Scissortail Creative Writing Festival, April 4, Morning Readings

This festival has been held on the campus of East Central University in Ada, Oklahoma for 8 years now, & I first attended it 2 years ago. It is more than just a "festival," it is a community of writers -- of fiction, non-fiction, children's book, & of course poetry. The writers come from all over the country, but with a concentration of writers from the Oklahoma, Texas & around the Southwest. There are no workshops, just readings -- writers reading to writers, & a marvelous book table run efficiently & pleasantly by staff & students from the school. The event is run each year by Ken Hada, whom Albany folks will remember from his reading last summer at Caffè Lena.

Both morning readings today were in the Estep Auditorium of the Cole University Center. The first reader was Jason Poudrier, an Iraq war veteran who is now a high school teacher, & whose work I first heard some years back at the Oklahoma Labor Fest. His book Red Fields (Mongrel Empire Press, 2012) is a favorite of mine. His poems mix his military experience ("Subject of Merriment," "Dream Song Delta 139," "The Bet," etc.) with being back home in Oklahoma & memories ("Off Road Cab-Over Camper"), even a poem titled "Modern Art."

John Yozzo, another Oklahoma poet, began with a funny, up-beat introduction, then on to a somber poem written here 6 years ago, "Saugers," for a dead friend. He read love poems, such as "Nuptials," "Evaluations," & "Marry Me" (which he called a "tumbler poem" since he doesn't use punctuation & the words just tumble down the page), & middle-age poems, such as "Seeking Wisdom" & "Death Before Dishonor, or Dying Before Retirement," as well as poems mixing the 2 themes.

Mary Kay Zuravlett read from her second novel, The Bowl is Already Broken, involving a woman who works in a museum in Washington, D.C. on illuminations in ancient manuscripts of Rumi's poetry. The section she read was about the woman's family & their dinner, touched with humor & mild satire of affluent life.


The 2nd session of the morning was introduced by Steve Benton who puts up the Scissortail Blog.

The first reader was novelist & short story writer Andrew Geyer. He read from a new, unpublished story cycle, the last story "Lament for a Larcenist" about an uncle & his money & life of crime, contrasted to the narrator's fathers' sweat & dirt work ethic. Good writing springing from from life & the experiences of growing up poor & working hard.

I had heard Ben Myers read here 2 years ago & a poem he read read today, "The City Dump," was one I remember him reading then. He read from his just published collection Lapse Americana (NYQ Books, 2013). The poems were of memory ("Speak House," "Trampoline") & growing up,  of being with his daughter at the county fair, even a sonnet, "Wanderlust." I especially liked his poem "Pep Talk," about writing, vision & being -- & I bought the book.

I had also met Rilla Askew (& her husband Paul Austin, who also read in the Festival), 2 years ago here, & about couple weeks ago at Sylvia Barnard's book-signing at the Book House I saw a prominent display of Rilla's latest novel, Kind of Kin (Ecco/HarperCollins). She & Paul spend several months a year (in the Summer, of course) in Woodstock, NY. Today she read a section of the novel, a rural courtroom scene. The novel is set in 2008 & deals with the issue of undocumented workers in the Southwest.

Then off to take a break for lunch, shop the book table, hang out with the readers & writers.

Full bios of the authors can be found here at the Scissortail Creative Writing Festival Blog.

[Note: this is a first of a series of a number of articles on the Scissortail Festival. Keep checking back periodically for further reports.]

Yes!/Fence Reading Series, March 30

Clark Coolidge is a major poetic voice & figure of the 20th/21st Century, & while not an "academic poet" himself he is certainly beloved by the academics. He read this night at the Albany Center Galleries as part of the ongoing Yes! a reading series, coinciding with publication of his monster (600 page) book, A Book Beginning What And Ending Away, published by Fence Publications (housed at the Writers Institute at the University at Albany).

Coolidge is notorious for pissing people off with his "durational performances," i.e., long readings, & tonight he was at his best, reading for over an hour the section "Music" from A Book Beginning What And Ending Away, the tedium modulated by the improvisations of the great bass-man, Michael Bisio. Can't say he didn't warn us. But it was a great paring, as Coolidge is a former jazzman himself, and obviously enjoyed Mike's music, snapping his fingers, nodding to the rhythm of the music, laying out to give the bass room to stretch out (as Mike did too, 2 jazz musicians riffing back & forth). Mike, as is his style, was all over his bass, picking, strumming, bowing, but always returning to a solid walking pattern to take him to another place to jump off, quoting masters from classical music & the jazz repertoire.

The words were non-narrative dyslexic cut-ups of compressed text, impressions, thoughts from morning journal entries (perhaps), lists of musical instruments, classical composers, jazz composers, titles & allusions to jazz standards & tunes by Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, quotes, fractured aneccdotes, bits of conversation, pointedly not avoiding "I" -- to piss off the L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poets.

The relatively brief Q&A afterwards, with Tomas Noel moderating, was informative & gave insights into both the compositional methods of A Book Beginning What And Ending Away as well as commenting on influences on Coolidge's work such as Kerouac, Dali, &, of course, jazz.

At the end of the night I don't know who showed more stamina, Mike Bisio, Clark Coolidge, or the audience -- it was a tour de force. I think Rebecca Wolff, the editor of Fence Books, summed it up best in her introduction to Clark Coolidge way back at the beginning of the evening when she said, "The voluminous-ness of his language is what we love about him."

Frequency North, March 28

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Poets Speak Loud!, March 24

Mary Panza put on her sexy high-heels, then made sure we noticed, as we gathered in the Back Room of McGeary's, chasing out the interlopers on their way to the Palace Theater movie or the Capital Rep. Hey, all the theater was here! The featured poet, Ben Figueroa, brought some of his poetry peeps with him (you could tell by their hats), & Mary cracked the whip as our host. Meanwhile competing with a music open mic out at the bar area made me think we were back at Valentines, exiled to the attic. But we were poets speaking loud & we prevailed.

Sylvia Barnard was up first (an early arrival for dinner at Don Levy's table in the Back Room), with a couple poems from her poetry chapbook, Trees. I followed (I was also at Don's table) with the new poem "Living in Wilcox" & a poem for this night, "What Passover Has Taught Me."

Jamie Martin was part of Ben's entourage with a piece based on Alice in Wonderland, "Alice at 50 Writes to Her Old Friends." Brian Dorn read a couple of love poems in careful rhyme, looking for "Luck" in love, & in praise of subtle beauty "Plain to See." A.C. Everson recalled a moment of good luck with an 8-ball break, "A Ball Breaker." Tess Lecuyer's "Driving to France" presented an alternative to doing your laundry.

Tonight's featured poet, Benedicto Figueroa, is the Poet Laureate of Union City, New Jersey; the fact that he as an office made some of the Albany Poets seethe. While Ben competes on Slam teams the poems he read & performed tonight were mostly of the story-teller variety without Slam attitude or spit, & were from his book, Was. Most of the poems were memories of childhood & school, teasing a girl ("Karate Chop"), finding god in sharing an ice with his mother ("St. Pete"), getting advice from a gay friend ("Friends & First Dates"), & the "Letter to my 8th Grade Self." He ended with a couple of poems in the present, the tender love poem "That Finger" & an "occasional poem" he wrote for an event in Union City, a poem about the children of Newtown & about his own 4-year old daughter, "Tendencies."

Don Levy was up next with one of the finest of his new poems, "Growing up Queer," then on to getting lots of laugh with his dream poem, "NRA Pride March." The night was getting long & raunchy (&, like I said, Mary Panza was in heels) & Ed Rinaldi was getting the brunt of it; about the poem he read, "Portage Reported" I can only report what I wrote down in my notebook: heading towards the Promised Land. Brian Roessel was last month's Featured Slam poet here & made the drive again to support his friend Ben, but he forgot his notebook of poems so did one from memory a poem he had performed last month, "Microsoft Word is a Mother-Fucking Prison." One of Albany's Slam poets, Algorhythm, followed with his dialogue-in-dialect imagined conversation with his father, but almost got derailed before it began with a lot of in-joke heckling from the crowd.

RM Engelhardt is definitely not a Slam poet & began with a poem about drinking at an open mic, "Poetry Whiskey & Buk," then a poem from his new book, Resurrection Waltz, remembering the 1980s. Julie Lomoe's poem "Library Sale" was about the trashing of books. "K.P.," another member of the Albany Slam team, had a couple of short poems, an untitled piece on writing a clever folk song, then a good Ketchup poem, "Realization Over Eggs." After much joking & snarky comments, the Albany Slam team's coach, Mojavi, did a tender poem about his new son, then a sadder piece about a dysfunctional relationship.  & that was the night.

The last Monday of the month finds this event at McGeary's on Clinton Square in Albany, with lots of open mic poets & a featured poet -- check AlbanyPoets.com for compete information.

Sunday Four Poetry, March 24

Another 4th Sunday in Voorheesville, with a bevy of open mic poets before today's featured poet, Charles Straney, our host Edie Abrams judiciously keeping the list.

First up was me with 2 recent poems, "Winter Peace" (the last time this season I will be reading this) & the new poem "Living in Wilcox." Alan Casline did a couple of "songs," "Song: Muse Blues" & from 1981 "Song after Car Crash" & something I think he said was "Colors with Linen Trucks" (which is a great title even if I got it wrong). Dennis Sullivan began with a memory of grade school & played on the word "civil" in "My Grammar School," then on to his favorite theme with "Continuing With the Theme of Death" & then the pensively philosophical "A Safe Confession is Good for the Soul." Edie Abrams' single poem "Schrodinger's Cat" pondered the paths that face us at mid-life, this path or that?

Obeedúid's book of poems, Telluric Voices, has a troubled history with an interim edition bootlegged by Benevolent Bird Press for Obeedúid's reading at Caffe Lena while FootHills Publishing struggled to recover from a fire. Today he read 2 Spring poems from the book, "We are born" & "Where I am safe," then ended waiting for the Sun "Early in the Morning." Now, apparently, the official FootHills edition will be ready out soon -- stay tuned. Lloyd Barnhart started with his poem "Boxes," one filled with ashes, the other with "life," then on to a poem about 2 women in his family "Suicide," & ended with a funny poem lamenting all the reasons he can't be a cowboy. Mimi Moriarty also has a new book from FootHills Publishing, Crows Calling & read 2 poems from the book, "Unfinished Hymn" & "Waving from Shore," & finished with a seasonal piece "Good Friday" mixing family with the Bible story.

Howard Kogan read "His Father's Mittens" from a conversation with his neighbor Earl, then a profound Proustian meditation on the fickle nature of memory, "Memories Are Made of This." Joe Krausman read his poem "Unanswered Prayers" that was a finalist in a contest, then a poem that really happened (to him) "Job Seekers Car Stolen," & ended with a piece in rhyme about the dreams of youth & of old age. Brian Dorn read what he described as 3 Easter poems, "Guilty as Sin," "Belove Poem" (an anaphoric list piece, "Love is…") & ended with his fabulous poem on the life of Christ, "3 Days."

Dennis Sullivan introduced today's featured poet Charles Straney, who was a finalist last year in the Smith Tavern Poet Laureate contest. He began with a poem about life's messages, "When Youth Pleads Guilty," then on to "Unknown Rose" & "Moon Enough" & a poem about the theft of old, salvaged radiators. Like the best of poetry his poems are meditations on meaning written in images drawn from the life around him. "The Leading Road" was about false prophets (at least based on my hearing it just once, a problem at these readings), then the pensive "Sunrise at 50" & a poem on climate change "Snapshots of the Aftermath." He ended with selections from a longer piece "Well Digger," from an experience in his youth, a wonderfully rich poem filled with images of the land, dirt, & working in a deep pit -- it would make a great chapbook.

Of course there was an extended après reading conversation over drinks & food at Smitty's Tavern Poet's Corner.

This community gathers each 4th Sunday at the Old Songs Community Center in Voorheesville, NY at 3PM, usually a featured poet & an open mic, for a modest donation to pay the poet & support the work of Old Songs.

Third Thursday Poetry Night, March 21

We began the night with a little background music from The Chieftains & the invocation of the muse, tonight the recently-gone poet Anselm Hollo (1934 - 2013); I read his early poem "Poemology" ("…it is easier to eat an apple/than to make a poem…"). Since there were only a few of us I dropped the one-poem rule & each poet could read 2 poems (if they wanted to &/or had them). Even a couple of late arrivals were "grand-mothered in."

First up was Alan Catlin (who had been 1st through the door), who said he had been trying to find "something Irish, but this is not Irish," "Beckett Plays Self-Portrait" & for his bonus poem, the unexaggerated account of "Senior Citizen Day at the Supermarket," engendering a discussion by Sylvia about shopping for old men (which gives many of us hope). Avery admitted he planned to read 2 poems anyway & read "The Egg The Seed The Acorn" based on versions of the Tarot card, & a poem written on St. Patrick's Day, like his first poem a meditation on the Eternal Moment. Sally Rhoades read a recent poem from a dream about her mother, then an older piece, a self-assured celebration, "I Am a Many Splendored Thing."

Brian Dorn referred to the movie Lincoln & read his poem "Freedom's Name," then a poem he hasn't read out before, "Invincible." I had brought only 1 poem (besides, as the host, I'm running my mouth constantly anyways), a recent fun piece, "Living in Wilcox." Kevin Peterson, in spite of the many poems in his Slammer head, also brought only 1 poem, a short one from February, another in his continuing series of lessons not-learned from behaving badly, oh well. Jan Farrell was "thrilled" to read 2 poems, one by Emily Dickinson (#165), then her own based on on a true experience, both about wounded deer.

Sylvia Barnard has been popping up on my Blog a lot recently as she sails through her local book tour. I was pleased to feature her here at the SJC where she is a regular reader in the open mic & supporter of the other poets in the community, to help her promote her collection of poems, Trees. Tonight she let the poetry gods pick her poems, beginning with "The Exorcism of Emily Dickinson," responding to Jan's poem. The gods kept her bouncing from theme to theme across many locations such as poems about her daughter at the Natural History Museum & at school, poems set in England ("Change," "Sir William Bardwell"), & of course, ancient history ("Beyond Babylon," "St. Albans, Hertfordshire," "Grave Stele," "Epidauros"). Closer to home, she read poems about a music festival in her Massachusetts, a portrait in the Clark Museum, and ballet at SPAC, ending with a love poem, "Easter 1988." It was a wonderfully eclectic reading giving us all a taste of the wide-range of subjects of the poems of Sylvia Barnard.

We gather together each third Thursday at the Social Justice Center, 33 Central Ave., Albany, NY, around 7:30PM to listen to a local or regional featured poet, & an open mic for community poets. A donation of $3.00 supports the reading series, pays the poet, & helps the Social Justice Center continue its work.

Book Signing: Trees, by Sylvia Barnard

I have known Sylvia Barnard since my undergraduate days at SUNY-Albany & we have been colleagues in the Albany poetry scene since I moved back here a number of years ago. I also featured her at Poets in the Park last year & she will read in the Third Thursday series this month. While she was preparing the manuscript of her book she asked me to read through it for her & I offered a number of suggestions.

It was a pleasure to see Sylvia surrounded by friends at the Book House this Saturday afternoon. She talked briefly about her life & her poetry, with reminiscences of the early days of the Albany poetry scene. She read a generous selection of her poems, which in many ways is an autobiography in verse, with poems of memory of her youth, her mother & her ancestors, of her daughter, her loves & losses, & her travels to Britain, Greece, Cyprus, & elsewhere.

Her book is available at the Book House & anyone interested in the poets of the Albany scene, or who just likes good poetry, should have the book in their collection.