the above/ground press 33rd anniversary/reading/launch party! August 22, at Anina’s Café,

celebrating THIRTY-THREE YEARS of continuous activity (and nearly fifteen hundred publications), Ottawa publisher above/ground press presents:

readings and chapbook launches by:

Stephanie Bolster (Montreal), Mark Goldstein (Toronto), Cara Goodwin (Ottawa), Sonja Greckol (Toronto), Harold Hoefle (Ottawa), James Spyker (Toronto) + Grant Wilkins (Ottawa)

lovingly hosted by above/ground press editor/publisher rob mclennan
SATURDAY, AUGUST 22, 2026 at Anina’s Café, 280 Joffre-Bélanger Way
7pm door/7:30pm reading
$10 at the door / cash or e-transfer / includes 2 chapbooks (of your choice!
[see the report here from last year’s event; and don't forget the 33rd anniversary sale, happening until September 1st!] 

Author biographies:

Stephanie Bolster’s latest book of poetry, Long Exposure, appeared with Palimpsest Press in fall 2025. Excerpts from the book were finalists for the CBC Poetry Prize in 2012 and 2019. Bolster’s first book, White Stone: The Alice Poems, won the Governor General’s Award and the Gerald Lampert Award and was translated into French as Pierre Blanche. Her poems have also been translated into Spanish, German, and Serbo-Croatian. Editor of The Best Canadian Poetry in English 2008 and The Ishtar Gate: Last and Selected Poems by the late Ottawa poet Diana Brebner, and co-editor of Penned: Zoo Poems, she was born in Vancouver and grew up in Burnaby, BC. She has been a professor of creative writing at Concordia University since 2000 and lives in Pointe-Claire, Québec, on the Mohawk (Kanien’kehá:ka) territory of Skaniatara:ti.

Stephanie Bolster will be launching her fifth above/ground press title, BIODÔME: Twentieth Anniversary Edition (2026).

Born in Cold Lake, Alberta, on a rainy April day in 1992, Cara Goodwin is the daughter of a beautiful Cree mother and a doting military father. Her early years were shaped by movement across the plains: visits to her mother’s relations on reserve and months spent with her Kokum in British Columbia; a move to Oromocto, New Brunswick, at age eight, where she developed an East Coast sense of humour; and a relocation to Yellowknife at fifteen, where she lived until high school graduation.

After a year abroad in Australia at eighteen—where she briefly fancied herself a mysterious foreign waitress before finding work milking cows—Cara moved to Ottawa at nineteen for school. There, she became roommates with her future best friend and has built a chosen family of her own. Now thirty-four, and a proud member of Fort McMurray 468 First Nation, she is focused on deepening her connection to her Cree heritage and considering how to leave the planet in a better place for her nieces.

An Ottawa-based poet, her work has appeared in Bywords, flo. literary magazine, and Room. Over the past five years, she has received two Honourable Mentions for the John Newlove Award and was shortlisted for Room’s Annual Poetry Prize in 2023. In 2025 read as a featured performer for the Riverbed Reading Series, where her poems traced her ancestral roots across what is now called Canada. Cara holds a BA (Hons.) in Social Communications and has completed numerous writing diploma and certificate programs over the years.

Cara Goodwin will be launching her above/ground press debut, Map of What Was Taken (2026).

Mark Goldstein is a writer, editor, translator, and graphic artist. His work includes the serial poem Endlossong (forthcoming), his book-length translation of poems by Paul Celan, Thricelandium (2024), his translation of Kafka's novel, The Trial, as Her Process (2021), poems, essays, and interviews published as Part Thief, Part Carpenter (2021), his long poem, Form of Forms (2012), which was a finalist for the International Stiftung Buchkunst 2014 competition in Lipzig, as well as his poem collection, Tracelanguage: A Shared Breath (2010), and After Rilke (2008). Moreover, he co-edited AnyWord: A Festschrift for Phil Hall (2024), as well as the virtual anthology Paul Celan/100 (2020). He can be found online at markgoldstein.ca

Mark Goldstein will be launching his above/ground press debut, The Common Dark (2026).

Sonja Greckol lives in Tkaronto and is grateful for subways, LRTs and bike lanes wherever.  No Hay Linea En El Tiempo / No Line in Time (Manofalsa Press (Lima/Mexico City) is her latest book. She published Monitoring Station (2023), No Line in Time (2018), Skein of Days (2014) and Gravity Matters (2008). Monitoring Station was listed for the Robert Kroetsch Award, No Line in Time for the LCP Raymond P. Souster Award. Her long poem 'No Line in Time' won the 2017 Briar Patch Writing in the Margins Poetry Contest. Her translation of Rosío Cerón’s ‘Trances’ appeared in Jan 2025 Asymptote Journal and above/ground press published her translation of Cerón's Materia Oscura as Dark Matter, Dark Matter —Diverted. She is the founding poetry editor of Women and Environments International and a member of the Feminist Caucus (LCP). sonjagreckol.com

Sonja Greckol will be launching her above/ground press debut, Dark Matter, by Rosío Céron; translated/etranslated by Sonja Greckol (2025).

Harold Hoefle’s poems have won the Bliss Carman Award, the Great Blue Heron Poetry Award (2014), and a National Magazine Awards silver medal. His debut collection of poems, The Night Chorus, was published by McGill-Queen’s University Press. He has also published a collection of short-fiction called The Mountain Clinic (Oberon Press). Harold lives in Ottawa, teaches in Montreal.

Harold Hoefle will be launching his above/ground press debut, Leaning In (2026).

James Spyker is a book and paper artist based in Toronto. He lives in that building where you visited your great aunt when you were a kid. He occasionally returns to writing when blank pages become too much to bear.

James Spyker will be launching his above/ground press debut, Bedtime stories for my imaginary fans (2026).

Grant Wilkins is an occasional poet, printer and papermaker who has made a practice of doing strange things to other people’s words. He has degrees in History & Classical Civilization and in English, and he’s working on another one in Art History. He lives in Ottawa on the unceded and unsurrendered land of the Algonquin Anishinaabe people.

Grant Wilkins will be launching his sixth above/ground press chapbook, provocations (2026).

 

new from above/ground press: Useful Poems, by Cary Fagan

Useful Poems
Cary Fagan
$6
 

Painting Poem

I don’t want
to paint 
a mural
a cathedral’s
ceiling
the brick 
wall
beside  
the Korean 
grocery

I want 
to paint
a 
dandelion
bee
chestnut
pencil stub
shoelace

house 
key

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
August 2026
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Cary Fagan is the author of novels, short story collections, children’s books, and poetry chapbooks. His next novel, Still the World, will be published by Book*Hug in 2027. He is involved in two chapbook houses, espresso and Found Object.

This is Fagan’s fourth title through above/ground press, after Fifty-Two Lines About Henry (2024), then / here / now / there (2025) and The Sun Will Bleach It Away (with Rebecca Comay; 2025).

To order, send cheques (add $2 for postage; in US, add $3; outside North America, add $7) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

some author activity: Hoefle, Zhang, Trivedi, Paige, Oniță + Webb,

forthcoming author Harold Hoefle is interviewed via Chaudiere Books in the "six questions" series; Elena Zhang is interviewed over at Touch the Donkey; Amish Trivedi has new work at autocorrect; Salem Paige has a poem in the "poetry pause" series via The League of Canadian Poets; Adriana Oniță is interviewed in the "12 or 20 questions" series; and Lindsey Webb is named a finalist for this year's Loraine Williams Poetry Prize, hosted by The Georgia Review.

new from above/ground press: Look Out, Yellow Umbrella, by Jason Heroux

Look Out, Yellow Umbrella
Jason Heroux
$6

Can U help me, yellow umbrella?

Yellow umbrella, can U tell me?

Come here, yellow umbrella, come in.

Yellow umbrella, can U speak?

I am Jason, yellow umbrella, who are U?

What’s Ur name, yellow umbrella?

How do U spell yellow umbrella?

Yellow umbrella, I don’t understand.

Yellow umbrella, when do U open?

Where is Ur entrance, yellow umbrella?  

Are U open at the moment, yellow umbrella?

How long is the wait, yellow umbrella?

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
July 2026
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Author’s note:

This manuscript was inspired by two influences: a recent painting titled “Oblivion” (2026) painted by my Grade 11 English teacher, Maurice Krystal, and a pamphlet called English-Swahili Useful Phrases, written by Aime F Lacasse, W.F. (T.M.P. Book Department, Tabora, undated).

back cover image: Maurice Krystal, “Oblivion” (2026)

Jason Heroux resides in Kingston, Ontario, works at ServiceOntario and lives with his wife Soheir and their two cats, Pablo and Neruda. He is the author of five books of poetry: Memoirs of an Alias (2004), Emergency Hallelujah (2008), Natural Capital (2012), Hard Work Cheering Up Sad Machines (2016), and Like a Trophy from the Sun (2024), which was listed on CBC’s list of “44 Canadian poetry collections to watch for in fall 2024.” His short story collection Survivors of the Hive (2023) was also listed among the best books of the year by The Miramichi Reader and 49th Shelf.  A new collection of poems, Unfinished Wilderness (A Feed Dog Book, Anvil Press), is forthcoming in Fall 2026. He was the third Poet Laureate for the City of Kingston, Ontario, from 2019 to 2022.

This is Heroux’s fourth above/ground press chapbook, after Something or Other (2023), A Further Introduction to Bingo, with Dag T. Straumsvåg (2024), and My Life as a Notebook (2025).

To order, send cheques (add $2 for postage; in US, add $3; outside North America, add $7) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

save the date! above/ground press thirty-three: anniversary reading,

readings and new (recent) chapbooks by Stephanie Bolster, Mark Goldstein, Cara Goodwin, Harold Hoefle, Grant Wilkins (and most likely a couple of others); more information soon,

Saturday, August 22, 2026
7pm door / 7:30pm reading
Anina’s Café, 280 Joffre-Bélanger Way, Ottawa

slight door cover, but will include copies of two above/ground press titles of your choice!

keep in mind, 2026 subscriptions are still available, yes? totally willing to backdate,

and don't forget the above/ground press thirty-third anniversary sale, happening through to September 1st!

some author activity: Zhang, Banks, Burnham, Novak + mclennan,

Elena Zhang has new work up at Ellipsis Zine; Chris Banks is included in the Canadian Poets Series via Peripety and/or Tronies; Clint Burnham has new work up at Almost Island; JoAnna Novak has an essay up at The New York Times; and rob mclennan has a review of at The Woodlot: Canadian Poetry Reviews & Essays.

Daniel Barbiero reviews Jason Camlot and Stuart Ross' collaborative Shooky Session 1 John Ashbery, As We Know 5 December 2022, Jason’s office (2026)

Daniel Barbiero was good enough to provide the first reviews of Jason Camlot and Stuart Ross' collaborative Shooky Session 1 John Ashbery, As We Know 5 December 2022, Jason’s office (2026) via Arteidolia. Thanks so much! You can see the full review here, or below:

There’s a model of intertextuality that holds that every text has its double; in back of every text is another text, largely hidden but partly visible through the cracks in the first text, which in turn came into being as a response to the text secreted behind it. In many instances this second text goes unacknowledged, whether through absent-mindedness, anxious repression, or misdirection. Not so with Jason Camlot and Stuart Ross’s new chapbook Shooky Session 1: John Ashbery, As We Know 5 December 2022, Jason’s Concordia Office, a collectively authored poetic sequence whose authors cheerfully acknowledge the text to which their own text responds.

To write their sequence, Camlot and Ross first chose a book from the library at the Montreal university where Camlot teaches, and then settled in at his office to write. The book they chose was John Ashbery’s As We Know. Next, they alternated between reading and writing: one would read aloud from the book to the other, who’d write while listening, and then they’d switch roles. What and how much to take from As We Know to incorporate into his own poem was up to the writer to decide.

Camlot and Ross selected a book by Ashbery as their point of departure on the strength of Ashbery’s style and the inscrutability of his meaning. Ashbery is a poet of indirection, rapidly changing topics, plain diction, and labyrinthine syntax; negotiating his particular brand of ambiguity by ear is liable to open up a broad field of meaning full of possibilities that can inspire a range of imaginative responses. And the collection’s longest poem, “Litany,” itself is structured as an interplay of two texts. It’s written in facing columns that mimic the counterpoint of two independent voices heard at once, which makes it a fitting forerunner of Camlot and Ross’s own variety of verbal counterpoint.

The chapbook is divided into two parts. Part I consists of a single, quasi-narrative poem, while Part II is made up of discrete sections that can be read as independent poems. (Each part presumably was written by one or the other of the two poets.)

Part I’s discontinuous through-line recalls something of Ashbery’s own constant jumbling and rearranging of subjects, but without his systematic evasion of reference. While the forward motion of the long poem is propelled by a sequence of events that make sense on a local level but refuse totalization into a cohesive account, the things and actions they include often come plainly into view, albeit in contexts that are themselves enigmatic. For example,

We blush before elaborately broken entablatures
of bird-dropped simultaneities,
while smoke lingers,
looms above some simple ornaments
symbolic of beginnings,
of lonesomenesses,
of roundnesses, and of slants,
of thinnesses and generalities,
privatenesses and all things,
of preludes, and of farness,
of wonderfulness and asphalt.

The setting is a smoke-enfolded, presumably classical architectural ruin, which apparently causes embarrassment to the speaker. (But why? We don’t know.). The building’s ornaments are “simple,” but once their meaning is unpacked they turn out to stand for a mounting inventory of airy abstractions that then comes thudding to an incongruous and sudden end on a hard, paved surface. We’re jolted from the realm of the Ideal to something very close to the literally concrete.

This quick-cut shift in register, which pulls the rug out from under the tentative footfalls of common sense, is supplemented by elaborate metaphors and similes whose meanings are the product of their very incongruity:

Artifice is a twist
gaping at a citadelic tree,
a thing lumbering into
the invisible garment huddling
in a bus shelter on the icy
edge of the globe, a kind of
togetherness that injures illusion.

[…] All we know is
existence is waiting for a cab, like a
woman with a baby carriage filled with
fever-stricken mechanisms
I shall never see

The poetry in Part II tends more toward the lyrical and reflective, as in this self-contained section:

Some very pretty views are ascertained.
At dusk, amidst fitful cedars,
an iota of remorse
reverberates against the nightingales.

So, I wander through each dirty street,
as fools rush into my interstices,
and as my holes dream impetuously,
Solemnly, of rich adhesions.

O Sun, I want to enjoy
your work, your shining,
and setting, and rising,
and turning everything around.

There’s a play of ambiguity here that keeps the tone evocative but undecidable. The light is dim and there’s a passing moment of regret, but there’s a suggestion of hope as well: the sun the poet wants to enjoy may just as easily be rising as setting, since “dusk” can describe either dawn or sundown, and nightingales can be heard at both times.

Sometimes Ashbery’s voice seems to come through on its own, as in this passage from Part II:

Did you ever stop to think
about that other blackened memory,
and whether it was omitted
from the agenda deliberately

or out of innocent oversight,
or perhaps because it was pre-ordained
to be omitted from the
minutes, and so had

also to be omitted from
the agenda, even though
that other blackened memory
was included, for whatever reason.

And that these memories bear little resemblance
to anything but blackened star-shaped flowers?

The subject here—the “blackened memory”–is elusive and defined only in terms of another memory that presumably came up earlier in a conversation we’re only coming to in medias res. What it is we don’t know, and how or why it would be on anyone’s agenda (and anyway, what kind of an agenda would include a blackened memory as a discussion item?) also is a mystery. And meanwhile the syntax takes several serpentine turns as the question, rhetorical or in earnest, unspools. It’s the kind of thing we’d expect to find in Ashbery.

To be sure, in reading Shooky Session 1 it might make for an amusing game to try to draw a direct line between Ashbery’s poetry and Camlot and Ross’s by looking for coincidences of imagery or diction. For example, Part I’s

You can find knowledge like that
flowin’ round the flowers.
In this poem, flowers
stand in for something else.
Flowers are code names
for wishes of different kinds.

may have jumped off from the titular image of Ashbery’s “Flowering Death,” while the “interstices” from Part II may be an echo of “the interstices of my desirings” from Ashbery’s right-hand voice in “Litany.” But such an exercise would be beside the point. In the end, Camlot and Ross’s intertextual relationship to As We Know doesn’t rest on simple appropriation or direct commentary, but rather on the less predictable, and more inventive, ground of inspiration. What they’ve written stands on its own, and provides pleasures of its own besides.