Tuesday, September 30, 2014

calgary wordfest: beaulieu, Robertson + Simpson, October 17, 2014

derek beaulieu hosts the Poetry Cabaret at Calgary Wordfest, Friday October 17, 2014, with performances by Dennis Lee, Nikki Reimer, Lisa Robertson and Natalie Simpson.

Friday, October 17 • 8pm
Theatre Junction Grand – Studio
Tickets: $15
$13 seniors, students and friends of cjsw

Buy Tickets / Call Wordfest to purchase tickets and passes: 403 237 9068

Thursday, September 25, 2014

Make Contact: Circulating Small and Micro Press Poetry in Canada

Congress 2015 is being hosted at the University of Ottawa. Colin Martin (University of Calgary) and above/ground press author Cameron Anstee (University of Ottawa) wrote a CFP for a member-organized session for ACCUTE that has been accepted. Full details below (pdf over at Anstee's original link, here), and further member-organized session CFPs available here. Send them your stuff!

Monday, September 22, 2014

new from above/ground press: THE MOTIONS, by Kate Schapira

THE MOTIONS
Kate Schapira
$4

What did I expect?
That things would rename.
I clambered and sank
in nature and in
houses, head of
the stairs pausing
me, suspended,
successful, in high dry
air. No fire anywhere.
Dispatcher warns of accident.
Demands an alternate route.
Ten-year-old kids duck,
dissolve and collapse,
face window after
window immersed
in their topography.
Brick and small-leafed
cluster, asphalt, ill-
traveled and steep: my
eye runs from creature to
dark burrow, runs
me into the ground.
Silences over the island.
Not island, peninsula.
Not surrounded, surrendered.
published in Ottawa by above/ground press
September 2014
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy


Produced, in part, as a handout for PHILALALIA, the three-day small press/art fair, September 25-27, 2014 in Philadelphia PA. Thanks much to Kevin Varrone for his help and support.

Kate Schapira is the author of four full-length books and nine other chapbooks of poetry. She lives in Providence, RI, USA, where she writes, teaches, and co-runs the Publicly Complex Reading Series. Learn more about her current project at climateanxietycounseling.wordpress.com.

This is her second above/ground press chapbook, after OVERHEARD WHILE HIDING FROM THE SUN (2014).

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; outside Canada, add $2) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9 or paypal at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

Sunday, September 21, 2014

above/ground press at Word on the Street: Toronto (today!)

If you wander by The League of Canadian Poets booth at Word on the Street in Toronto today, they'll be handing out (while supplies last) a stack of above/ground press "poem" broadsides! I've been digging through the archives lately, and have discovered multiple broadsheets still in print by Sarah Pinder, Natalee Caple, Nelson Ball, Gil McElroy, Ken Norris, Steven Heighton, Ashley-Elizabeth Best, Wanda Praamsma, George Bowering, Joe Blades and Christine McNair, among numerous others. Why not stop by?

Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Tuesday, September 2, 2014

The Factory Reading Series : smith, Blackman, Anstee, Million + Simpson, October 11, 2014;

with readings by:
jesslyn delia smith
Jeff Blackman
Cameron Anstee
Justin Million
and Rachael Simpson
lovingly hosted by rob mclennan
Saturday, October 11, 2014;
doors 7pm; reading 7:30pm
The Carleton Tavern,
223 Armstrong Street (at Parkdale; upstairs)


Five approximately Ottawa-based poets are hitting the road. jesslyn delia smith, Jeff Blackman, Cameron Anstee, Justin Million, and Rachael Simpson are reading in four cities in five days, taking their show to Ottawa, Montreal, Toronto, and Peterborough from October 11-15, 2014.

Apt. 9 Press is publishing a book to mark the occasion. Five is Apt. 9’s first venture into publishing a book with a spine, and is currently being printed at the legendary Coach House in Toronto. Five collects new work.

Follow along at anaccordofpoets.wordpress.com.

jesslyn delia smith lives in Ottawa, ON, where she works 9-5 in a real estate office. 2014 poems have appeared in ottawater and The Steel Chisel, and her most recent chapbook the grass is a yard now, again was published in fall 2013 by Apt. 9 Press.

Jeff Blackman [pictured] grew up shy in Thornhill, ON, then got a little brave, moved to Ottawa, ON, and has a great love for the roads in between. His poetry has appeared over the last year or so via Blacklock’s Reporter, Bywords, and The Steel Chisel. Last year saw the publication of his first solo chapbook in some time, So Long As The People Are People, which is pretty much his hymnal.

Cameron Anstee lives in Ottawa, ON, where he runs Apt. 9 Press and is pursuing a PhD studying Canadian literature at the University of Ottawa. He has published chapbooks with above/ground press (Ottawa), The Emergency Response Unit (Marmora), and In/Words (Ottawa).

Justin Million [pictured] lives in Peterborough, ON, sells shoes in Pickering, ON, and might even make it to Toronto, ON someday.

Rachael Simpson’s poetry has been published in Canada (including as a broadsheet through above/ground press) and the United States. She lives in Ottawa, ON.

Monday, September 1, 2014

Jordan Abel at The TREE Reading Series, Ottawa, September 23, 2014

above/ground press author and Vancouver resident Jordan Abel heads east for his first Ottawa reading, appearing at The TREE Reading Series alongside David Groulx on September 23, 2014.

For a complete list of upcoming readers at The TREE Reading Series, check out their website at http://www.treereadingseries.ca/readings