Susan Rich's Blog, page 82

What I Learned Reading and Tabling at Wordstock: 10/10/10

What I learned tabling at the Wordstock Festival in Portland, OR this weekend --- and reading at the festival with Kelli Rusell Agodon.

1. The world keeps getting smaller. Thank you Kelly L, Judy, and Deb for coming out to our reading. Having virtual friends via this blog become face to face friends was incredibly eye-opening. This makes traveling for book readings far more appealing.

2. Audiences appreciate readers who like each other. Kelli and I are good friends and I think this shows in the give and take with which we approached our reading. Audience members told us the warmth that we created together filtered out to our listeners and made a palpable difference to their experience of our work.

3. A retro suitcase makes a dynamite display case. Kelli found this vintage suitcase at a local antique store. Not only is it useful for bringing books to events, but it made a great display case for our table. Unusual displays are a way to connect with an audience.

4. Tabling is an art. We were located next to the ultra cool Copper Canyon Press and admired how their display looked more like a many textured bookshop with wooden shelves than it did a convention center display. This was our first venture into tabling and there's lots to learn.

5. I wish I had included a few recipes in The Alchemist's Kitchen . Several browsers picked up my book, but then put it down again when they realized it was not a cookbook. I wonder if my recipe for halibut would have helped cinch the sale.

6. Road trips with friends are fun. Annette, Kelli and I  laughed and talked all the way from Seattle to Portland and back again. We had amazing meals as well as pretzels and animal crackers for dinner. Without their friendship, navigational skills, and intriguing conversation, the trip wouldn't have been much fun.

7. Readings and events beget more readings and events. Kelli and I received invitations to do more readings and events together. We are looking forward to having our Crab Creek Review table make its second appearance at AWP this February-- this time with more chocolate.

Literary Criticism & See You in Portland

"I dream about a kind of criticism that would try 
not to judge but to bring an oeuvre, a book, a 
sentence, an idea to life; it would light fires, 
watch the grass grow, listen to the wind, and 
catch the sea foam in the breeze and scatter it. 
It would multiply not judgments but signs of 
existence; it would summon them, drag them 
from their sleep. Perhaps it would invent them 
sometimes -- all the better.


"Criticism that hands down sentences sends me 
to sleep; I'd like a criticism of scintillating leaps 
of imagination. It would not be sovereign or
dressed in red. It would bear the lightning 
of possible storms."

-Michel Foucault, "The Masked Philosopher," interview in *Le Monde,*
1980

Thanks to Cindy Stewart-Rinier for this quote. 

If I Ever Mistake You For A Poem: Kelli Agodon at Poetry Daily Today

How great to read a fabulous poem and see a friend at Poetry Daily. Starting at midnight and for 23 more hours, Kelli Russell Agodon's poem, "If I Ever Mistake You For a Poem" is up at Poetry Daily. The poem is from her new book, Letters from the Emily Dickinson Room. I just started reading my copy and am impressed once again by the scope and heart of these poems.  Congratulations, Kelli!

Listen to Nic: 4 O'Clock News at House of Sky on Whale Sound

What a whale of a view. Alaska! A few days ago I wrote about the generosity of Nic Sebastian at Whale Sound in letting poets submit the work of other poems for inclusion on her archive. Today I found out that my poem, "4 O'Clock News at House of Sky" is featured. Thank you, Nic. Nic has a melodious voice and her reading of the poem was lovely to listen to. Such a strange pleasure to hear one's work in another's voice. It's an experience out of time. Maybe that's where the name comes from? In any case it's a great site. Everyday another poet to listen to. Check out Donna Vorreyer and J. Zimmerman while you're there.

Bridging the GAP: Thank You Artists Trust

Yesterday, Artist Trust announced the 66 artists in Washington State receiving funding for a project involving literary, performing, or media arts. In my case, this means that I can actually pay poets and provide refreshment for Taboo Against the Word Beauty: 4 Local Poets Present New Work. This takes place 2:00 PM, Sunday, November 7th at the Frye Art Museum. Poets include Allen Braden, Oliver de la Paz, and Kelli Russell Agodon.

 I also want to congratulate the other Washington State poets who were GAP recipients including: Elizabeth Austen, Nance Van Winkel,  and Frances McCue. As poets we cannot sell "original" art work in the way that painters can, we rarely get paid for performances in the way that musicians do, and so arts funding seems all the more imperative for us. I just heard yesterday that President Obama has declared October the month of Arts and Humanities. May this be just the beginning!

A Poem and A Pup: Wordstock This Weekend, October 10th @ 3:00 PM with Kelli Russell Agodon

Good news can sometimes come from bad news. My poem, "Naming It," is a Special to The Oregonian today. Last week I learned that it would be printed in The Oregonian, then I learned that the Copy Editor had had to cut it, and just now I heard from the very kind poetry editor, Bt Shaw, (a fine poet) that she had worked to get my poem included on-line. Life is a good deal like this, isn't it? Some pieces of news, or new aspect of your life seems wonderful, then terrible, and then events even out to be more good than bad. The photograph above is Shilshole Bay. Here is to staving off loss by narrowing what we need.


Poetry: 'Naming It'Published: Monday, October 04, 2010, 1:24 PM     Updated: Monday, October 04, 2010, 2:39 PM Special to The Oregonian 
Share this storyStory toolsShilshole: the shape in 
which the estuary threads 

her way inland to Puget Sound; 

or -- to pull a thread 
through the eye of a bead. 

That same sense of direction -- 

staving off loss 
by narrowing what we need. 

-- Susan Rich, Seattle 

"Naming It" appears in Susan Rich's third poetry collection, "The Alchemist's Kitchen" (White Pine Press; 2010); it also appears in the anthology "Poets of the American West" (Many Voices Press; 2010). Winner of awards from PEN USA, The Times Literary Supplement and Peace Corps Writers, Rich serves on the boards of Crab Creek Review, Floating Bridge Press and Whit Press. As part of the Wordstock Festival, Rich will read Saturday, Oct 9, at 3 p.m. the Oregon Convention Center (777 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.) with Kelli Russell Agodon. For a complete festival schedule, visit wordstockfestival.com. 

Portland's Lan Su Chinese Gardens: Hall of Brocade Clouds

Sometimes beauty equals profound tranquility. This garden is where I want to be right now. I've looked at a hundred or more photographs of the Lan Sun Chinese Garden in Portland and none of them do it justice. I realize it's because the images do not, cannot evoke the profound experience of entering these gates and walking into a garden of twelve interlocking parts: Reflections in Clear Ripples to Moon Locking Pavilion, Courtyard of Tranquility to Hall of Brocade Clouds. If I lived in Portland I would take-up permanent residence in the Tower of Cosmic Reflections otherwise known at the teahouse. If you are in Portland for Wordstock this weekend (Kelli Russell Agodon and I read Saturday at 3:00 PM) be sure and sneak away to the Scholar's Study or at least Painted Boat in the Misty Rain.

Generosity of Spirit in the Poetry World: Very Like A Whale + Humanities Washington

I admire new ideas that combine intelligence and heart. Here is an announcement that makes me happy. Nic Sebastian at the on-line archive, Very Like a Whale, has just opened submissions so that poets can submit work on behalf of other poets. Today's poem is by Sarah Lindsay - and in addition to the recording, there is a comment box for people to discuss the poem. The editor chooses poems that are already available on-line so that you can listen to the poem and view it as well. How cool is that? Take a look at Very Like a Whale, or even better, submit a poem by a poet that you love.

And on a complimentary note, tonight is the Humanities Washington Night Flight event at the Fairmont-Olympic Hotel in Seattle. Writers presenting include: Nancy Pearl, Charles Johnson, Garth Stein, Jennie Shortridge, Carol Cassella and me. Doors open at 6:30 but you need to contact Humanities Washington for advance tickets -- it's a fundraiser for a great cause.

The Writer Wanderer: Mary Morris Goes to Morroco

I first saw Mary Morris read in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She was having a good time, you could tell. I had never been to a reading where the author was so prescient, so engaged with her audience, so alive. I was there because I had loved her book, Nothing to Declare, about a woman living alone in Mexico for a year. This was travel writing with an enormous difference because the focus was on Morris's interior journey as well as her location.

I've just discovered that Morris has a blog called The Writer and the Wanderer and that she is headed to Morocco, the country I most want to visit next. It has taken her a few tries to get there and so I am optimistic that I will make the journey someday, too. Meanwhile, I have found a wonderful link to her ideas and her travels. When I started this blog I promised to focus on the traveling life as well as the  writing life of a poet. I've been neglectful. This next year I will be traveling a good deal and so I'm looking forward to my poet-wanderer self re-emerging.

Meanwhile, may you enjoy the intelligence and beautiful prose of Morris's blog. And if the opportunity comes your way, I highly recommend seeing her read. And if you have favorite travel blogs, I would love to hear about them. Any would be great, but especially for Mexico, where I will be teaching in January.

Poem for Wednesday - Natasha Trethewey

I am a huge fan of Natasha Tretheway's poetry. I even like her prose. Beyond Katrina: A Meditation on the Mississipi Gulf Coast.  Her book Bellocq's Ophelia was a great help to me when I was writing The Alchemist's Kitchen poems, especially the poems on the life of Myra Albert Wiggins. Here is a simple, yet not so simple poem from Trethewey care of Poets & Writers.



Vespertina Cognito
by Natasha Trethewey 

Overhead, pelicans glide in threes—
     their shadows across the sand
          dark thoughts crossing the mind.

Beyond the fringe of coast, shrimpers
     hoist their nets, weighing the harvest
          against the day's losses. Light waning,

concentration is a lone gull
     circling what's thrown back. Debris
          weights the trawl like stones.

All day, this dredging—beneath the tug
     of waves—rhythm of what goes out, 
           comes back, comes back, comes back.