report: the above/ground press 33rd anniversary reading/launch/party!

Happy anniversary! The thirty-third anniversary reading/launch/party occurred over the weekend at Anina’s Café in Vanier (a space of which I am becoming increasingly fond). Thirty-three years! And nearly fifteen hundred publications-to-date, by the by [don't forget the current anniversary sale, happening for but a few more days]. Do you recall my report from last year's event? Or the year prior? With readings and launches of new above/ground press titles by Stephanie Bolster (Montreal), Mark Goldstein (Toronto), Cara Goodwin (Ottawa), Sonja Greckol (Toronto), Harold Hoefle (Ottawa), James Spyker (Toronto) and Grant Wilkins (Ottawa). The crowd for this event was impressive (with some notable absences, due to travel etc), with the occasional above/ground press author and editor sprinkled throughout, including Cameron Anstee, Frances Boyle, Ottawa's current English-language poet laureate, David O'Meara, and Tamara Fairchild (above/ground press produced a chapbook of hers back in 1997, don't forget), as well as artist and photographer Paul Elter, Ottawa writer Matthew Firth and visual artist Daniel Sharp, among others.

Armed with broken foot and accompanying boot, Montreal-based poet and editor Stephanie Bolster opened by launching the recent twentieth anniversary edition of her above/ground press title, BIODÔME, a title originally produced through the press way back in 2006. This new edition was actually prompted by Montreal poet Misha Solomon, who had worked his own chapbook-length response to Bolster's work, and his chapbook-response was produced simultaneously to Bolster's new edition, which also holds an introduction by Solomon [see his introduction to such here; see Bolster's afterword to the collection here]. In case you don't recall, above/ground press actually produced Bolster's solo debut, the chapbook Three Bloody Words, back in 1996, and it was rather terrifying to realize that it has now been ten years since we produced the twentieth anniversary edition of that particular title. 

The second reader was Ottawa-based poet Cara Goodwin, a poet barely a year or so older than the press itself, which does tend to make one feel ancient. After Bolster's reading, it was very exciting to counterpoint such an established writer against a chapbook debut, as Goodwin was launching her new chapbook, Map of What Was Taken, a title that had been in the works for some time. Clearly, Goodwin is a poet worth paying attention to.

The third reader was Toronto poet, editor and publisher Mark Goldstein, launching his own above/ground press debut, The Common Dark, a chapbook-length section of a poetry title he has forthcoming soon (hopefully later this year). How many years have I been soliciting Goldstein for a manuscript? Oh, too many to count (but the wait was completely worth it). I look forward to seeing how this particular title fits into the larger context of something book-length.

The next reader was Toronto poet and translator Sonja Greckol, who landed in town to launch a slightly older title, Dark Matter —Sonja Greckol translation, Materia Oscura—Rocío Céron, Dark Matter – Diverted—Sonja Greckol etranstranslation (2025), that appeared just around Christmas of last year [see the essay she wrote on translating such here] (a title that is soon to appear in a second printing). Part of what became remarkable about this event was that Greckol requested a Spanish speaker from the audience to read Céron's original text, and Goodwin's friend, Dan Josh, someone who claimed to have "no prior relationship to poetry," but read brilliantly! A remarkable blend of voices and considerations.

It was very good to hear Harold Hoefle, a (formerly Montreal-based) poet who recently retired from teaching at John Abbott College, especially given his recent relocation to Ottawa. Having a new chapbook, Leaning In, and him part of this launch felt a nice way to be able to welcome him to town, especially given the number of years he's been travelling in for the sake of multiple literary events, as well as social interactions with Ottawa writers (there's a poem in this new collection for the late Ottawa poet Michael Dennis, for example). Apparently Matthew Firth, back when he was a chapbook publisher, produced Hoefle's chapbook debut some twenty-plus years ago, which I didn't know. 

Toronto-based writer James Spyker and his work aren't the same locally-known quantity as they had been, back in the day, when he and I were part of running Ottawa's The TREE Reading Series in the mid-1990s (Spyker is also co-founder of the ottawa small press book fair, an event he recently started attending once more, as exhibitor). Given how long I've known him (I can't recall if we met five minutes prior to or following the creation of above/ground, which was less than a year prior to me joining TREE as one of the organizers/curators, back in June 1994), it was a bit surprising it took this long for his own above/ground press debut to appear, Bedtime stories for my imaginary friends, the thirty-fifth title produced as part of the press' ongoing prose/naut imprint. He purposefully read a single, slightly surreal prose-piece that hinted as an introduction for the final reader of the evening, Grant Wilkins. 

Ottawa writer, papermaker and quiet builder of complex sounds, shapes and phrases, Grant Wilkins launched what is his sixth above/ground press title produced over the past few years, provocations. Wilkins is another I've actually known since the earlier part of the 1990s, circa 1994, but has only moved into publishing his explorations through sound and text over the past few years, prompted in part through his participation in jwcurry's infamous Messagio Galore sound poetry choir. Wilkins' work [see a recent artist statement he wrote, here] blends the influence of the late American poet Jackson Mac Low with an engagement with sound, chance and play, merging texts and ideas with an unmatched ease and attention to detail.

Thanks so much to everyone to participated! And to Anina's for hosting us! There are already plans afoot, by the way, for some fall surprises (oh, and the 2027 subscriptions will be announcing soon, also; the same rates as this past year, methinks).

new from above/ground press: Bedtime stories for my imaginary friends, by James Spyker

Bedtime stories for my imaginary friends
James Spyker
$6

Day 1

I almost always first navigate to the home screen of Google TV before turning it off. And I mean I’m not actually turning it off.  I’m turning off the tv, which the Google TV thing will notice and then go into some sleep mode

I think

I can’t really tell what it is doing when the tv is off. In any case, I do that out of kindness. I don’t feel I need to be kind to my tv, or my Google TV. But kindness is a habit and a skill so practicing it is good.

I also take care when I lower myself into a chair, although that might be because I worry I am too fat, so let’s pretend I didn’t say that.

As to why it would be kind, to first navigate to the home screen, these unexpected state transitions are hard things to make work. I know that from my half century of writing software. Imagine if you were teaching a friend to cook dinner and at any point when a klaxon went off they would be required to immediately abandon that dinner and reset the kitchen to its “ready to start cooking dinner” state. That would be hard to do.  Should they drain the pasta before tossing it in the garbage?  Is the protein still frozen enough that it can just be put back into the freezer?  And so on.

Much easier if you let them finish making it and then just need to teach them how to safely store it for potential future consumption.

I could explain how that is a really good analogy to the Google TV thing, but that would turn this into a technical article. Analogies are so much less work than reality. I try to practice kindness towards myself too.

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
August 2026
as the thirty-fifth title in above/ground’s prose/naut imprint
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

[James Spyker launches Bedtime stories for my imaginary friends in Ottawa on August 22 as part of the above/ground press thirty-third anniversary reading/launch/party]

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.

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

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).