Rob Mclennan's Blog, page 10

Ongoing notes: the ottawa small press book fair (part four : Grant Wilkins + Salma Hussain,

[see the first part of these notes here; see the second part of these notes here; see the third part of these notes here] And youalready know about the dates of our next three fairs, yes? Saturday, November22, 2025 (thirty-first anniversary event!), Saturday, June 20, 2026and Saturday, November 14, 2026 (thirty-second anniversary event!), allat our usual (new) location of Tom Brown Arena. Strange to be booked that farahead, but there you go. As ever, check for updates here when there are any(although if you already know the dates, I’m not sure what further updates you’dneed, beyond the pre-fair reading announcements, which would only happen acouple of weeks before each fair).

ottawa small press book fair co-founder James Spyker + Ottawa poet Grant Wilkins
Montreal QC/Ottawa ON: It is always good to seenew work from Ottawa poet and performer Grant Wilkins [catch a recent essay he wrote on his work here], and his latest chapbook (and to my immediate knowledge, his first non-above/ground press chapbook, beyond the privately printed hardcover TheKamouraska Codex: A Preliminary Translation with Commentary that heself-produced in 2019 in an edition of fifteen copies) is the chapbook-lengthsequence LEGENDARY THINGS (in which Phyllis Webb sings Motörhead to Basho)(Montreal QC: Turret House Press, 2025), a sequence “variously gathered,sifted, nicked or otherwise drawn” from Webb’s The Vision Tree(Vancouver BC: Talonbooks, 1982), Basho’s On Love and Barley – Haiku ofBasho (Penguin Books, 1985) “and the lyrics of various songs by Motörhead(Lemmy Kilnister et al.).” “That weather-beaten skeleton / at the secret heartof your poem / has nowhere to hide,” he writes, to open the second page of thesequence. Half a page down, offering: “Laying there drunk on the cobblestones /I studied your graceful script / Sans serif and righteously stoned [.]”

Thereis something quite fascinating in the way Wilkins approaches hisrecombinations, finding new threads through not only the source material he selects,but the collision of what might otherwise seem contradictory sources, from “Theechoes of music and poetry / are shredded by summer’s end / and the bombs goingoff at night” to “I’ve lost my passion / for burning skies / and riders wearingblack [.]” There are other poets working creative work through similarprocesses of recombination, providing both original works and threads of criticalresponse to their source materials, including a couple of recent titles such asEdmonton writer and critic Joel Katelnikoff’s Recombinant Theory(Calgary AB: University of Calgary Press, 2024) [see my review of such here]and Toronto poet R. Kolewe A Net of Momentary Sapphire (Vancouver BC:Talonbooks, 2023) [see my review of such here], not to mention Philadelphia poet and critic Laynie Browne’s ongoing work [see an interview I did with her on such here; see my review of her latest here]. Wilkins is doing someinteresting things, and I very much hope he keeps going. I want to see what hedoes next.

Ottawa poet (and Brick Books tabler) Manahil Bandukwala and Ottawa poet Mahaila Smith
London/Toronto ON: Okay, so Baseline Press wasn’tactually at the small press fair this time around, but this chapbook landed inthe mail around about the same time (and they’ve been at fairs before, so itstill totally counts). The latest from the press is What if Maybe and other poems (July 2025) by Toronto-based writer Salma Hussain, a poet and fictionwriter, author of the debut young adult novel The Secret Diary of Mona Hasan(Tundra/Random House, 2022). A sleek collection of nine poems, the piecesin What if Maybe and other poems follow a trajectory of the narrative,first-person lyric, but one that holds to smallness, to precision; one thatspeaks in points of light across distances, step upon step upon step. “Math wasnot math     until / the Greeks saw thevalue in how the Arabs used zero,” she writes, to open the poem “THE VALUE OFZERO,” “They needed zero / for calculating prayer times / for weighing za’ka:tdues / for shirking interest // but also / they were counting stars / mappingpatterns in the light beyond their grasp [.]”

I’mcurious, intrigued, even, about Hussain’s lyric precisions, and would beinterested to see what she might do in the space of a full-length collection.Her lines pull the stretch between small and expansive, often simultaneously, ininteresting ways. There’s a fine line between her poem’s ungencies andpropulsion, and the ability to hold to the moment, to stand peacefully andutterly still. Or, the first two stanzas of the poem “SCREAMSONG,” that begin:

Belligerent with thenurses I pulled
the feeding tube out ofmy nose
like a birthday partymagician    pulling out yards of silkyred ribbon
from an upturned top hat 

The white coats recommenda two-week residential stay
at a physio rehabclinic    but I insisted I be sent backhome
I felt then and I knowtoday that I have two little daughters who unknowingly
unwittingly are the only gurusI need(ed) for my healing
We signed a mountain ofrelease forms
liability waivers    other papers
and my trembling husband bithis lip    his tongue the entire drivehome

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Victoria Kennefick

Dr Victoria Kennefick is a writer, poet, editor and teacher. Shecompleted a PhD in English Literature at University College Cork and was aFulbright Scholar at Emory University and Georgia College and State University.Her research on the short stories of Flannery O’Connor and Frank O’Connor wasalso funded by an IRCHSS Scholarship and a MARBL Fellowship. Her debut poetrycollection, Eat or We Both Starve (Carcanet Press, 2021), won the SeamusHeaney First Collection Poetry Prize and the Dalkey Book Festival EmergingWriter of the Year Award. It was shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize, theCosta Poetry Book Award, Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry and the Butler LiteraryPrize. It was a Book of the Year in The Guardian, The Irish Times,The Sunday Independent and The White Review, and was alsoselected as one of The Telegraph's Best Poetry Books to Buy 2021. Hersecond collection, Egg/Shell (Carcanet Press, 2024) was a Poetry BookSociety Choice for Spring 2024 and won the Farmgate Café National Poetry Award2025. It was also BBC Poetry Extra Book of the Month for March as well as aBook of the Year in The Telegraph, The Sunday Independent and ThePoetry Society UK. In 2023 she was an Arts Council of Ireland/UCD Writer inResidence as well as Poet in Residence at the Yeats Society Sligo. In 2024, shewas Cork County Council Arts Office Writer in Residence. In 2025, she wasappointed as the Arts Council of Ireland/Trinity College Dublin Writer Fellow.

1 - How did your first book or pamphlet changeyour life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does itfeel different?

My first pamphlet, White Whale, waspublished by Southword Editions as a winner of the Cork International PoetryFestival Fool for Poetry Chapbook Prize and it felt like a miracle that it waschosen to be published and even more so that its launch was part of thefestival. It felt like I had finally reached a long-held goal – to publish abook – no matter how slight – and to be a tangible part of the literaryconversation I had been following since I was a child and first started toread. Poetry was always my first love – an instinctual language that I recognisedand responded to immediately. I think, without putting it too sentimentally,that I felt like I was finally home and a real part of my true community – thepoetry community. This validation, and the success and reception of thepamphlet gave me confidence and provided many unexpected opportunities tofurther publish my work and to hone my craft. My debut collection, Eat or WeBoth Starve, was published by Carcanet Press in 2021 during the deaththroes of the pandemic. It was a very weird experience launching it from mymother’s kitchen over Zoom, but I wouldn’t change it for the world now – Ithink people were available and open to read it as it seemed to just hit at theright moment. It won the Seamus Heaney First Collection Poetry Prize and theDalkey Literary Festival Emerging Writer of the Year – as well as beingshortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize and the Costa Prize for Best PoetryCollection. This success catapulted my words into the wider world and as aresult I was able to take a career break from my job as a secondary schoolteacher (which I am still on!) and work as a writer, poet, mentor and freelancecreative writing teacher full-time – my lifelong dream! I am so grateful to allwho made this possible and particularly to the Arts Council of Ireland who havesupported me financially and creatively every step of my writing career todate. My more recent work is my second poetry collection, Egg/Shell(Carcanet Press, 2024) and it is a very different animal in many respects –particularly as I explore more complex themes and allow myself to experimentmore with language and form. It is a more intense book – and a softer one, Ithink, than my debut.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, asopposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?

I loved reading everything as a child –voraciously and without much discernment to begin with – but poetry seemed tobe to be the most honest and uncompromising of the genres. I was a veryintense, sensitive and curious child – I always felt so very weird being human– being a person constantly confused me (it still does, to be honest!) andpoetry seemed to be where people truly and intelligently explored thisexperience in a way that was entirely vulnerable and utterly frank. It veryquickly became the place where I would go find answers to my trickiestquestions. There was room to be curious and demanding there! I remember findingout very early on that ‘stanza’ was the Italian word for ‘room’ and thisbrought me great joy. This poetic language was one I innately understood andfelt at home in – these rooms were my rooms. Then I started making small wordbuildings myself.  

3 - How long does it take to start anyparticular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is ita slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, ordoes your work come out of copious notes?

There is no one way! I am in constant flux inmy writing process as I am in everything in my life. I am learning still toaccept and appreciate this flow. I feel like I am always writing – every day apoem or a line or the feeling of a poem visits me in some way, shape or form.Mostly, I succeed in writing it down on the notes app on my phone or recordingit – rarely I forget or can’t access something to record it on so there aresome poems that are lost and still floating around hoping for a chance to be caughtagain – maybe by another poet who is more aligned to the moment! After a periodof gathering these snippets and fragments, recording and paintings, articlesand songs, I can feel the book coming together because all of these parts startto reach out to one another in some way that I can’t logically explain – theyattach on different levels – and often they might grow new offshoots or othersmight wilt and die. Then it is time to immerse myself. I usually do a week-longretreat once a year – or I try to – and then I write for seven days solid – thebones of the book. It is a frenzy, and I am not very sociable or coherentduring this phrase. I hold the feeling. I must live it and let it live throughme. I try to let the document sit for a week or so after that and then begin myrevisions which are vigorous and lengthy. I use a different brain for thatprocess, and it takes anything from a month to six months depending on thequality of my focus and the busyness of my life. When that part is complete, Ifinally send it to my wonderful, astute and very sensitive editor at Carcanet Press, John McAuliffe.

4 - Where does a poem usually begin for you?Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project,or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?

Since publishing my first book, I write shortpieces, but I am always conscious of a larger body of work that it may or maynot be a part of. I love thinking about the book and how these little fragmentswill form part of a whole – while also being whole in and of themselves – it’svery organic, don’t you think?

5 - Are public readings part of or counter toyour creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?

I do enjoy readings, in my own way. I findenormous peace and focus on the stage reading from the page. It’s like timestops and everything is clear. The more social before and after aspects are awee bit trickier, I must admit but I think that’s understandable given thenature of the poet brain – always working, always analysing, always feeling – Iam totally exhausted and spent after events and yet I am constantly surprisedand vexed by this! 

6 - Do you have any theoretical concernsbehind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work? Whatdo you even think the current questions are?

Yes, I have all the concerns, all the time!Now I am interested in being honest and open on the page, but not necessarilybeing factual. That’s an important distinction. I am also fascinated by how thestructure of the poem allows for vulnerability but also has an inbuiltprotector for the writer. I often wonder if poetry is actually a boundarybetween me and other people rather than the connective force I think it to be.

7 – What do you see the current role of thewriter being in larger culture? Do they even have one? What do you think therole of the writer should be?

Personally speaking, I feel my vocation is to‘say the thing’ – that which is difficult or shameful or impossible for peopleto express in their own lives. Maybe a poet is a channel of some sort? I alsofeel it is my calling to honour the complexity and nuance of life’s interiorexperience and find some kind of acceptance and healing through creating newpoems that externalise this in some way. Formally, I think poetic structures,the use of white space, language choices, register etc. have so much to offerin how we process thoughts, emotions and intense feeling of all kinds.

8 - Do you find the process of working with anoutside editor difficult or essential (or both)?

The key is to find the right editor and to bevery aware of your own ego – so for me working with an outside editor isessential when it comes to the near-final stages of book making.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you'veheard (not necessarily given to you directly)?

It doesn’t matter what you do, it only mattersthat you do it.

10 - What kind of writing routine do you tendto keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?

This is a dangerous question! My only routinenow is that I don’t have one and there is no such thing as a typical day forme. I am in two minds about whether this is a problem or not, but perhaps Iwould benefit with some kind of balance in this regard – this is always awork-in-progress!

11 - When your writing gets stalled, where doyou turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?

I go to visual art, the work of other writersand poets, and walking in nature – particularly by the sea – always nourishesand soothes me. 

12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

Salty sea spray.

13 - David W. McFadden once said that bookscome from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work,whether nature, music, science or visual art?

Absolutely yes – visual art. Walking throughan art gallery is like walking through a poetry collection for me.

14 - What other writers or writings areimportant for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

There are so, so many – and their importancewaxes and wanes depending on what I am writing about – anyone from Patrick Kavanagh to Miranda July, from Ntozake Shange to Mariana Spada, Gustav Parker Hibbett to Sylvia Plath

15 - What would you like to do that youhaven't yet done?

Everything and nothing.

16 - If you could pick any other occupation toattempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would haveended up doing had you not been a writer?

A visual artist or a very earnest and hammyactor.

17 - What made you write, as opposed to doingsomething else?

There was nothing else.

18 - What was the last great book you read?What was the last great film?

Greatis such a weighty value – most recently, I loved the adaptation Nosferatu(Eggers, 2024) because its unrelenting bleak tension and flat intensity (acompliment) made me feel so extremely calm. This year I’ve hugely enjoyed Open, Heaven (Cape, 2025) by SeánHewitt.

19 - What are you currently working on?

Too many things but also just enough. The new poetry collection is percolatingand there are also some essays brewing. It is an exciting time. I don’thonestly know what I will write next.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

Spotlight series #111 : Helen Robertson

The one hundred and eleventh in my monthly "spotlight" series, each featuring a different poet with a short statement and a new poem or two, is now online, featuring Ottawa poet Helen Robertson.

The first eleven in the series were attached to the Drunken Boat blog, and the series has so far featured poets including Seattle, Washington poet Sarah Mangold, Colborne, Ontario poet Gil McElroy, Vancouver poet Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Ottawa poet Jason Christie, Montreal poet and performer Kaie Kellough, Ottawa poet Amanda Earl, American poet Elizabeth Robinson, American poet Jennifer Kronovet, Ottawa poet Michael Dennis, Vancouver poet Sonnet L’Abbé, Montreal writer Sarah Burgoyne, Fredericton poet Joe Blades, American poet Genève Chao, Northampton MA poet Brittany Billmeyer-Finn, Oji-Cree, Two-Spirit/Indigiqueer from Peguis First Nation (Treaty 1 territory) poet, critic and editor Joshua Whitehead, American expat/Barcelona poet, editor and publisher Edward Smallfield, Kentucky poet Amelia Martens, Ottawa poet Pearl Pirie, Burlington, Ontario poet Sacha Archer, Washington DC poet Buck Downs, Toronto poet Shannon Bramer, Vancouver poet and editor Shazia Hafiz Ramji, Vancouver poet Geoffrey Nilson, Oakland, California poets and editors Rusty Morrison and Jamie Townsend, Ottawa poet and editor Manahil Bandukwala, Toronto poet and editor Dani Spinosa, Kingston writer and editor Trish Salah, Calgary poet, editor and publisher Kyle Flemmer, Vancouver poet Adrienne Gruber, California poet and editor Susanne Dyckman, Brooklyn poet-filmmaker Stephanie Gray, Vernon, BC poet Kerry Gilbert, South Carolina poet and translator Lindsay Turner, Vancouver poet and editor Adèle Barclay, Thorold, Ontario poet Franco Cortese, Ottawa poet Conyer Clayton, Lawrence, Kansas poet Megan Kaminski, Ottawa poet and fiction writer Frances Boyle, Ithica, NY poet, editor and publisher Marty Cain, New York City poet Amanda Deutch, Iranian-born and Toronto-based writer/translator Khashayar Mohammadi, Mendocino County writer, librarian, and a visual artist Melissa Eleftherion, Ottawa poet and editor Sarah MacDonell, Montreal poet Simina Banu, Canadian-born UK-based artist, writer, and practice-led researcher J. R. Carpenter, Toronto poet MLA Chernoff, Boise, Idaho poet and critic Martin Corless-Smith, Canadian poet and fiction writer Erin Emily Ann Vance, Toronto poet, editor and publisher Kate Siklosi, Fredericton poet Matthew Gwathmey, Canadian poet Peter Jaeger, Birmingham, Alabama poet and editor Alina Stefanescu, Waterloo, Ontario poet Chris Banks, Chicago poet and editor Carrie Olivia Adams, Vancouver poet and editor Danielle Lafrance, Toronto-based poet and literary critic Dale Martin Smith, American poet, scholar and book-maker Genevieve Kaplan, Toronto-based poet, editor and critic ryan fitzpatrick, American poet and editor Carleen Tibbetts, British Columbia poet nathan dueck, Tiohtiá:ke-based sick slick, poet/critic em/ilie kneifel, writer, translator and lecturer Mark Tardi, New Mexico poet Kōan Anne Brink, Winnipeg poet, editor and critic Melanie Dennis Unrau, Vancouver poet, editor and critic Stephen Collis, poet and social justice coach Aja Couchois Duncan, Colorado poet Sara Renee Marshall, Toronto writer Bahar Orang, Ottawa writer Matthew Firth, Victoria poet Saba Pakdel, Winnipeg poet Julian Day, Ottawa poet, writer and performer nina jane drystek, Comox BC poet Jamie Sharpe, Canadian visual artist and poet Laura Kerr, Quebec City-area poet and translator Simon Brown, Ottawa poet Jennifer Baker, Rwandese Canadian Brooklyn-based writer Victoria Mbabazi, Nova Scotia-based poet and facilitator Nanci Lee, Irish-American poet Nathanael O'Reilly, Canadian poet Tom Prime, Regina-based poet and translator Jérôme Melançon, New York-based poet Emmalea Russo, Toronto-based poet, editor and critic Eric Schmaltz, San Francisco poet Maw Shein Win, Toronto-based writer, playwright and editor Daniel Sarah Karasik, Ottawa poet and editor Dessa Bayrock, Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia poet Alice Burdick, poet, writer and editor Jade Wallace, San Francisco-based poet Jennifer Hasegawa, California poet Kyla Houbolt, Toronto poet and editor Emma Rhodes, Canadian-in-Iowa writer Jon Cone, Edmonton/Sicily-based poet, educator, translator, researcher, editor and publisher Adriana Oniță, California-based poet, scholar and teacher Monica Mody, Ottawa poet and editor AJ Dolman, Sudbury poet, critic and fiction writer Kim Fahner, Canadian poet Kemeny Babineau, Indiana poet Nate Logan, Toronto poet and editor Michael Boughn, North Georgia poet and editor Gale Marie Thompson, award-winning poet Ellen Chang-Richardson, Montreal-based poet, professor and scholar of feminist poetics, Jessi MacEachern, Toronto poet and physician Dr. Conor Mc Donnell, San Francisco poet Micah Ballard, Montreal poet Misha Solomon, Ottawa writer and editor Mahaila Smith, American poet and asemic artist Terri Witek and Ottawa-based freelance editor and writer Margo LaPierre.
 
The whole series can be found online here .

Matthew Nienow, If Nothing

 

WHAT LUCK

I lived. Lived again. Wrecked,
hungover. Swerved in thedark
from river back to bunk
and never hit a tree. Neverwas
pulled over when my only
tongue was Swamp. Locked
my keys in the trunk in athunder
storm, done hotboxing theCimarron
with can’t remember, carhalfway
in the road. Aura ofblunt, pungent
as roadkill skunk. Alwaysmade it
home. Always stumblingthick-
tongued, lucky if I didn’tget the spins,
mumbling if I had tospeak, numb
thing dump in the truestsense.
floor was floor and I wason it, gone
wind in a way. Also stone.
Somehow sang even undone.
Almost alone, eventhroned
among future tombs, I lived,
the coal of my heart on aslow
burn, no time to lose, nosuch
thing as time, eyesturned
to the lack of light,skull
locked tight, crownedalive, the King
of Lost Keys.

Ihadn’t heard of Port Townsend, Washington poet and mental health counselor Matthew Nienow before seeing a copy of his second full-length collection, If Nothing (New Gloucester ME: Alice James Books, 2025), following his debut, House ofWater (Alice James Books, 2016). Set with an opening and closing poem oneither side of five untitled sections of poems, Nienow has articulated acollection of tight, narrative, first-person meditations that offer apurposeful meandering, composing poems that attempt to both place and findhimself. “Guilt’s my godfather,” he writes, to open the poem “OWNERSHIP,” “footingall the bills. / Cleaning out my chimney / each spring, bags and bags / of ash.I know how good / I have it. I know.” There’s an honesty to these poems I quitelike, as these poems attempt clarity, through the first person lyric, pushingdeep into family and addiction, marriage and despair, into the self to examinewith a firm hand and straightforward line. The poem “FIVE YEARS NOW” begins: “withouta drink, but in dreams / such timelines do not // exist. I can be 12 again, or20. / I can be in the middle of hurting // myself for the final time, / in themiddle of waking up // to whatever wounding meant / to that man almost gone //from every world I’ve known.” There’s some dark years running as undercurrentto this entire collection, as Nienow’s lyrics offer the clarity of held breathand a straight line enough that it might cut into the skin; poems that wrestlewith all he ever was, is and could be, writing out what he could be againstwhat he should be; an undertone of what he almost was, each poem, each moment,closer to a clarity and attention that might be a process across the rest ofhis life. If you’ve ever been attempting or navigating the other side of bad choices,these are poems in that exact space: having emerged, with the shadow of thoseexperiences never fully behind. As the opening poem, “ON THE CONDITION OF BEINGBORN,” begins: “As you were, then. As you were / at the moment of your firstbreath / outside the mother, good / before you knew any other way to be. / Whocan remember such a time?”

 

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Ross McMeekin

Ross McMeekin is author of the upcomingnovel, Pepperleaf, out in 2026 from Thirty West Publishing House, aswell as a story collection, Below the Falls (Thirty West, 2024), anda novel, The Hummingbirds (Skyhorse, 2018). His short fiction hasappeared in publications such as Virginia Quarterly Review, X-R-A-Y, Vol.1Brooklyn, and Shenandoah. More can be found at www.rossmcmeekin.com.

1 - How did your first book change yourlife? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feeldifferent?

My first book, a neo-noir novel called TheHummingbirds, changed my life in that it helped me to see and accept myselfas a writer, more so than I had before. It was also gratifying to get thechance to hear people respond to the project I’d been working on for so long inrelative solitude.

That first novel, though told frommultiple perspectives, had the same overriding tone and style throughout it,where my story collection, Below the Falls, is more of a crowd ofdifferent voices, and the styles vary. Another difference is that the storieswere written over a much longer period of time than the novel. For me, storiesconjure up memories from the time and place I wrote them, so the story collectionbrings forth a lot of different times and places, where the novel is lessdisparate in the memories it brings up.

2 - How did you come to fiction first,as opposed to, say, poetry or non-fiction?

In a high school English class, I wasintroduced to stories from James Baldwin and Franz Kafka, among others. Throughthose two writers in particular, the teacher opened my eyes to how complex,nuanced, and powerful fiction could be, and that’s when I started to read a lotof literary fiction—and why I was drawn to write it, too.

3 - How long does it take to start anyparticular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is ita slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, ordoes your work come out of copious notes?

My process is one of fits and spurts. Iwrite every day and have now for years, but for me that’s no guarantee I’ll beinspired. I’ve come to see the daily ritual as part of the process, even thetimes where it’s dry. Sometimes it’s more important to spend time pacing andthinking about a piece before tapping the keys. At some point, the ideas come,and I write them out.

I think because I move slowly throughthe first draft, it tends to resemble a final draft more than some otherwriters I’ve known, who fly through their first drafts knowing they might throwit all away and not just revise but rewrite the project altogether.

4 - Where does a work of prose usuallybegin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into alarger project, or are you working on a "book" from the verybeginning?

I’ve found that a work of prose beginswith an image in my mind of a place. That sparks the wider story. Another wayof saying that is place comes first, setting. From there the characters emergeand the scene is set into motion.

I have a novel, Pepperleaf,coming out with Thirty West Publishing House in Spring of 2026, and that bookstarted as a short story and then the seeds of it spread out like roots intothe ground. I’m becoming better at getting a sense of how long a story will beearly on, but it’s still kind of mysterious. Once I start writing, and theinspiration comes, there’s no knowing what it might turn into. That’s part ofthe fun of it, I think.

5 - Are public readings part of orcounter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?

I’m a pretty quiet, solitary person bynature, so public readings can feel overwhelming, especially the time leadingup to them. But once I’m there, I tend to relax a bit enjoy them. I thinkreading one’s work in front of others can be a help in the revision process,because there’s a live audience and you get a sense of what they respond to andwhat they don’t, in real time. But for me, I have a few trusted readers whosefeedback is most important, and that’s usually the crowd I rely on.

6 - Do you have any theoreticalconcerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answerwith your work? What do you even think the current questions are?

I tend to be interested in characterpsychology, more specifically how human beings contradict themselves. Ifexamined, our contradictions can tell us a lot about ourselves, and our world.In that way, I’m also interested in honesty, and how it reveals complexity. Themore honest I can be in writing, the better. I don’t start with questions I’mtrying to answer, and often I can finish a draft or two of a piece beforeunderstanding what questions the story is grappling with.

7 – What do you see the current role ofthe writer being in larger culture? Do they even have one? What do you thinkthe role of the writer should be?

I can only speak as a fiction writer,but I think our role can—maybe should—be honesty. Through fiction, writers havea chance to illuminate the nature of humanity and what isn’t being said, orrealities that people are afraid to say for various reasons. The cloak offiction allows writers to illuminate aspects of humanity and culture that mightotherwise remain unsaid. 

8 - Do you find the process of workingwith an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?

I think having an outside editor hasbeen helpful to me over the years. It requires me to re-examine my work andmake changes when appropriate. Though I tend to be very perfectionistic, I’malso deeply aware that there will be parts I’ve missed or haven’t thoughtthrough. Editors force me to look at my work more dispassionately, which in thelater stages can spur me toward a fuller realization of what I’d expressed in aless effective way. So you could say it leads me toward greater specificity inmy work. 

9 - What is the best piece of adviceyou've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?

Show up to write every day. I’ve heardit from a lot of places, and while it’s not true for everyone, it’s true forme. It helps me see the process as one of seasons. Through experiencing the ebband flow of it, I’ve been able to be less anxious when I’m less “productive”—interms of actual word count, page count, etc.—and feel more enjoyment when I’mwriting profusely. I’m at a point in life where my schedule varies a lot eachday, so having a solid writing time that won’t change has helped me be morecreative and have a more enjoyable time through all aspects of the process. 

10 - How easy has it been for you tomove between genres (short stories to the novel)? What do you see as theappeal?

I’m always writing short stories, evenwhen I’m focusing on a novel. Stories are the primary tenants of my apartmentbuilding. I think rather than distracting from larger projects, they comealongside them and, in some cases, help move them forward. Both short storiesand novels have a lot to teach each other, and often intersect. For me, forwhatever reason, going back and forth between them feels natural.

11 - What kind of writing routine doyou tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you)begin?

I wake up around one in the morning,work until four-thirty when my wife gets up, then rush through the day ofresponsibilities from there. I wake up without an alarm. It’s not rushed. Mymost creative times are in the late night/early morning.

12 - When your writing gets stalled,where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?

A professor from grad school told me hereads poetry before he sits down to write fiction. I don’t always do that, butwhen I’m feeling stuck, I do, and it helps. I also have found that researchinghelps get me inspired. But most often I pace around, and that seems to help,too. 

13 - What fragrance reminds you ofhome?

Evergreens, wet soil, rotting branchesand leaves. I’m fortunate to live in a place where I’m surrounded by trees,which I love, save the cloud of pollen hovering over us every spring. Smallcost, though. I wish I smelled it more often, the smell of home…it’s funny howa person gets used to a smell and ceases to smell it, then leaves and comesback a few days later to discover that smell again. 

14 - David W. McFadden once said that bookscome from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work,whether nature, music, science or visual art?

Music influences my writing, for sure.Language is music. I studied jazz as an undergrad, and I know its rhythms are apart of my writing, as are many other forms of music. A sentence is a melodyand often also a harmony.

15 - What other writers or writings areimportant for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

So many! Flannery O’Connor, Tom Drury,Pinckney Benedict, Elizabeth Strout, Charles Portis, Graham Greene…these arejust a few on my all-time list of writers who’ve inspired me.

16 - What would you like to do that youhaven't yet done?

What I’ve been doing over the lastcouple of months: writing a True Grit-esque novel taking place in the late1800s in the Pacific Northwest. I’m drawn to that period because it was a timeof great societal change, and I’m drawn to the place because I’m surrounded by theland and its history.

17 - If you could pick any otheroccupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think youwould have ended up doing had you not been a writer?

I’d love to teach fiction writing againsomeday. I’ve always harbored the fantasy of being a fly-fishing guide, thoughI don’t think I’m anywhere near talented enough to do it. Overall, I would saysomeplace where I could help people learn and get joy from an artistic pursuit(which fly-fishing can be, too).

18 - What made you write, as opposed todoing something else?

I think because it’s what I enjoy most.I love to write…even the difficult parts, in the end, I enjoy. Before mygrandmother passed, she told my father that she thought there was going to be awriter in the family. That stuck with me, and I’ve become that, and I feel asatisfaction that I’m doing good by her. But in the end, I do it because it’swhat I love.

To go a bit further, I think there issomething to the way that I experience the world that lends itself towardscreative expression. Writing is a way of thinking, and something like a storyor novel is the expression of a long, intense period of thought, strung out(usually) over weeks or months or years. I read that once the poet RobertLowell was described as, “thinking in metaphor.” I think that’s true of a lotof fiction writers, too, but maybe more so that we think in story.

19 - What was the last great book youread? What was the last great film?

The last great book I read was Suttreeby Cormac McCarthy, which I’d read years ago and then returned to. I rememberedit as a dark, serious book—which it is—but was surprised by how funny parts ofit are. I think the comedic elements of his writing are sometimes overlooked.The last great film I watched was another revisit: the original Rocky.The character development and rising action are superb, and the quieter partsof the film can be gentle and sad in a very satisfying way. And no one does amontage scene like Sylvester Stallone.

20 - What are you currently working on?

I’m drafting that PNW period novel Imentioned, and I also have a short story without an ending, or at least asatisfying one. I’m also beginning to think through minor changes to Pepperleafin anticipation of the editing process before publication.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

Evan Nicholls, Easy Tiger

 

EASY TIGER

The tiger makes it all soeasy, the way it sweeps the woman’s house, packs a satsuma for her snack,accounts for the taxes. The way it ambushes need. How it steps the ache out ofher back after work, shifting like a moon man or a dressage horse. This tigeris better people than most, the woman thinks. Stil, it is shit at being atiger. The way it obeys all rules of the IRS.

Thelatest from Charlottesville, Virginia poet and artist Evan Nicholls, followinghis prose poem and full-colour visual debut, Holy Smokes: Poems + Collages (Syracuse NY/Exeter NH: Ghost City Press, 2021) [see my review of such here],is the small yet hefty volume Easy Tiger (Future Tense Books, 2025). EasyTiger offers a quintet suite of surreal prose poems with occasionalfull-colour collage, all of which appear structured in similar ways, onesentence or phrase or image set atop another into a pile, providing less of astraightforward narrative through-line than an assemblage that suggests anarrative of collisions and surrealisms through the very act of reading. “He isnot a white knight or a black knight.” the poem “A REGULAR KNIGHT” begins. “Heis a regular knight. / In regular armor. / With a regular sword. / He does notride a white horse or a red dragon. / He rides a pony and is accompanied by alarge ginger cat.” One might attempt to describe such pieces as short narrativefictions or prose poems, as sharp collage works or jumbles, as quirky or oddball,all imprecise offerings for what Nicholls’ poems are doing and attempting, allof the above simultaneously, deliberately riding that fine line between senseand non-sense. The single line of the poem “LAIR OF THE DOG THAT BIT YOU,” forexample, that reads: “You mow the lawn. You vacuum up.”

There’sbeen a heft of younger American poets leaning into the prose poem over the pastfew years, often with a surreal bent or thread, including Evan Williams [see his above/ground press title here], Shane Kowalski, Benjamin Niespodziany [see my review of his latest; see his above/ground press title here], Nate Logan [see my review of his latest; see his latest above/ground press title here], Ben Jahn [see his above/ground press title here], MC Hyland [see my review of their latest; see their above/ground press title here] andLindsey Webb [see my review of her latest; see her above/ground press title here], as well as a whole slew of others,most of whom seem to be following an impulse or prompt by such as the late Russell Edson [see my review of his posthumous selected poems here], althoughwith more of a lyric bent. In his own way, Nicholls does write, as Vik Shirleyoffers on the back cover, with “a relentless commitment to the weird andstrange,” or, as Zachary Schomburg offers, “a recklessness,” although one withsuch a playful, joyful sense of nuance and heart. Nicholls composes poems thatcan’t help but lift any dark mood, dark heart, through such joyful and surreal ridiculousness,even across the occasional dark thread. In the end, these might just be poemsof hope.

CHEKHOV’S GUN

The gun had a bell for amother. The gun’s father was a cheap crate. If the gun’s mother ever tried togo off, the crate would eat her with the entire length of his arms.

the above/ground press 32nd anniversary reading/launch/party! August 7 at RedBird,

celebrating THIRTY-TWO YEARS of continuous activity(and nearly fourteen hundred publications), Ottawa publisher above/ground presspresents:

readings and chapbook launches by:

Jason Christie (Ottawa), Monty Reid (Ottawa), BeatrizHausner (Toronto), Ellen Chang-Richardson (Ottawa), Lina Ramona Vitkauskas(Toronto) + Mandy Sandhu (Toronto);

lovingly hosted by above/ground press editor/publisherrob mclennan
THURSDAY, AUGUST 7, 2025 at RedBird
7pm door/7:30pm reading 

$18 ; includes copies of three recent above/groundpress titles ; Tickets available via RedBird, or at the door; [see the report here from last year’s event] 

author/performer biographies: 

MontyReid was born in Saskatchewan, and currently lives inOttawa.He is the author of the full-length collection KarstMeans Stone (NeWest Press, 1979), The Life of Ryley (ThistledownPress, 1981), The Dream of Snowy Owls (Longspoon Press, 1983), TheAlternate Guide (Red Deer College Press, 1985), These Lawns (RedDeer College Press, 1990), Dog Sleeps: Irritated Texts (NeWest Press,1993), Crawlspace: New and Selected Poems (House of Anansi Press, 1993),Flat Side (Red Deer College Press, 1998), Disappointment Island(Chaudiere Books, 2006), Luskville Reductions (Brick Books, 2008), Garden(Chaudiere Books, 2014) and Meditatio Placentae (Brick Books, 2016),as well as a mound of chapbooks. The former Managing Editor of Arc PoetryMagazine, he was the Artistic Director of VERSeFest: Ottawa’s InternationalPoetry Festival for more than a decade.

Reid is the author of seven titles throughabove/ground press: Six Songs for the Mammoth Steppe(2000), cuba A book (2005), In the Garden (sept series) (2011), MoanCoach (2013), seam (2018), Where there’s smoke (2023) and cuba A book: twentieth anniversary edition (2025), which he will be launchingas part of this event. above/ground press produced Reportfrom the Reid Society Vol. 1 No. 1 (2022).

Jason Christie lives and writes in Ottawa with his wifeand two children and no pets. His published books include Canada Post(Invisible), i-Robot (EDGE/Tesseract), Unknown Author(Insomniac), and Cursed Objects (Coach House). He’s wrapping up a newcollection that he wrote with/against/for AI.

Christieis the author of nine chapbooks withabove/ground press: 8th Ave 15th St NW. (2004), Government(2013), Cursed Objects (2014), The Charm (2015), random_lines= random.choice (2017), glass language (excerpt) (2018), Bridgeand Burn (2021) and glass / language / untitled / exaltation (2023;second printing, 2023), which won the bpNichol Chapbook Award, as well as PSA (2025), whichhe will be launching as part of this event.

Beatriz Hausner has published several poetry collections,including The Wardrobe Mistress (2003), Sew Him Up (2010), Enterthe Raccoon (2012), Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart (2020) and SheWho Lies Above (2023), as well as many limited edition chapbooks. Her bookshave been published internationally and translated into several languages,including her native Spanish, French, and most recently Greek. Hausner writesextensively about surrealism and her translations of Spanish Americansurrealist poets have exerted an important influence on her own writing.Hausner has edited journals and magazines, including Open Letter, ellipse,Exile Quarterly, as well as many of the books published during hertenure as a publisher of Quattro Books. She is the editor of Someone Editions,and its current project French Letter Society. Beatriz Hausner wasPresident of the Literary Translators’ Association of Canada and Chair of thePublic Lending Right Commission. She lives in Toronto where she publishes ThePhilosophical Egg, an organ or living surrealism. Currently, with RussellSmith, she curates and runs the lecture series Soluble Fish. She willbe launching her above/ground press debut chapbook, The Oh Oh (2025).

Ellen Chang-Richardson is an award-winningpoet, multi-genre writer, judicial assistant, and editor of Taiwanese andChinese Cambodian descent. A third culture kid at heart, Ellen’s writing isinformed by their love of contemporary art, their concern with humanity’simpact on Earth, and their experience moving through various societies as afemme-presenting genderqueer. The author/co-author of six other poetrychapbooks, Ellen’s multi-genre writing has appeared in Augur, Anti-HeroinChic, The Ex-Puritan, The Fiddlehead, Grain, Plenitude,Watch Your Head, and more. Their debut collection, Blood Belies(Wolsak & Wynn, 2024), was shortlisted for the Gerald Lampert MemorialAward. They are a co-founder of Riverbed Reading Series, an editor for Room andlong con magazine, and a member of the poetry collective VII. Find out more at www.ehjchang.com. They will be launchingtheir above/ground press debut, The Moleskin Coat (2025).

Lina Ramona Vitkauskas isa Canadian-American-Lithuanian formerly from Chicago, living in Toronto. She isan award-winning, published poet & video poet. She was a 2020 recipient ofa PEN America grant for her development of an experimental poetry collectionthat adapted poems from Vsevolod Nekrasov and Bill Knott. She was also thevoice of George Maciunas’ mother in the documentary, GEORGE (directed byJeffrey Perkins) screened at MoMA and in Vilnius. Her work has been mostrecently featured in/at: Film Video Poetry Society (Los Angeles); Octopus FilmFestival (Gdansk, Poland); John Gagné Contemporary Gallery (Toronto):Post-Future Era with Kunel Gaur, Justin Neely, and Confusions (Ben Turner);Poetic Phonotheque (Denmark); MOCA Toronto (public installation); SIFF(Moldova); Newlyn Film Festival (UK); Festival Fotogenia (Mexico); MidwestPoetry Fest (US); Vienna Video Poetry Festival (Austria); and the InternationalMigration & Environmental Film Festival (Canada). Her website islinaramona.com. She will be launching her above/ground press debut, TheDeaf Forest of Cosmic Scaffolding (2025).

Mandy Sandhu is a poet based inOakville, Ontario. Her work, often in sonnet form, blends vivid imagery withsharp observation, drawing inspiration from writers like Sylvia Plath, theBeats, Dale Smith and Ted Berrigan. Mandy works at Toronto Metropolitan University in the Disability Office.She will be launching her chapbook debut, The Temporary Space of aPlacenta (2025).

for media inquires, as ever, send a note to rob mclennan at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail (dot) com,

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Bindu Suresh

Bindu Suresh [photo credit: Eva Maude] is the author of the novella 26 Knots (2019) and the novel The Road Between Us (2025). A former journalist, she has written hundreds of articles for various newspapers, including the Montreal Gazette and the Buenos Aires Herald. She has a degree in literature from Columbia University and a medical degree from McGill University, and currently works full-time as a pediatrician. She currently lives in Montreal with her husband, her seven-year-old daughter, and her five-year-old son.

1 - How did your first book change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?
My first book legitimized me as a writer in my own eyes. Prior to that I’d published poetry and short stories in literary journals, and written newspaper articles in my time as a print journalist, but it was with my first book that I began to see myself as a writer.

I think my most recent work is similar to my previous work in style, tone, and form, but it’s also more lighthearted, less Romantic, less tragic.

2 - How did you come to fiction first, as opposed to, say, poetry or non-fiction?
I actually started, as a teenager, with poetry, but had moved on pretty definitively to fiction by the time I turned 18. I discovered an interest in character, and then (though less so) in plot. My beginnings are still evidenced in my poetic style of prose; this is actually the sine qua non of my writing, for me.

3 - How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copious notes?
I find the ideas and words come pretty quickly once I start, and that first drafts appear looking close to their final shape. I don’t have any notes; I have a timeline, which I use to track what my characters are doing when (very necessary in a book like my latest, in which eight characters traverse twenty years and three continents), a rough document that I use in the moment (to compare two versions of a sentence to decide which I prefer), the main document with the novel itself, and that’s it.

4 - Where does a work of prose usually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?
I often (well, for the two novels I’ve written!) start at the beginning: that is, on Page 1. After that it can be a bit all over the place, with me writing Page 2, then 3, then what ends up being 15, and 16, then what in the end will become 143 and 144. And then the ending, then maybe back to the beginning. For me it is certainly short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, though I am aware the whole way through that I am working on a ‘book’. So it’s a bit of both, I suppose!

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I do enjoy them; I enjoy feedback of any kind, to be honest, and readings—particularly the questions and discussion that follow—are a kind of feedback. I write for my own brain’s satisfaction and pleasure in getting a story down on the page, but I also write as a grateful reader; that is, as someone who feels she was helped and guided to live a happier life through the fiction she read. My fondest wish as a writer is to get to do the same for someone else.

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the current questions are?
I don’t, really. The questions I’m trying to answer are on the level of our human experience: what makes us act the way we do? What are the consequences of our decisions? I usually use relationships (parental, platonic, and most often, romantic) as the means through which I explore those questions.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Do they even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
I think I alluded to this a bit in a previous question, but for me the role of the writer is to augment our understanding of the world, and to help us live better, happier lives as a result.  

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
Ha, both! I hate fighting over commas, over whether-or-not-I-need-two-metaphors-here, and the like. But I would also hate to go without it, because the only editor I have ever worked with—Leigh Nash, now at Assembly Press, who edited both 26 Knots and The Road Between Us—deeply parsed every line and made the book better for it. Even if I disagreed with her and the line in question stayed as it was, my understanding of my own line had deepened in having to defend it.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
Can the best piece of advice come from me, having discovered it through trial and error? If yes, then I’d say it’s to end each writing day knowing where you’re going next. That way, when you sit down the next day to write, you start on a roll instead of in front of a glaring blank page.

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (journalism to non-fiction to fiction)? What do you see as the appeal?
It’s been fairly easy to move between genres. Each kind of writing brings its own satisfaction: journalism (efficiency, clarity, the odd interjection of humour if you can get away with it/the piece calls for it), and fiction (world- and character-building, the use of more poetic language, the construction of a story arc). I certainly wouldn’t be good at all forms of writing, but I would love to try them all—I’ve always been tempted to write a play, for example, given how important I think dialogue is to a story.

11 - What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?
My writing routine is very much grab-the-time-when-you-can. I’m a shift worker (I work in a pediatric emergency setting) so sometimes I work in the mornings and sometimes in the evenings, sometimes on weekdays and sometimes on weekends. If I have a number of day shifts in a row I’ll try to take advantage and write in the early morning, say at 5am, before my kids are awake. If I work an evening shift, I can write in the morning when they’re at school. I’ve learned to start with writing as my first work of the day and leave less intellect-requiring tasks (identifying, testing and then throwing out all my kids’ cap-less, dead markers, folding laundry, answering emails…) for the evening. That way my most energetic self is put towards the work that is most important to me.

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
To be perfectly honest, what happens now is that I doggedly and ineffectually continue on, imagining that if I just ‘think harder’ for a while longer I’ll solve whatever problem has presented itself and come up with the finally-right sentence. At the end of sometimes hours of frustration I’ll then remember all the actions I could have taken to get myself unstuck: reading a book, going for a run, organizing a closet. I’m still learning to notice when I’m stuck and to realize I need to take a break. Thankfully, I don’t get stuck often!

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
Lilacs. They were ever-present for me growing up, first as a child in Saskatchewan, then as a teenager in Calgary. And now, at my home in Montreal, I’m lucky enough to have a lilac bush in my backyard.

14 - David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?
I’d agree with that statement, in that my biggest influences have been other books. I do also love visual art, and dance, and frequent exhibitions and performances often, so I am sure those are influences, too. Films and plays have also been hugely influential.

15 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
There are writers who have influenced my development as a writer, like Alice Munro (who does so much with so little), William Faulkner (who leaves much unsaid and leaves the reader to fill in the gaps), or Jorge Luís Borges (with his commanding narrative voice that impels the reader to suspend all disbelief). There are contemporary writers I’ve discovered more recently that have propulsive plots with literary execution in a balance that I admire (Damon Galgut, Claire Keegan). There are writers I read simply because they’re enjoyable to read (though they are gifted writers, also, certainly), like Sally Rooney and Elizabeth Strout.

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I don’t think there is anything! Can I cheat and list things I love to do that I don’t do any longer? If so, I’d say dancing—salsa, merengue, and tango—which I did a lot pre-kids and haven’t had time to go back to post-kids. I’d also like to travel anywhere I haven’t been and learn as many languages as I can; I think the next one I’d learn would be German (though, in a practical sense, before embarking on a new language I would try to improve my French and Spanish, which seem to undergo a steep attrition the minute they’re not used).

17 - If you could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?
I already have another career (as I know many other writers do): I’m a pediatrician. To answer in the spirit of the question, however, I’d probably say I would have become a literature professor. That way I could continue to keep books close, but also teach, which I love doing. (As a doctor I get to teach residents and medical students, as well as my patients’ parents, all the time.)

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
For me, the drive to write comes both from a sense of joy and a sense of duty. It is my favourite thing to turn my mind to. It is also—by my personal sense of ethics—what, if I happen to have any skill at doing, I should turn my mind to. I mentioned before how grateful I am to the novels and stories that have shown me how to live a happier, more considered life, and if I can do even in small part the same, I feel that I should.

19 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
When I’m writing I tend to read contemporary novels in English, so when I’m between projects I take advantage to branch out to other languages and periods. I just finished Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier, which was great. In terms of the last great film, I’d say Anatomy of a Fall, by Justine Triet.

20 - What are you currently working on?
Nothing currently! I’m taking a little six-month break between the end of editing The Road Between Us and writing something new. I always say I have three jobs: being a writer, a doctor, and a mom (though, of course, being a mom is a full-time job!). The pause will allow me to more fully throw myself into the other two; in the fall I’m sure I’ll be delighted and ready to start a new project.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

Touch the Donkey : new interviews with Straumsvåg, ryan, Solomon, Lockhart, Dulin, Davis + Higgins,

Anticipating the release next week of the forty-sixth issue of Touch the Donkey [a small poetry journal], why not check out the interviews that have appeared over the past few weeks with contributors to the forty-fifth issue: Dag T. Straumsvåg, brandy ryan, Misha Solomon, D. A. Lockhart, Dominic Dulin, Jordan Davis and Larkin Maureen Higgins.

Interviews with contributors to the first forty-four issues (more than two hundred and eighty interviews to date) remain online, including: J-T Kelly, Jennifer Firestone, Austin Miles, Alice Burdick, Henry Gould, Leesa Dean, Tom Jenks, Sandra Doller, Scott Inniss, John Levy, Taylor Brown, Grant Wilkins, Lori Anderson Moseman, russell carisse, Ariana Nadia Nash, Wanda Praamsma, Michael Harman, Terri Witek, Laynie Browne, Noah Berlatsky, Robyn Schelenz, Andy Weaver, Dessa Bayrock, Anselm Berrigan, Alana Solin, Michael Betancourt, Monty Reid, Heather Cadsby, R Kolewe, Samuel Amadon, Meghan Kemp-Gee, Miranda Mellis, kevin mcpherson eckhoff and Kimberley Dyck, Junie Désil, Micah Ballard, Devon Rae, Barbara Tomash, Ben Meyerson, Pam Brown, Shane Kowalski, Kathy Lou Schultz, Hilary Clark, Ted Byrne, Garrett Caples, Brenda Coultas, Sheila Murphy, Chris Turnbull and Elee Kraljii Gardiner, Stuart Ross, Leah Sandals, Tamara Best, Nathan Austin, Jade Wallace, Monica Mody, Barry McKinnon, Katie Naughton, Cecilia Stuart, Benjamin Niespodziany, Jérôme Melançon, Margo LaPierre, Sarah Pinder, Genevieve Kaplan, Maw Shein Win, Carrie Hunter, Lillian Nećakov, Nate Logan, Hugh Thomas, Emily Brandt, David Buuck, Jessi MacEachern, Sue Bracken, Melissa Eleftherion, Valerie Witte, Brandon Brown, Yoyo Comay, Stephen Brockwell, Jack Jung, Amanda Auerbach, IAN MARTIN, Paige Carabello, Emma Tilley, Dana Teen Lomax, Cat Tyc, Michael Turner, Sarah Alcaide-Escue, Colby Clair Stolson, Tom Prime, Bill Carty, Christina Vega-Westhoff, Robert Hogg, Simina Banu, MLA Chernoff, Geoffrey Olsen, Douglas Barbour, Hamish Ballantyne, JoAnna Novak, Allyson Paty, Lisa Fishman, Kate Feld, Isabel Sobral Campos, Jay MillAr, Lisa Samuels, Prathna Lor, George Bowering, natalie hanna, Jill Magi, Amelia Does, Orchid Tierney, katie o’brien, Lily Brown, Tessa Bolsover, émilie kneifel, Hasan Namir, Khashayar Mohammadi, Naomi Cohn, Tom Snarsky, Guy Birchard, Mark Cunningham, Lydia Unsworth, Zane Koss, Nicole Raziya Fong, Ben Robinson, Asher Ghaffar, Clara Daneri, Ava Hofmann, Robert R. Thurman, Alyse Knorr, Denise Newman, Shelly Harder, Franco Cortese, Dale Tracy, Biswamit Dwibedy, Emily Izsak, Aja Couchois Duncan, José Felipe Alvergue, Conyer Clayton, Roxanna Bennett, Julia Drescher, Michael Cavuto, Michael Sikkema, Bronwen Tate, Emilia Nielsen, Hailey Higdon, Trish Salah, Adam Strauss, Katy Lederer, Taryn Hubbard, Michael Boughn, David Dowker, Marie Larson, Lauren Haldeman, Kate Siklosi, robert majzels, Michael Robins, Rae Armantrout, Stephanie Strickland, Ken Hunt, Rob Manery, Ryan Eckes, Stephen Cain, Dani Spinosa, Samuel Ace, Howie Good, Rusty Morrison, Allison Cardon, Jon Boisvert, Laura Theobald, Suzanne Wise, Sean Braune, Dale Smith, Valerie Coulton, Phil Hall, Sarah MacDonell, Janet Kaplan, Kyle Flemmer, Julia Polyck-O’Neill, A.M. O’Malley, Catriona Strang, Anthony Etherin, Claire Lacey, Sacha Archer, Michael e. Casteels, Harold Abramowitz, Cindy Savett, Tessy Ward, Christine Stewart, David James Miller, Jonathan Ball, Cody-Rose Clevidence, mwpm, Andrew McEwan, Brynne Rebele-Henry, Joseph Mosconi, Douglas Barbour and Sheila Murphy, Oliver Cusimano, Sue Landers, Marthe Reed, Colin Smith, Nathaniel G. Moore, David Buuck, Kate Greenstreet, Kate Hargreaves, Shazia Hafiz Ramji, Erín Moure, Sarah Swan, Buck Downs, Kemeny Babineau, Ryan Murphy, Norma Cole, Lea Graham, kevin mcpherson eckhoff, Oana Avasilichioaei, Meredith Quartermain, Amanda Earl, Luke Kennard, Shane Rhodes, Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Sarah Cook, François Turcot, Gregory Betts, Eric Schmaltz, Paul Zits, Laura Sims, Stephen Collis, Mary Kasimor, Billy Mavreas, damian lopes, Pete Smith, Sonnet L’Abbé, Katie L. Price, a rawlings, Suzanne Zelazo, Helen Hajnoczky, Kathryn MacLeod, Shannon Maguire, Sarah Mangold, Amish Trivedi, Lola Lemire Tostevin, Aaron Tucker, Kayla Czaga, Jason Christie, Jennifer Kronovet, Jordan Abel, Deborah Poe, Edward Smallfield, ryan fitzpatrick, Elizabeth Robinson, nathan dueck, Paige Taggart, Christine McNair, Stan Rogal, Jessica Smith, Nikki Sheppy, Kirsten Kaschock, Lise Downe, Lisa Jarnot, Chris Turnbull, Gary Barwin, Susan Briante, derek beaulieu, Megan Kaminski, Roland Prevost, Emily Ursuliak, j/j hastain, Catherine Wagner, Susanne Dyckman, Susan Holbrook, Julie Carr, David Peter Clark, Pearl Pirie, Eric Baus, Pattie McCarthy, Camille Martin and Gil McElroy.

The forthcoming forty-sixth issue features new writing by: Kirstin Allio, kemeny babineau, Joseph Donato, Beatriz Hausner, Matthew Walsh, Nicole Markotić, Lisa Pasold, Lina Ramona Vitkauskas and Emily Izsak.

And of course, copies of the first forty-five issues are still very much available. Why not subscribe?

Included, as well, as part of the above/ground press annual subscription! Which you should get right now for 2025! And you know about the above/ground press 32nd anniversary reading/launch/party happening in Ottawa on August 7th? tickets are available!

We even have our own Facebook group, and a growing (new) above/ground press substack. It’s remarkably easy.

Christine + I read in Dublin (Ireland) at Books Upstairs on July 13, with Christodoulos Makris and Éireann Lorsung

Christine McNair (dear spouse) and I are reading in Dublin, Ireland at Books Upstairs (17 D’Olier Street, Dublin 2, Ireland, D02 RX06) on Sunday, July 13 at 2pm with Irish poets Christodoulos Makris and Éireann Lorsung . You should come out! https://booksupstairs.ie/events/