifting as the day broke
improvising lines, like we practiced
machines in their tracks, mud
turned to cement, the feet
missed our gardens we
were coming and going
like it will matter, currents
through white sheep completely
alive, this was during the day—
it should be the truth. Naturally
in those lines this is a lie—
Uncertain—it heard us
never asking, how do you talk, even find
the words, from all the words
in your head, such a moment, liquid
of the ears, the blues
of the planet, two spoonfuls
absorb, in each head, a spiked drink, tongue
know the dropper, seem
surprised to drown the point.
Jared Schickling is the author of Needles of Itching Feathers, recently published with The Operating System. He has written several BlazeVOX books, including The Mercury Poem (2017) and Province of Numb Errs (2016), as well as The Paranoid Reader: Essays, 2006-2012 (Furniture Press, 2014); Prospectus for a Stage (LRL Textile Series, 2014); Donald Trump and the Pocket Oracle (Moria Books, 2017); and Donald Trump in North Korea (2017). He edited A Lyrebird: Selected Poems of Michael Farrell (BlazeVOX, 2017) and he edits Delete Press and The Mute Canary, publishers of poetry. He lives in Lockport, NY.
Dylan Krieger’s collection, no ledge left to love, is the recipient of the Ping-Pong Free Press poetry prize of 2017, chosen by judge and poetry badass, Brian Henry. It is my extreme pleasure to share with you a sneak peek–one of my favorite poems out of this fascinating and essential collection, release date: December 1, 2017. Read More >
The Hartnell College Planetarium and the Homestead Review are pleased to announce the 17th annual Poetic Voices Poetry Festival. This event will take place at 7pm in the Hartnell College Planetarium. This year’s featured readers will be a bevy of local poets: Elliot Ruchowitz-Roberts, Jennifer Fellguth, River Tabor, Bob Barminski, and Maria Teutsch.
Poetic Voices Poetry festival celebrates the poetry of college students, and will also feature 10 student poets who will receive the Circo Prize for poetry. Students wrote poems about various celestial bodies and/or planets. Andrew Lindsey, planetarium coordinator, will display celestial images to accompany the poets
The event is sponsored by the Homestead Review literary journal and the Hartnell College Foundation. Student winners: Erica Craddock, Helen Dunston, Jaime Flores, Celia Jimenez, Jennifer Le, Joel Pablo, Monroe Vallejo, Christina Veitenheimer, Jacob Vosti, and Paige Wolfe
The reading will take place at the Hartnell College Planetarium at 7PM, Thursday, April 27th, 2017. The event is free and open to the public.
Poet Republik Ltd. is proud to present the dual launch party for two extraordinary books of poetry:
Invitation to a Rescue by Kate Lutzner and Occassionally, I Remove Your Brain Through Your Nose, by J. Hope Stein with guest readers Jameson O’Hara Laurens winner of Ping-Pong Free Press Poetry Prize, 2016, Maria Garcia Teutsch, Christine Hamm, Karen Hildebrand, Martha Cambridge, Sherry Stuart and musical guest, Orly Bendavid
Saturday, April 22nd at Botanica Bar, 47 E. Houston St., in Soho, NYC from 6-8.
The post-reading party info is to be announced.
Kate Lutzner is also having her “soft book launch” at this reading — there will be preview copies of her new chapbook, Invitation to a Rescue, published by Poet Republik, Ltd. Her poetry and stories have appeared in such journals as Antioch Review, Mississippi Review, The Brooklyn Rail, BlazeVOX, Rattle and Barrow Street. Kate holds a J.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an MFA from City College and has been featured in Verse Daily. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize as well as the Best of the Net Anthology.
Jameson O’Hara Laurens completed her MFA in poetry and translation in 2014, and has collaborated with artists, choreographers, and translators. She is fortunate to call a bilingual secondary literature classroom her professional home, and has recently received research sabbatical and leadership grants for teaching projects. Having grown up in the West, she has an ongoing concern for the natural world, and for all things apiary. She became a feminist writer by necessity. Her work has appeared in Enclave, Alexandria Quarterly, Hawkmoth, and Poet Republik. Medeum is her first collection.
J. Hope Stein is the author of experimental chapbooks Corner Office, [Talking DolI] and [Mary]. She is a Consulting Producer of the film Don’t Think Twice and an Associate Producer of the film Sleepwalk with Me. She is the editor of PoetryCrush.com.
Maria Garcia Teutsch’s chapbook, The Revolution will have its Sky was chosen by Heather McHugh as winner of the Minerva Rising contest in 2015. She still thinks that’s the coolest thing ever. She has published over 25 poetry books in her vast career as Editor in chief of the Homestead Review, Ping-Pong Journal of Art and Literature and the presses, Ping-Pong Free Press and Poet Republik Ltd. In her spare time she teaches at Hartnell College, and serves as President of the Board of Henry Miller Memorial Library.
Christine Hamm has a PhD in American Poetics, and is an editor for Ping Pong Free Press. She is currently an MFA poetry student at Columbia University. Her poetry has been published in Orbis, Nat Brut, BODY, Poetry Midwest, Rattle, Dark Sky, and many others. She has been nominated five times for a Pushcart Prize, and she teaches English at Pace. The New Orleans Review published Christine’s chapbook, A is for Afterimage, and nominated her work for a Pushcart in 2014 and in 2017, Ghostbird Press is publishing an excerpt from her ongoing manuscript, Notes on Wolves and Ruin.
October 1st, 2016 at The Henry Miller Memorial Library
7:30 PM
Come join us in a benefit for Big Sur’s own literary press: Ping-Pong Free Press, published by the Henry Miller Memorial Library. The evening will feature a poetry reading by Brenda Coultas; a staged reading of Henry Miller and Anais Nin’s more salacious writing entitled Miller Out Loud! featuring local actors portraying the roles of Henry, June, Anais and Rimbaud. Chicago musician and Library friend extraordinaire, Al Rose, who just dropped a critically acclaimed CD entitled, Spin Spin Dizzy will close out the evening with a musical set featuring songs that put the free in free speech. Please join us in this celebration, because we believe that without free speech there can be no human rights. Doors open at 6:30, program begins at 7:30.
Poetry Reading by Brenda Coultas
Miller Out Loud! staged reading
Al Rose in performance
Brenda Coultas is the author of four poetry collections, including The Tatters (Wesleyan University Press, 2014), The Marvelous Bones of Time (Coffee House Press, 2008), and A Handmade Museum (Coffee House Press, 2003). Her honors include a New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship and residencies from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, the Emily Harvey Foundation in Venice, Italy, and the Millay Colony for the Arts.
Al Rose is a striking songwriter and musician with a unique and powerful vision that continues with his seventh and latest release (2016), “Spin Spin Dizzy”. His previous albums have received extensive airplay on AAA and Americana stations throughout the US along with a bevy of critical praise. He is a mesmerizing transformer when performing live as a solo or with any number of his band, The Transcendos, in any configuration. This drives the songs each night, but the songs have always been what drives the musicians in what The Chicago Tribune has called “one audaciously entertaining ride”.
Ron Genauer is an optometrist who has been involved in community theatre for many years. Some of his favorite roles have been Gelman, in Arthur Miller’s “Broken Glass”, the Player, in Tom Stoppard’s “Rozencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead”, and Charley, in David Mamet’s “Speed the Plow.”
John Dotson is a writer/producer/director/multi-media artist with Carmel Bay Players. He also works with The Seventh Quarry Drama Group of Swansea, Wales. John’s first acting was in excerpts of Shakespeare directed by Charlotte Perry at Santa Catalina School. He performed at the Forest Theater in The Hollow Crown, directed by Marcia Hovick, and in Robinson Jeffers’ Medea, directed by Nick Zanides. At Cherry Hall in Carmel, John performed Willie in Beckett’s Happy Days, directed by Conrad Selvig. John’s three-act play, It’s Always Something, directed by Nancy Pridemore, was staged in Kingsport, Tennessee, his hometown, in 2001. He then wrote and played the leading role in Without Why, directed by Conrad Selvig. With Lisa Maroski, John has written two plays, Touching Distance and Dearly Departing, performed in the US and at the Dylan Thomas Theatre in Swansea.
Susan Roether Zsigmond (Director) is a writer and film maker. She is a friend of the San Francisco Library; North Beach Citizens: American Film Institute; The Actor’s Studio Playwrights Unit; and the Mecahnics Institute Library and Chess room. Her recent novel “Our Lady of West Hollywood” was listed among “Best of the Independent Press, 2014” by Kirkus Review. Susan is also a member of the board of directors of the Henry Miller Memorial Library.
Maria Garcia Teutsch (Producer) The Revolution Will Have its Sky, won the 2016 Minerva Rising chapbook competition, judge: Heather McHugh. She is a poet, educator and editor. She has published over 20 journals of poetry as editor-in-chief of the Homestead Review, published by Hartnell College in Salinas, and Ping-Pong journal of art and literature, published by the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur, California. She teaches poetry and creative writing online as a member of the faculty of Hartnell College. She serves as president of the board of the Henry Miller Memorial Library, and is the founder and EIC of Ping-Pong Free Press.
Deidre Mccauley has been doing theatre for over 50 years. In Philadelphia she began at Old Academy Players following in her mother’s footsteps onto the stage.
She’s performed at Western Stage, Magic Circle Theatre, The Golden Bough, Outdoor Forest Theatre and Carl Cherry Center for the Arts. Recently she starred in a film called “Laces” which debuted at the Monarch Film Festival. She is part of The Actor’s Collective which is a group of actors who love to fly without a net.
Marnie Glazier is a writer, theatre artist and educator. She holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing, and a PhD in Theatre and Performance Studies. She has directed a number of productions – professional and academic – has taught Theatre, Writing, and Communication Studies for more than ten years, and currently serves as Theatre Faculty Lead at Hartnell College in Salinas. Her scholarly writing has been presented at numerous conferences and published in Laconics and the Texas Theatre Journal, and upcoming performances include: Transpiration, at the American Society for Theatre Research Conference this fall in Minneapolis, MN. Her work is deeply embedded in social practice/physical/visual theatre, ecology, and ecofeminism.
River Atwood Tabor is a poet, photographer, philosopher and other things that begin with the letter “p.” At 20 years of age, he has helped found a press, published a book of poetry, and traveled to 5 countries, and that’s just in the past year.
I will be reading and performing part of my new multi-media piece from American Dissident with Henry Miller Memorial Library director, Magnus Toren at the Page Poetry Parlor at the historic home of Geraldine Page and Rip Torn, now an artist’s space for actors, directors and well, unknown poets such as myself. It also happens to fall on my birthday, so cake may be involved–all I’m saying. I do so love being the girl with the most cake.
I will be reading with the wondrous Lisa Samuels who will be flying in from New Zealand to share her poetry.
I am apoplectic with joy to be reading with Lisa Samuels on April 17th for the folks at Torn Page Poetry Parlor
from Wild Dialectics (Shearsman Books 2012)
Peephole metaphysics
Listening for you listening notes for right to seek up
futures as a buffer against permanence can you make
actuality not a matter of argument I’m sirry I’m political
ready to drag down changeable as the crew people
jumping in to small boats showing their interest
without necessary attributes to be hot, so hot
sirrah listening to the heart boats bombing are you
new to the names amidst your hectares get along
new to your improves on several hats beside the year’s
tasted aperture months ready to open pour in
astonished to discover mouths underneath the boats
craggy as fashionable creamy broody belts in range
out of range the edges of the heart mouths totally
unsteady drama groovy coming along worth trying
to sell our inherited personalities for settlement when
people came here they planted themselves in utterly familiar
and hills coming along at the edges of the heart
mouths planting the recognizable in water at the moment
falling through the atlas trope sway comprehensive
for another album of highlights everybody getting a little
somefin a tiny mouthful louche over the skin of the teeth
a point especially clear when terms of value broken
across the example becomes clear a like simple
economy of scale transient as the top blend came on
a simple feat hot off the head as hundreds rippled
like scales real as existence marbles tottling on
the edges of the site kept at it fully every rim
consistent turning square to diamante pusher
folly coming along saying flask as catskin blueberry
rich or cast is it what you expectation frag there
slightly animistic with an absolute forearm
or what it means to compromise with cultural life
as you make room make room stead skulldigger
in a roaring mind the trophy on your head your own
juggy code out at the stuck late skin in show
I often kilter or a separately repeated to see how
it changes a man with a fixed expression in plastics
a cast as what you expectation frag there yes
Lisa Samuels is the author of thirteen books of poetry and prose, with recent experiments in memoir (Anti M, Chax 2013) and the novel (Tender Girl, Dusie 2015). Her poetry is in anthologies such as Out of Everywhere 2 (Reality Street 2015) and has inspired scholarly work and musical scores internationally. Her literary essays include Over Hear: six types of poetry experiment in Aotearoa/New Zealand (TinFish 2015), and in 2016 she is a visiting scholar at the University of Washington Simpson Humanities Center, writing The Civic Unconscious (poetry) and The Long White Cloud of Unknowing (prose) and continuing experiments in soundwork. Some of her writing and recordings can be found via the Electronic Poetry Center, academia.edu, and pennsound.
I will be reading at Beyond Baroque in Venice Beach, California on March 11, 2016, with the wondrous Sesshu Foster.
Sesshu Foster has taught composition and literature in East L.A. for 20 years. He’s also taught writing at the University of Iowa, the California Institute for the Arts, the University of California, Santa Cruz and Naropa University’s Summer Writing Program. His work has been published in The Oxford Anthology of Modern American Poetry, Language for a New Century: Poetry from the Middle East, Asia and Beyond, and State of the Union: 50 Political Poems. He kicks ass! Check out the Poet Republik edition where he’s featured here!
