By George, Held's Done it Again

Check out George Held's "Sting Like A Butterfly at BAP Quarterly

http://www.bapq.net/fall-10/fiction_sting-like-butterfly.asp

From John J. Trause

Dear Family & Friends,

The past First Wednesday was another bittersweet one as we shared the news that Jane Fisher will be leaving her position as Director of the Rutherford Free Public Library by the end of the month to accept a position at the New York Public Library in coordinating seventeen libraries in the Bronx.  We know she will thrive personally and improve library services to those communities, but we will miss her and her guiding wisdom very much.  It was Jane Fisher who had the idea of starting the William Carlos Williams Poetry Cooperative in response to the success of the first William Carlos Williams Poetry Symposium in September 2005.   Over these past five years, she has done innumerable things to help keep it grow, and in the process she herself became a poet – and a published one at that!  Jane assures us that she will still reside nearby and poke in on our series when she can.

Burt Kimmelman and Jon Curley, colleagues in Humanities at New Jersey Institute of Technology, shared generously of their work, both published and new, and provided a nice coupling of voices.  To begin the evening Joel Lewis gave a lecture on four of Dr. Williams’s lesser known “disciples”.

I continue to host this excellent series, now in its fifth year, so please come by for this upcoming reading.  Mark your calendars now!

NOTE that this series is held on FIRST Wednesdays each month from now on.

The WCW Poetry Cooperative of Southern Bergen County is pleased to invite Rick Mullin and Colleen Russell, two poets who excel at both formal and free verse and who have made a mark on the online poetry communities, as the features on Wednesday, November 3, 2010 at 7:00 p. m.  As usual this monthly program will also feature the words of William Carlos Williams (presented this month by me, John J. Trause) and open readings from the floor.  No advanced registration is required and all poets and poetry lovers are invited.  Note that we are now holding the WCW Poetry Cooperative readings on the Terrace of the Williams Center for the Arts (www.williamscenter.org) located at 1 Williams Plaza in Rutherford, N. J.

For more details, please see the program flyer attached to this message as a Word document.

Also, please remember that noted poet Jim Klein leads our peer-to-peer poetry workshops (Red Wheelbarrow Poets) on Wednesdays (2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th) when we do not have the readings.  These will continue in the Rutherford Free Public Library (www.rutherfordlibrary.org).  Please see the flyer here:

www.rutherfordlibrary.org/wedworkshops.pdf

Also, please see the Red Wheelbarrow website here:

redwheelbarrowpoets.wordpress.com/a-red-wheelbarrow/about

Remember that the Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow Poets just published volume 3 of The Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow, including three poems of mine, those of many others associated with the WCW Poetry Cooperative and literary life in Rutherford, some excellent essays, and as usual some original, previously unpublished work of Dr. Williams himself.  Copies of the anthology are on sale now, so please contact the editors at redwheelbarrowpoets@yahoo.com, if you would like more information or like to purchase a copy or two.  They make excellent birthday or holiday gifts for poetry lovers and anyone who loves literature and history.

Please come out and support these creative endeavors.

Thank you.

Love & Peace,

JOHN

3 Oldies but Goodies Now Available at CreateSpace!

We just converted 3 of our older chapbook titles to perfect bound editions: PAYDAY LOANS by Jee Leong Koh, TWO NAKED FEET by Maria Lisella and PHASED by George Held. They are now available for sale at CreateSpace.com and will soon be available on Amazon.com.




PAYDAY LOANS
Poems
  by Jee Leong Koh
Original Publication Date: March, 2007
Publisher: Poets Wear Prada
ISBN/EAN13:  0981767893 / 9780981767895
Perfect Bound Paper Back: 36 pages
List Price: $10
https://www.createspace.com/3481468

Smart, irreverent, often unnerving, these sonnets smirk, smile, argue and bless. Jee Leong Koh has taken a month of days and rendered a very contemporary version of the artist as a young man. Cash in your paycheck and buy this book."--Marie Howe



TWO NAKED FEET
by Maria Lisella
Original Publication Date: September 2009
Publisher: Poets Wear Prada
ISBN/EAN13:0984184414 / 9780984184415
Perfect Bound Paper Back:  34 pages
List Price: $10
https://www.createspace.com/3477735

TWO NAKED FEET is brilliantly wired with the tension of paradox. It is about exile and the movement of peoples, the destruction and pastiche of cultures, the chasm between the idealized world and the colloquial one. Lisella writes with depth and simplicity. Her "I" rarely steps outside of the observing eye to become autobiographical, and yet the poems are remarkable for their passion.--Stephanie Dickenson, award-winning author of HALF GIRL and ROAD OF FIVE CHURCHES

PHASED
Poems, etc.
by George Held
Original Publication Date: August 2008
Publisher: Poets Wear Prada
ISBN/EAN13: 098176780X / 9780981767802
Perfect Bound Paper Back: 34 pages
List Price: $10
https://www.createspace.com/3479883

A delightful, entertaining, and attractively presented collection celebrating our sidereal companion, the moon.

--THE ICONOCLAST

From John J.Trause

Dear Family & Friends,

I am pleased and honored to be asked to appear at the Haworth Public Library in Haworth, N. J. along with some of my fellow Red Wheelbarrow Poets. A number of us will be presenting our poetry, which has recently been published in the third annual volume of The Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow, on this evening.

Susan Rappaport (formerly of the Rutherford Public Library), who now works at the Haworth Library, has arranged for the Red Wheelbarrow Poets to be featured at a special program next Tuesday night, October 12, 2010. Susan herself is a published in The Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow, and we are grateful for her invitation and participation.

Here are the specifics:

WHERE: Haworth Municipal Library,

300 Haworth Avenue (Haworth Avenue and Stevens Place),

Haworth, NJ.

Phone: 201-384-1020

Website: http://haworth.bccls.org/

WHEN: Tuesday, October 12, 2010

TIME: Program begins at 7:30 and ends at 9:00 (The library is not open on Tuesdays. They have scheduled this as a special event and are opening up for it.).

Here too is the posting from the Haworth Municipal Library website:

Tuesday, October 12th - 7:30-9:00pm -

RED WHEELBARROW POETS which grew out of the Williams Carlos Williams Poetry Cooperative of Southern Bergen County, has just published their third volume of poetry.They will be reading from the anthology. Other poets are invited to share their own poetry during the open reading. Please join us for an interesting evening.

Copies of The Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow will be on sale.

For me this is a special honor, since this takes place at a library near the Oradell Public Library, of which I am the Director, and that is also a member of the same consortium, the Bergen County Cooperative Library System (BCCLS).

Please come out and support us.

Love & Peace,

JOHN

Good News from Karen Neuberg

Karen Neuberg's  poem, "See How Sky Falls," 

appears in the latest issue of Switched-on-Gutenberg.

Table of Contents at

http://www.switched-ongutenberg.org/current/toc.htm

See How Sky Falls at
http://www.switched-ongutenberg.org/current/neuberg.htm

Sat Oct 9: IAWA features FAGIANI & CALABRO in NYC at Cornelia St. Cafe

This month, the ITALIAN-AMERICAN WRITERS ASSOCIATION features John Calabro and Gil Fagiani, plus open mic  (5 minute limit).  Maria Lisella, Gil Fagiani, hosts.  The 2nd Saturday of every  month at The Cornelia Street Cafe in Greenwich Village, New York City. 6PM - 7:45pm. (Arrive at 5:45pm to sign-up for the open.) $7 Cover include one house drink.

Saturday October 9, 2010

6PM - 7:45PM

Doors Open at 5:45pm

The Italian-American Writers Association

features

JOHN CALABRO

&

GIL FAGIANI

Plus Open Mic

@

The Cornelia Street Cafe,

29 Cornelia Street

New York, NY,  10014

212.989.9319

http://www.corneliastreetcafe.com/

$7 Cover include one house drink

Your Hosts this Evening:  Maria Lisella & Gil Fagiani

About the Featured Writers:

Of John Calabro ’s work, Nino Ricci, author of Lives of the Saints and the Origins of Species, writes “Calabro’s work erases the line between the ordinary and the haunting, as if he has peeled back the skin of the real to make it realer.” An educator, a publisher and a writer, Calabro’s first novella, Bellecour, published in 2005 by Guernica Editions, was named by The Globe and Mail’s First Fiction reviewer as one of the top five books in that category for 2005. He published a collection of short stories called Somewhere Else in 2006. His short stories and essays have also appeared in Italian Canadiana, Strange Peregrination, and More Sweet Lemons (2010). The Cousin is his second novella.

The backdrop for Gil Fagiani’s most recent book of poetry, A Blanquito in El Barrio (Rain Mountain Press, 2009), are the streets and music of Spanish Harlem. “...a story peopled with desperate, decimated and unforgettable characters, whose lives Fagiani never condemns, but uplifts and honors with tough, vivid verses set to the pulsating rhythms of Latin dance halls,” writes Steve Zeitlin, Founding Director, City Lore: The New York Center For Urban Folk Culture. Accompanying his 72 poems is a glossary of Spanish and slang terms, and a discography. Emmy-award winner, Poetry Czar, proprietor of the Bowery Poetry Club Bob Holman named Blanquito among 2009’s most compelling reads. Fagiani’s poetry collection Rooks (Rain Mountain Press, 2007) is set at Pennsylvania Military College in the 1960s; his chapbook, Grandpa’s Wine (Poets Wear Prada, 2008) has been translated into Italian by Paul D’Agostino. Forthcoming collections include Chianti in Connecticut (Bordighera Press) and Serfs of Psychiatry to be released by Finishing Line Press in 2011.

 




Gil Fagiani
[Photo Credit: Maria Lisella]



New from Rain Mountain Press:

Poet Gil Fagiani’s Tribute to East Harlem



A Blanquito in El Barrio
by Gil Fagiani
Paperback
ISBN: 978-0980221138
Rainmountain Press (December 2009)
http://rainmountainpress.com/books12.html
Now Available at Amazon.com!



A Blanquito in El Barrio is no mere cautionary tale of a blanquito’s—a white man’s—descent into an inner city hell, but a tribute to the music, language and people of one of America’s truly mythic neighborhoods, El Barrio – East Harlem.

"Out of the squishy swamp of dead personal lyrics that is contemporary American poetry, Gil Fagiani’s hard-boned zombies rise out of his poetry collection, A Blanquito in El Barro. His poems are crafty narratives that sing the music of sex, compassion, friendship, justice, mercy, comedy, betrayal. Fagiani is a poet of unusual power. These poems have strong heart and deep soul. A Blanquito in El Barrio is that rare good thing—a necessary good book.” --Angelo Verga, author of A Hurricane Is, 33 NYC Poems, and Praise For What Remains.

A Blanquito in El Barrio
http://rainmountainpress.com/books12.html

Iris Berman at STARK REALITY!! Friday, 10/8

STARK REALITY!! Open Mic Friday, OCTOBER 8th 6:30 pm Sign up!!! featuring IRIS BERMAN The Haunting Poet and Mistress of Words!!!  JENNI LARK, Musician, Singer, Where jazz meets soul meets rhythm & blues!! Plus the Stark Openmic SPOKEN WORD Artists, POETS, COMICS, SINGERS, MUSICIANS & BANDS!! COME SHARE AND BE A STAR @ STARK REALITY!!  @ Nola Studios 244 W 54th Street (bet. Bway & 8th Ave.) 11th Floor Studio C New York, NY 10019 SIGN UP 6:30 PM!! SHARP Info: (917) 292- 2683 Contribution only!! Hosted by Viviana Poets/Musicians/Actors Performance Artists/Comics An Open Mike for the Wild Mind!! CHAOS ARE US!!! PLUS DANCE!! to DJ VIV'S ROCK/SOUL/MOTOWN/DISCO& TECHNO/HIP HOP

Pianos Bar & Grill in Bloomfield, NJ on Monday, October 4

Dear Family and Friends,

Please join the folks at Pianos Bar & Grill in Bloomfield, NJ on Monday, October 4, 2010 at 7:30 p. m. for RockStar Poets and Writers [Bloomfield Reading Series]. The feature is the noted poet, publisher, professor, and painter Jim Klein.

The event is FREE!

Jim Klein has published more than 100 poems in publications including The Berkeley Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, Joe Soap’s Canoe, Oxford Magazine, The Plastic Tower, Onthebus, Pulpsmith, Gandhabba, and many times in The Wormwood Review, including a Feature Section. He has also published articles in The Christian Century, James Joyce Quarterly, College English. He founded two literary magazines, Lunch, at Fairleigh Dickinson, Rutherford, in the seventies, and currently The Rutherford Red Wheelbarrow. Blue Chevies, his first book, came out in conjunction with the Williams Symposium in September, 2008. To Eat Is Human Digest Divine, his second, came out this month.

Bloomfield Reading Series, also known as RockStar Poets, is the series for which I (John J. Trause) was the inaugural feature in February 2008, and as we continue in our third year we are pleased to have such a distinguished poet appearing on Monday, October 4th. Note that this series holds a reading every FIRST MONDAY of the month at 7:30 p. m. at Pianos hosted by writer Sanjay Agnihotri. The readings take place on the back stage. Come early and have a drink or dinner. Remember to bring some work of your own as an Open Reading follows the feature.

Pianos Bar & Grill

36 Broad Street

Bloomfield, NJ 07003

(973) 743-7208

http://www.pianosbarandgrill.com/

I encourage you to come out and support Jim Klein and hang out with us.

Love & Peace,

JOHN

Austin Alexis is Awesome!

Awesome Austin is published again!

His poem, "The Magpie," is in Shot Glass Journal: 

http://www.musepiepress.com/shotglass/austin_alexis1.html

Fri Oct 8: JOEL ALLEGRETTI rides the Pink Pony /w Jackie Sheeler in NYC

Friday, October 8th, 6PM - 7:45PM:  Joel Allegretti is the featured reader at the legendary Friday Night Pink Pony Reading & Open Mic with host Jackie Sheeler at The Cornelia Street Cafe in Greenwich Village NYC. A $7 Cover include one free house drink.  Arrive by 5:45pm to sign up for a 3-minute slot (there are about 20 to 25 slots as time permits) to read a short poem or 2 at the open mic.

Friday, October 8th, 2010

6pm - 7:45pm

JOEL ALLEGRETTI

w/ Host Jackie Sheeler

+

Open Mic

@

The Cornelia Street Cafe

29 Cornelia Street

Greenwich Village, New York 10014

212.989.9319

http://www.corneliastreetcafe.com/

$7 cover include house drink



THRUM
Poems by Joel Allegretti
Paperback: 38 pages; Price: $12

Poets Wear Prada (March 1, 2010)
ISBN: 978-0984184446



Joel Allegretti
[Photo Credit: Jon Paul]

Joel Allegretti is the author of two full-length collections from The Poet's Press: The Plague Psalms, which appeared in 2000 and is now in its third edition, and Father Silicon, selected by The Kansas City Star as one of 100 Noteworthy Books of 2006, a list that included novels by Thomas Pynchon and Cormac McCarthy. In March 2010 Poets Wear Prada published his third collection, Thrum, a chapbook of poems, prose poems and brief poetic essays about musical instruments. Raymond Hammond, editor of The New York Quarterly, calls Thrum "an intriguing and must read for anyone who has a sense of all that culminates in the commingling of the arts."

Allegretti's work has appeared in Art/​Life Limited Editions, Rattapallax, The New York Quarterly, Descant, The Laurel Review, Margie, and Confrontation among many other journals, as well as in the anthology Chance of a Ghost (Helicon Nine Editions, 2005) which included work by Billy Collins, Rita Dove and James Tate. His poem in that collection received an Honorable Mention in the 2006 edition of The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror from St. Martin's Press.



His website is www.joelallegretti.com.

Wed Sept 29th at 3PM: Listen to TANTRA-ZAWADI on Blog Talk Radio with Kathleen Schmidt

Project Empowerment presents Tantra-Zawadi,  a Blog Talk Radio interview with Kathleen Schmidt, Author of Escaping the Glass Cage: A Story of Survival and Empowerment from Domestic Violence

Wednesday, September 29, 2010 at 3:00PM EST

www.blogtalkradio.com/projectempowerment 

Call-in Number: (347) 945-5441

"You must be the change you wish to see in the world." —Mahatma Gandhi

Tantra-Zawadi

Joining us for today's show is Tantra-Zawadi. She best describes her work "by the love that I make through my art to the vision of the unseen reality." As a performance poet and published author, Tantra supports the rights of women to exist, choose, decide and think through the art form of spoken word. http://www.tantra-zawadi.com. Tantra has performed to standing-room audiences at venues as far away as South Africa, London, Germany and Toronto. Her new book: Gathered at Her Sky: Life Poems by Tantra-zawadi, published by Poets Wear Prada. She is the author of alifepoeminprogress and her poetry was featured in Essence Magazine and in spoken word publications such as Redeye, spokenvizions.com, defpoetryjam.com, Platinum Poets, Sunpiper Press, Souled Up and poetswearprada.com. On Screen Tantra-zawadi is the host of her own spoken word series, WORDSPACE, and has made several appearances on cable television, local and satellite radio shows. Music and Poetry Tantra’s poem and video  “Scarlet Waters,” was featured on the Product(RED) video wall to raise awareness for HIV/AIDS in Africa. Her short documentary, “A Silent Genocide ~ A Brief Insight into HIV/AIDS” edited by Oliver Covrett, takes another look at the personal impact of this disease. Tantra also participated in a public service announcement for BETAH Associates produced by Marc Herbert Productions aimed at promoting HIV/AIDS awareness and is sharing her one-woman performance pieces “Girl – A Choreospective” and “Soldier Blues” with the world. She is also a Mentor for Girl Child Network Worldwide, http://www.girlchildnetworkworldwide.org.




Kathleen Schmidt

 Host Kathleen Schmidt is a full time work at home mom of two Type 1 Diabetic sons and lives in Seattle, WA with her husband of over 11 years.  She is the published author with her debut book, Escaping the Glass Cage: A Story of Survival and Empowerment from Domestic Violence. Her intention is to share empowering stories, people and events that are making a difference in our world. Please check out her website at http://kathleenmschmidt.com/ for updates, speaking and guest appearances and all the fun projects she's working on to help empower others.

Cendrine Marrout, Canadian Independent Artist Examiner, Gives GATHERED AT HER SKY by Tantra-zawadi 5 Stars!

Gathered at Her Sky 
Life Poems by Tantra-zawadi
ISBN 978-0-9841844-6-0
Paperback: 42 pages
Poets Wear Prada, June 2010
$12.00

"GATHERED AT HER SKY, Tantra-zawadi’s new book will make you like poetry again. This short but amazing ten-poem collection delivers poignant truths that will tug at your heartstrings and shake your bones. It speaks to the divine in us, a place where Love is not hindered by materialistic considerations. Most importantly, the book asks women to proudly stand up and refuse the dictatorship of closed minds."
-- Cendrine Marrouat, Canada Independent Artist Examiner, examiner.com

To read the rest of Marrouat's review click here:
http://www.examiner.com/canada-independent-artist-in-canada/review-of-gathered-at-her-sky-review


GATHERED AT HER SKY by Tantra-zawadi is available from Amazon.com, CreateSpace.com and LULU.com and at the Greenpoint Bookstore, 686 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217.