new from above/ground press: spectre, by Hassen Saker

spectre
Hassen Saker
$6

the jays kept screaming the jays kept screaming
jays, the jays
jays were screaming







wreckage scattered on the floor
tea cup teacup tea
tea cup  teacup tea
spilt in the forest

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

score at https://soundcloud.com/hassensaker/spectre

cover photo by the author

Hassen Saker is a North American experimental poet, documentary filmmaker, and interdisciplinary/transmedia creator working with texts, audio, photography, film, new media, performance, & actions (i.e., forming organizations & activist-art projects). Her written works have been published in various magazines, journals, & anthologies like Rail, Tool, EOAGH, Big Bridge, miniMag, 100 Days Anthology by Barque Press (2001), and End of the World Project by Moria Books (2019). Her published collections of poetry include Salem (belladonna* books, 2005); Crabapples (Furniture Press, 2004), Sky Journal (Dusie Press, 2014); & Consolation Snacks (Furniture Press, 2017). Her poetry films include Waiting (2007); BRUT (2011), a la Muerte de la Muerte (2012), Surge (2012), poiètes + kinesis + grapho (2013), terra lingua: three aspects (2013); Sky Journal (2014); Solastalgia, a poem by Deborah Poe (2017); and Beasts: Rivers (2023). Her transmedia project, Nighttime Physicks, was published as a NFT collection on OpenSea in 2022. Saker’s multimedia & art/poetry film installations have been featured online, over radio, in public art spaces & galleries. She has performed in numerous venues throughout cities in the U.S. including Grand Rapids, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York, Boston, and Washington D.C. 

Saker has also been a sustainable business owner, gallerist, art frame maker, professional organizer, etc, living in Los Angeles, Oakland, Chicago, Philadelphia, & South Jersey. She currently lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan with her partner, Lauren Cavote. More at hassensaker.com

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

new from above/ground press: Revelations of divine love, by Katherine DeCoste

Revelations of Divine Love
Katherine DeCoste
$6

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

Katherine DeCoste is an uninvited guest on the unceded land of the Lək̓ʷəŋən (Songhees and Xʷsepsəm) peoples, where they live with their wife and cat. Their poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in SICK Magazine, Grain Magazine, yolk, filling Station, Contemporary Verse 2, The New Quarterly, PRISM International, and elsewhere. They were previously an editorial intern for Sundress Publications and are currently on the poetry editorial board at PRISM International. They are currently working on a full-length collection of poetry.

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: Sparling, Peterson, Shafer, Macdonald, Zhang, Barwin, Nećakov + Niespodziany,

Ken Sparling has new work up at R&R Magazine and talking about strawberries all of the time; Andrew K. Peterson and Emily Shafer also have new work up at talking about strawberries all of the time, where there's even an interview with Dawn Macdonald; Elena Zhang has new work up at had; and Gary Barwin & Lillian Nećakov are included in Benjamin Niespodziany's Sunday Poem & Prompt, 

new from above/ground press: CO—STAR & RESPONSE, by Shelagh Rowan-Legg

CO—STAR & RESPONSE
Shelagh Rowan-Legg
$6

Destroy with purpose


        Or perhaps I will force my heart
        to an earthquake —
        a dismantling that I refuse
        to allow but in a precise
        fissure — a tremulous shift
        that will be brief as possible,
        the musculature will find
        new companions in this
        rearrangement, a necessary
        reshuffling of salvation.

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

Shelagh Rowan-Legg is a writer and filmmaker in Montréal. Her poetry and short stories have been published in numerous journals such as The Windsor Review, The Ampersand Review, and New Poetry. Her short films have screened at festivals around the world, and she is a Contributing Editor at ScreenAnarchy. Find her at shelaghrowanlegg.com and on Bluesky.

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: Robinson, Earl, Melançon, Niespodziany, Zhang, Braun + Crosby,

Ben Robinson is included in the "Canadian Poets Series" via Peripety and/or Tronies; Amanda Earl's "14 Weeks with Jérôme Melançon" continues; Elena Zhang is the most recent poet featured in Benjamin Niespodziany's Sunday Poem and Prompt; Jacob Braun has new work in the eunoia review; and Gregory Crosby has new work up at Forget Cool.

above/ground press: 2027 subscriptions now available!

The race to the half-century continues! And with nearly FIFTEEN HUNDRED TITLES produced to date over the past thirty-three years, there’s been a ton of above/ground press activity over the past calendar year, including MORE THAN FIFTY TITLES (so far) produced in 2026 alone, including: poetry chapbooks by Ken Norris, Pete Smith, Peter Carl Anderson, Lori Anderson Moseman, Mark Tardi, Geoffrey Young, Lea Graham, Cara Goodwin, James Spyker, Grant Wilkins, Mark Goldstein, Harold Hoefle, Cary Fagan, Jason Heroux, Ken Norris, Stuart Ross and Jason Camlot, David Currie and IAN MARTIN, Jérôme Melançon, Dag T. Straumsvåg, Mrityunjay Mohan, Jon Cone, Emily Shafer, Derek Beaulieu, rob mclennan, Fred Wah, Daphne Marlatt, J.R. Carpenter, ryan fitzpatrick, Elena Zhang, Sarah Burgoyne and Clara Yeager, Susan Rudy, Shelly Harder, Misha Solomon, Stephanie Bolster, Jennifer Baker, Travis Sharp, John Levy, Christina Wells, Sarah Burgoyne, Ken Sparling, Jake Kennedy, Dawn Macdonald, Noah Sparrow, Glenn Bach, Jon Cone and K.Lipschutz, Robert van Vliet and Rose Maloukis, as well as three (quarterly) issues of Touch the Donkey and an issue of The Peter F. Yacht Club! There’s even two bilingual anthologies co-edited by Ottawa’s two poets laureate, Véronique Sylvain and David O’Meara, as part of their laureate tenures, and a further solo edited by O’Meara (all of which are still in print, at least for the moment).

SLIDING SCALE SUBSCRIPTIONS (AND RESUBSCRIPTIONS): As with last year, I am offering a sliding scale subscription rate; to simultaneously respond to ongoing postal/printing increases, as well as not automatically price everyone out. Honestly, if you are open to subscribing, whatever works within that particular range is completely fine! Not everyone has the same kinds of resources, and the main goal is to have the books available to those who want them. Subscriptions include everything above/ground press makes from the moment you subscribe through to the end of 2027, such as chapbooks, broadsheets, The Peter F. Yacht Club and G U E S T [a journal of guest editors] and quarterly poetry journal Touch the Donkey [a small poetry journal] (and whatever else the press can dream up, obviously):

CANADIAN SUBSCRIPTIONS : $75-$120 (CAN $)
AMERICAN SUBSCRIPTIONS : $75-$120 (US $)
INTERNATIONAL SUBSCRIPTIONS : $100-$140 (CAN $)

As well, anyone who subscribes on or by November 1st will also receive the last above/ground press package of 2026, including those exciting new titles by a number of those folk listed above, plus whatever else the press happens to produce before the turn of the new year.

Why wait? You can either send a cheque (payable to rob mclennan) to 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa, Ontario K1H 7M9, or send money via PayPal or e-transfer to rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com (or through the PayPal/donate button at robmclennan.blogspot.com).

Forthcoming items through the press also include individual chapbooks by Ryan Di Francesco, Paul Elter, Laura Carter, Noah Berlatsky, Michelle Lynn Dyrness, Tyler Mills, rob mclennan, Hassen Saker, Lisa Fishman, Shelagh Rowan-Legg, Katy DeCoste + David Phillips, another issue of Touch the Donkey, a further chapbook edited by David O’Meara (a couple of which have already been sent to the printer, by the by), as well as a whole slew of publications that haven't even been decided on yet. Who knows what might happen next.

And don’t forget our glorious substack! I’ve been posting author features/interviews over there for a while now; nearly forty interviews posted so far, most recently with Jennifer Baker, Jason Heroux, Lea Graham, Grant Wilkins and Lori Anderson Moseman. Lots of other cool updates that way, including clusters of new publication announcements every two months or so (because one at a time might be too much).

And don’t forget (also) that groundswell:the best of the third decade of above/ground press, 2013-2023 (Invisible Publishing, 2024) is also still available,

I’m sure you’ve also seen the posts, as well, through the (ottawa) small press almanac? lots of information on above/ground press and everyone else in town who makes chapbooks/ephemera etcetera! And the next edition (32^nd anniversary!) of the ottawa small press fair is November 14th! We will see you there, yes?

new from above/ground press: Spirit House, by Ken Norris

Spirit House
Ken Norris
$6

Being me, it’s hard
to believe. Faith

so often seems like
a scam. Forget

about this life. Be humble,
be poor, don’t delve

into revolution.
The orthodox stories

are so lame, smell strongly
of lying. Priests

in black gowns
always have a lot to say

about renunciation. They
gave up on living years ago.

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

Cover drawing: Marlene Konyves
Cover graphic design: Janet Kennedy

Ken Norris was born in New York City in 1951. He came to Canada in the early 1970s, to escape Nixon-era America and to pursue his graduate education. He completed an M.A. at Concordia University and a PhD in Canadian Literature at McGill University. He became a Canadian citizen in 1985. Norris is Professor Emeritus at the University of Maine, where he taught Canadian Literature and Creative Writing for thirty-three years. He currently resides in Toronto.

This is Ken Norris’ fifteenth above/ground press chapbook, after Windward – St. Lucia Poems (1995), The Commentaries (1999), Songs For Isabella (2000), Green Wind (2010), Looking Into It (2011), Hong Kong Blues (2019), Hawaiian Sunrise (2021), Stray Dog Café (2021), The Traveling Wilburys Collection (2021), False Narratives (2022), Echoes (2023), Broken River (2024), What’s Left (2025) and Traveller (2026). See his 2025 above/ground press substack interview here.

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