Southeast Chapter of the National Cartoonists Society usually meets on the first Tuesday of every month. On Saturday, September 11, 2010 the Southeast Chapter of the National Cartoonists Society present a “Shop Talk” at the Skyland/South Buncombe Library (260 Overlook Road, Asheville, NC). The program will run from 10 am until 4 pm.
More details to be provided later.
James Longenbach presented a lecture titled “The Excess of Poetry” at the Warren Wilson College MFA program for writers this morning. Here’s a few of the notes I wrote:
There are more notes I wrote, but they are a bit scramble. Longenbach presented poems by Keats, Dickinson and Pound as way to explore the “fine excess” of poetry.
The Warren Wilson College MFA program for writers provides free readings and lectures to the public. The first reading begins tomorrow night. The reading schedule is posted on their web site (link). I plan on attending as many as I am able. However, a passage from one of Günter Grass’s novels makes me wonder about the validity of creative writing programs.
Here unpolished literary attempts were read aloud and critiqued…. based on the American notion of teaching creative writing. (Crabwalk, Chapter 2)
Last night I picked up some art supplies downtown. The staff at True Blue is not only helpful, but offered me a cup of water after I coughed a couple of times. For some reason the pollen this year is especially irritating to my throat. It’s not often that staff voluntarily offer a cup of water to store customers, and that kind of service is why I plan to return often.
Being downtown, I couldn’t resist dropping by Malaprop’s for a visit to one of my favorite booksellers. Wandering through the book aisles I came across two book titles that caught my attention. The first book is by Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation. I haven’t read much of Merton’s writings. But as I was flipping through pages of New Seeds my eyes fell upon the following passage:
If I am supposed to hoe a garden or make a table, then I will be obeying God if I am true to the task I am performing. To do the work carefully and well, with love and respect for the nature of my task and with due attention to its purpose, is to unite myself to God’s will in my work. In this way I become His instrument.
The work ethics idea in this passage seems so foreign in today’s culture that it caused me to stand, shifting my weight from one foot to the other, and ponder the question: am I true to the task I am performing? However menial the task, do I accomplish tasks with due attention to its purpose?
The other book that caught my attention while I walked through the book aisles at Malaprop’s is The Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard. Here’s a passage that arrested my attention:
And whereas philosophical reflection applied to scientific thinking elaborated over a long period of time requires any new idea to become integrated in a body of tested ideas, even though this body of ideas be subjected to profound change by the new idea (as is the case in all revolutions of contemporary science), the philosophy of poetry must acknowledge that the poetic act has no past, at least no recent past, in which its preparation an appearance could be followed.
This took me a couple of readings to unpack the idea in this passage, and I’m not sure if I agree with it or disagree with it. My initial thought is not to agree with it simply on the basis that there is nothing new under the sun. However, counterpoint to my initial thought is a recollection of Jane Hirshfield’s thoughts on creativity and originality in poetry.
I wish I could have purchased these books last night, but I spent my money at True Blue and will have to wait until new funds arrive to purchase these titles.
Here’s a video of Pasckie Pascua from last week’s Traveling Bonfires poetry reading at Malaprop’s Bookstore/Café.
When I mentioned earlier today that you should join the Traveling Bonfires tonight at Malaprop’s, you really were invited to join the reading. Two of the three poets were unable to show up for tonight’s reading. The emcee of the poetry reading and founder of the Traveling Bonfires invited anyone in the audience to read poems. He asked me to read my poems as well.
I wasn’t prepared to read; only to listen. But no one else came prepared to read. So, I frantically dug into my old messenger bag and found two poetry chapbook manuscripts by other poets. For a brief moment I thought I would read from their manuscripts, but I didn’t want to read poems that weren’t ready for the public. Sandwiched between loose papers and a copy of Selected Cantos of Ezra Pound and Narrow Road to the Interior was my red notebook containing poem sketches and revisions. I had half of a thought to read selections from Pound and Basho, but in my notebook I found six poem sketches and revisions to test in front of an audience.
The moral of the story is this: always be prepared to read your poems and if you’re a poet in the Asheville area (or if you’re a poet traveling near the Asheville area) contact me or the Traveling Bonfires (travelingbonfires@yahoo.com) and we’ll find a space and a mic and a crowd of listeners.
The Traveling Bonfires return to Asheville with a one-hour poetry reading featuring founding members Pasckie Pascua and Matthew Mulder.
Friday, January 22, 2010
7:00pm
Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe Street, 55 Haywood Street City/Town: Asheville, NC
// what ever happened to WNCNN, Mad Miss Mattie & others (http://scrutinyhooligans.us/2007/09/01/early-morning-mad-miss-mattie/)…1
NOTES:
1) “Early morning Mad Miss Mattie,” Scrutiny Hooligans, September 1, 2007, accessed May 30, 2009, http://scrutinyhooligans.us/2007/09/01/early-morning-mad-miss-mattie/ (page no longer available, web site deactivated)
// just returned from the BMCM+AC poetry reading wordfest event… two hours until the next reading at jubilee…
// drunk on sufi poetry from the reading/performance by Thomas Rain Crowe & Coleman Barks… the hangover should be delicious…
// so when the asheville police showed up at the bobo gallery, i told j- d- ‘now this is what i call a poetry reading’ …
// 18°F outside with a wind chill of 2°F. For those traveling to the airport, all the roads are clear.
// of course, i’ll catch the bus tonight. there’s no buses running today because it’s a holiday….. so much for the working class.
Time: Friday, September 5, 2008 7:00 p.m.
Location: Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe
Title of Event: Jonathon Flaum-A Fable of Leadership
Local author and CEO of WriteMind Communications,Inc., Flaum will read from his new book, How the Red Wolf Found Its Howl: The Internal Journey to Leadership
Time: Sunday, September 7, 2008 3:00 p.m.
Location: Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe
Title of Event: Poetrio- 3 Readings by 3 Poets
Join us every first Sunday for Poetrio, poetry readings by three poets. This month’s featured poets are Scott Owens, author of The Fractured World, Beverly Jackson, author of Every Burning Thing, and Pat Riviere-Seel, author of No Turning Back Now (New Women’s Voices Series, No. 30)
Ditto, Ashvegas:
The other thing that is annoying the hell out of me in Asheville is all the road construction. Every street and sidewalk in downtown Asheville is currently impassable. Link
Last night, I waited at the Transit Center 20 minutes to catch the bus home. Earlier this week, I waited 20 minutes for the bus heading to the Transit Center. Thinking I was late and had missed the bus, I walked back home to at least plug into my digital nomad life. Two minutes later I see the bus pass by. So I totally missed that bus and arrived at work two hours late.
Whoever had the bright idea at ATS, to throw spaghetti on the a map of Asheville and decide that’s how to re-route buses should be forced to drive those routes for an entire day. Since the schedules are fubar, I don’t even plan to show up at the bus stop on time. This morning I found it saved time to simply walk—almost two miles—from the Transit Center to the office.
(photo by Coffeehouse Junkie)
Sunday, I had the opportunity to sit in the WPVM studios during a broadcast of WordPlay. Katherine Min read from Secondhand World
It’s been a long time since I did an Asheville open-mic circuit on a Thursday night.
The Open Mic at Dripolator offered quite a full evening. Kapila hosts the event. The Drip sure pulls a crowd. Parking was an issue–I had to park two blocks away. Kapila read some of his work around 9 p.m. In one, he laments that this city is now called Ashevegas when Ashevillage is he would dream she be called.
I hung out for awhile and listened to several good singer/songwriters and poets. But I left with an annoying thought–I’m not feeling Asheville. It’s an expression I lifted from another local writer. He uses the expression when a line of prose or poetry works: “Yeah, man, I’m feelin’ it now.” I suspect the expression has jazz or blues roots.
The Courtyard Gallery Open Mic offered a sparse gathering, but I arrived after 10 p.m. So there may have been a larger crowd earlier. Jarrett Leone graciously invited me to read a couple poems I found in my notebook. The same notebook I haven’t been able open since the writers residency back in July. I read a couple blues poems because it seemed to be the only sketches I was feelin’. My voice strained to pull the words off the page and send it to the audience. Jim, a regular at the Courtyard and previously Beanstreets, greeted me warmly and told me he was thinking about me the other night when he was reading through my old chapbook, Late Night Writing
I began to feel Asheville again, but it was awkward–like kissing an ex-lover. A lover that has moved onto to someone else, and the space between us is more than physical. It is an annoying thought that troubles me tonight. I’m not feelin’ Asheville. And I don’t know why.
The Flood Fine Art Center poetry reading series Friday night inspired me. Four talented poets read their work to a very supportive audience.
Stephen Kirbach
Shad Marsh
Jennifer Callahan
Lynette JamesSunday afternoon offered a Writers at Home Series at Malaprop’s Cafe & Bookstore. Patrick Finn and Michael McFee read from their work.
Michael McFee
FRI Mar. 16, 8:30pm
Poetry reading series features:
Stephen Kirbach, Shad Marsh, Jennifer Callahan & Lynette James.
Flood Fine Art Center located in the
Phil Mechanic Studios
UNC Asheville’s 2006-07 Writers at Home Series continues with readings by local writers Patrick Finn and Michael McFee at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 18, at Malaprop’s Bookstore/Café, 55 Haywood St., downtown Asheville. Writers at Home is part of the Great Smokies Writing Program, a consortium of Western North Carolina writers and UNC Asheville. The event is free and open to the public.
Finn’s fiction has appeared in many literary publications, including “Quarterly West,” “Ploughshares,” “The Richmond Review,” “Third Coast,” “Punk Planet” and the Houghton Mifflin collection “Best American Mystery Stories 2004.” He received a Distinguished Story Citation in the Pushcart Prize Anthology and is currently working on a novel set in a bowling alley in the California desert. Finn teaches writing at UNC Asheville.
McFee has published nine volumes of poetry, most recently “Shinemaster” and “The Smallest Talk,” a collection of one-line poems. His first book of prose, “The Napkin Manuscripts,” was released in 2006. Finn is editor of “The Language They Speak is Things to Eat” and “This is Where We Live,” both anthologies of contemporary North Carolina poems and short stories. He has received numerous awards, including the Thomas Wolfe Literary Award from the Western North Carolina Historical Association, the UNC Chapel Hill Students’ Undergraduate Teaching Award and Roanoke-Chowan Award for Poetry from the North Carolina Literary and Historical Association. An Asheville native, McFee teaches poetry writing and North Carolina literature at UNC Chapel Hill.
Please call Elaine Fox@828/ 232-5122 with any questions you may have.
On March 16, 2007, Flood Fine Arts Gallery will host its monthly poetry reading at 8:30pm, featuring the following poets:
Stephen Kirbach’s work can be found in Apocryphal Text, Shampoo, and Word for Word. He teaches Humanities at UNC–Asheville, and organizes the web-based writers’ forum, Wire Sandwich. Kirbach also hosts “Stunt-Cipher-Mayhem,” a radio show on WPVM that explores experimental music and sound.
Shad Marsh has published fiction in the flash fiction anthology Blink, and his poetry has appeared in Artvoice, Ghoti, Light, The Muse, The Pebble Lake Review, Vox, and Wire Sandwich. Marsh serves as the poetry editor for the E-zine Edifice Wrecked. He lives in Asheville, NC with his wife and son.
Jennifer Callahan studied creative writing at Austin Peay State University, and attended graduate school at Washington University. Her poetry has been printed in Zone 3. In 2004, Callahan participated in Words of War, an exhibit featuring writers’ and artists’ works about their personal experiences with war. Her photography has been displayed at Maryville College of Art and Design, Studio 101, and Untitled Nashville. Callahan currently lives in WNC, and works as a wedding photographer.
Lynette James will be the fourth poet. Her bio was unavailable at the time of this release.
Flood Gallery Fine Arts Center is located at 109 Roberts Street in the River Arts District of Asheville North Carolina. For more information, please contact Mark Prudowsky at info@floodgallery.org or call 828-776-8438.
Yesterday afternoon I heard Sebastian Matthews read from his new collection of poems, We Generous. The first time I heard him read was from his memoir, In My Father’s Footsteps.
Okay, my wife called this morning and said they mentioned my name on the local NPR radio station–WCQS. It is in regards to the Arts & Events Calendar–specifically the poetry reading at the Flood Fine Arts Center. I will be reading 6 to 10 poems with other poets–read press release.
So I had my three seconds of NPR fame. Back to your regular activities. But don’t forget–Friday night, 7PM, Flood Fine Art Center.
(Now if I can get Garrison Keillor to promote this gig…)
Coffeehouse Junkie 