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Awestruck. Awesome.
A magazine of poetry and related arts straight from L.A.
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Poems by Poetry Flash |
Guest Star
PoetryFlashPoetry Flash, A Poetry Review & Literary Calendar for the West provides open access to the vibrant West Coast literary scene in Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Portland, Seattle, and points between. It has served as an independent voice on behalf of poets and writers since 1972—as Allen Ginsberg once said, "Poetry Flash keeps us up to date with the muse." Poetry Flash publishes an eclectic, wide ranging editorial mix of book reviews, poems, literary essays, interviews, photographs, and calls for submissions and contest information for creative writers, with the most comprehensive listings of literary events in the West. The all-genre creative writing event Calendar offers an in-depth portrait of California literary events, and events in the Pacific Northwest, and the Southwest, with a representative sampling of national conferences and festivals.
Recent issues have included remembrances of Robert Creeley, Barbara Guest, Edith Jenkins, Kenneth Rexroth, Thom Gunn, and Philip Lamantia. Feature interviews with Kay Ryan and Lynn Emanuel, a talk on spirituality and a new poem by Robert Hass, an essay on the poetry of Mahmoud Darwish, poems by Kate Gale, Chad Sweeney, fiction reviews on Kate Braverman's short stories, poet Gail Wronsky's novel, and fiction by Robert Glück, poetry reviews on books by Dennis Phillips, Jack Grapes, Matthew Rohrer, Naomi Shihab Nye, Mark Turpin, Martha Ronk, and many brief "New & Noted" reviews including Brian Teare, Ilya Kaminsky, Catherine Barnett, Ben Lerner, Eleni Sikelianos, Srikanth Reddy, Donald Revell, Matthea Harvey, Brigit Pegeen Kelly, and many, many others. Upcoming issues include an interview with Black Mountain poet/painter Basil King by Steve Dickison, Director of The Poetry Center at San Francisco State University, a review on Maureen Owen's poetry, poems by winners of the National Writers Union competition, an interview with Santa Cruz poet Robert Sward, and an essay by Clayton Eshleman. Poetry Flash is printed in a newspaper
format in editions of 22,000, and follows the "free paper" model.
Complementing our quarterly print schedule is an active, frequently
updated calendar. The site receives an average of 13,000 visits a
month; there were 17,000 visits to the site in March 2006. Please
see the website to request
a free sample copy of Poetry Flash. Event listings can be
sent to the editor or
mailed to: Other Poetry Flash projects include sponsoring the Northern California Book Reviewers and producing the Northern California Book Awards, co-sponsored by the Northern California Independent Booksellers Association, San Francisco Public Library and the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library, Northern California Book Reviewers, and Poetry Flash.
Poetry Flash also sponsors and presents the Watershed Environmental Poetry Festival, which has been held in both San Francisco and Berkeley. A collaboration with former U.S. Poet Laureate and U.C. Berkeley professor Robert Hass, Berkeley Farmers' Market/Ecology Center, and EcoCity Builders, the tenth annual Watershed was held in September, 2005. Kamau Daa'ood (with jazz bassist Marcus Shelby), Kay Ryan, Joanne Kyger, Alison Hawthorne Deming, Brenda Hillman, child-poets from River of Words, California Poets in the Schools, and Poetry Inside Out, and the award-winning Berkeley Slam Team headlined the event. Since the early eighties, Poetry Flash has also curated one of the West Coast's best and longest running reading series at Cody's Books in Berkeley, one of the largest and most historically influential independent bookstores in the nation. Over one-hundred writers—mostly poets—have been presented each year by our host, Associate Editor Richard Silberg. Our series is open to every style; our readers are diverse; our audiences come back for more. We are grateful to Cody's Books for their dedication to this partnership and their long-standing commitment to supporting poetry and literature. Unfortunately, Cody's Books on Telegraph Avenue, site of the reading series, will close for good on July 10, 2006, a casualty of Amazon.com and the chain stores. The last Poetry Flash at Cody's reading will take place on June 4, 2006. The June 11 reading will move to Moe's Books, right next door, and the Flash series will soon move to another venue. See the website for updates. The poems in this issue are by editors, contributing editors, advisors, and contributors to Poetry Flash. Some are well published, some are less well-known as poets themselves, such as Editor/Publisher Joyce Jenkins. So here is a glimpse into the back story of Poetry Flash, and into the work of those who are sometimes "Speechless" when they write and edit the work of others. |
