Zane Koss' The Odes (Incomplete) (2020) shortlisted for The Nelson Ball Prize!

Yesterday, Stuart Ross announced the shortlist for The Nelson Ball Prize, which includes The Odes (Incomplete) (2020) by Zane Koss! Hooray! The shortlist also includes titles by patrick friesen, Julie Joosten, Chantal Neveu (translated by Erín Moure) and Matthew James Weigel. Congratulations to all the shortlisted authors, translator, publishers and titles! For further information, check out the link here.

new from above/ground press: G o n e S o u t h, by Barry McKinnon

G o n e S o u t h
Barry McKinnon
$5

in Arizona
the desert – weather within

weather, no discernible season, sense of its ancient

growth – the Sequoia? tree, names I don’t know – the desert sans name / or taxonomy/  but for this little burst, minute, pink to cactus red buds  to take as measure.  (what was or is it in a temporality /does not need us nor, without a mind, need itself.  thus,  ... it’s worse than the puzzle it appears.   

the desert

/no matter the temperature / cold sun stings.  this/no meaning as is with any sensation being only itself in the same condition.

the desert

looking at an interior, not yrself exactly, - but a vast expanse that if you entered wld you be you?  this was its fear, yr fear, all fear  in whatever risk one or it takes.
("in Arizona")

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
November 2021
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Barry McKinnon was born in 1944 in Calgary Alberta, where he grew up.  In 1965, after two years at Mount Royal College, he went to Sir George Williams University in Montreal and took poetry courses with Irving Layton.  He graduated in 1967 with a B.A. degree.  In 1969, he graduated with an M.A. from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, and was hired that same year to teach English at the College of New Caledonia in Prince George where he has lived and worked ever since.

Barry McKinnon’s The the was nominated for the Governor General’s Award for poetry in 1080.  Pulp Log was the winner of the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Award for the B.C. Book Prizes in 1991 and Arrhythmia was the winner of the bp Nichol Chapbook Award for the best chapbook published in Canada in English in 1994. His chapbook Surety Disappears was the runner-up for the bp Nichol Award in 2008.

This is McKinnon’s second above/ground press chapbook, after Into the Blind World (2012).

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) 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: Naughton, Tierney, Brockwell, Johnson + Flowers,

Katie Naughton has some new work up at Tagvverk, as does Orchid Tierney; Stephen Brockwell has a new poem up at The Typescript; Chris Johnson has four new poems in the October issue of deathcap; and Neil Flowers is being interviewed over at poetry mini interviews.

some author activity: Mohammadi, Barbour, MacEachern, Coulton + Robinson,

Khashayar Mohammadi has some new translations of poetry, by Shahin Sadeghzadeh, now up at Asymptote Journal; Edmonton Journal publishes an article on the late Douglas Barbour; Jessi MacEachern is interviewed over at Touch the Donkey; and Valerie Coulton has begun to curate a new series of free pdf poetry chapbooks, palabrosa, which recently posted a new title by Elizabeth Robinson.

new from above/ground press: The Northerners, by Benjamin Niespodziany

The Northerners
Benjamin Niespodziany
$5

[an ekphrastic sequence written while watching the Dutch film De Noorderlingen (1992) directed by Alex van Warmerdam, to whom this chapbook is dedicated]

 

[some of these poems first appeared as daydreams on Post-It notes]

                        [1]

 

                                    The saint sleepwalks
                                    on her graveyard
                                    shift. Without her lipstick
                                    she feels like a child.

    

                        [2]

 

                                    An ashtray in the classroom.
                                    A handful of students.
                                    One boy runs in orange shoes.
                                    Makes a fire in the sand.

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
October 2021
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Benjamin Niespodziany's writing has appeared in the Wigleaf Top 50, Fence, Salt Hill Journal, Fairy Tale Review, and various others. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best Microfiction. A former Peace Corps Volunteer in Ecuador, he currently works nights in a library in Chicago and runs the multimedia art blog [neonpajamas].

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) 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: Rogal, Collis, Downs + Niespodziany,

Stan Rogal has some poems up at The Pi Review; a poem by Stephen Collis is discussed by Pattie McCarthy, Kate Colby and Lily Applebaum via the Jacket2 podcast PoemTalk; an article (with interview) on Buck Downs' latest project, "The Poet Posting Stickers All Over Washington D.C.," is covered by The Click; and Benjamin Niespodziany is interviewed over at the new podcast We All Speak In Poems.

new from above/ground press: THE TRAVELING WILBURYS COLLECTION, by Ken Norris

Ken Norris
THE TRAVELING WILBURYS COLLECTION
$5

LIKE A SHIP

I shoot up bleach in my spare time.

And it is all spare time now.

I can’t concentrate—
flit from thought to thought
like a hummingbird.

The buds of Spring
seem frozen in their tracks.

And something’s happening,
something’s rotten
in the state of Denmark to the south.

Does everything sink,
or does everything
sail on
like a ship?

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
October 2021
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

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 Ph.D. in Canadian Literature at McGill University. He became a Canadian citizen in 1985. For thirty-three years he taught Canadian Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Maine. He currently resides in Toronto.

This is Ken Norris’ ninth 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) and Stray Dog Café (2021).

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) 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