Good Morning!
I’ve been on the road, home only three days in the last three weeks–whew! But now, I’m home and it’s time to get a little writing done!
Join me!
Check out my page of writing prompts, updated daily!
Get that beautiful write on, y’all!
https://marycarrollhackett.com/writing-prompts/
Happy writing!
xo
Mary
Monday Must Read!
This week meet Margaret Mackinnon, author of The Invented Child, for which she received the Gerald Cable Book Award and was given the 2014 Literary Award in Poetry from the Library of Virginia. Her work has appeared in Image, Poetry, New England Review, Georgia Review, Quarterly West, RHINO, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Poet Lore, and other publications.
Margaret Mackinnon grew up in the South, influenced by a lush landscape and a family that emphasized a deep connection between language and meaning. Her mother wrote poetry as a young woman (and generously encouraged all her earliest literary efforts). Her father was a Presbyterian minister, so every Sunday, she watched him try to give shape to beliefs and questions through the words of sermons, prayers, and creeds.
In college, at Vassar and the University of North Carolina, Mackinnon studied art history and religion, thinking about how image and pattern intersect with what we see as significant. And then came five years in Japan, where she taught English and studied textile design in a small circle of Japanese women artists. She learned something there about the discipline of a craft, and how that kind of focus can take one into a deeper attention to the everyday world. Back in the United States, she entered the graduate program in creative writing at the University of Florida.
Her awards include the Richard Eberhart Poetry Prize from Florida State University, a Tennessee Williams Scholarship from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and a residency at the Vermont Studio Center. She teaches at a private girls’ high school and lives in Falls Church, Virginia.
She lives with her husband and daughter in Falls Church, Virginia.
More about The Invented Child
Margaret Mackinnon is a compelling voice in American poetry. Her début collection, The Invented Child, is beautifully poised between reticence and candor. Frequently inspired by visual art, she writes lovingly of her parents, her husband, her child, but also of Sophia Hawthorne and Walt Whitman and Grant Wood, reminding us of the “sweet amplitude” of life. These are splendid poems of feeling that look far beyond the self to the miraculous other. Brava! — Kelly Cherry
Four Poems from The Invented Child
http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/invented-child/
“For Grant Wood” at The Poetry Foundation
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poem/29417
“Mary Shelley’s Dream”
http://www.valpo.edu/vpr/v12n1/v12n1poetry/mackinnonmary.php
More poems and reviews at Verse Daily
http://www.versedaily.org/2013/aboutmargaretmackinnon.shtml
Happy Reading!
xo
Mary
This week, meet Lennart Lundh, the author of six poetry chapbooks. Four Poems, Pictures of an Other Day, and So Careless of Themselves were published by Writing Knights Press. Fifth April 1975, an extended poem written during the American bombing of Cambodia, is self-published. Poems Against Cancer 2014 and Poems Against Cancer 2015 were written and distributed as fundraisers for the St. Baldrick’s Foundation and its research into childhood cancers.
Len’s poetry has appeared in print since 1967, and online since the turn of the century. In the last year and a half, his work has been found in the real or virtual pages of Binnacle, Children Churches and Daddies, Copperfield Review, Crisis Chronicles, Drunk Monkeys, Hessler Street Poetry 2015, Liminal Age, NonBinary Review, Poetry Quarterly, Poetry Storehouse, River Poets Journal, Silver Birch Press projects, and anthologies from Writing Knights Press. He reads regularly at Lit by the Bridge, Traveling Mollies, Waiting for the Bus, and Waterline Writers in the Chicago area. Three or four times a year, he can be found featuring at various venues in Ohio.
He is also a historian (five books and a score of articles between 1984 and 2002) and short-fictionist. His fiction has appeared in Coffee Shop Blues, Ethereal Tales, Flashquake, Inkburns, Jet Fuel Review, Liar’s League, Litro, Mocha Memoirs, NonBinary Review, Page & Spine, postcard poems and prose, Quotable, River Poets Journal, SmokeLong Quarterly, Song of the Siren, Stray Branch, and Weird Lies. A short-fiction chapbook, After the Wolves, is scheduled to appear from Writing Knights Press this year.
Len and his wife of 47 years, Lin, live in northeastern Illinois.
One of these days, Lennart will have a Web site.
He is on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/lennart.lundh.5
Audio and video files of his work can be found on YouTube and Soundcloud.
To order his books from Writing Knights Press, go http://writingknights.bravesites.com/
To order his self-published chapbooks, contact Len at lenlundh@aol.com. Please note that all proceeds from Poems Against Cancer 2014 and Poems Against Cancer 2015 will go to the St. Baldrick’s Foundation.
Monday Must Read!
This week meet Julie Brooks Barbour, the author of Small Chimes (Aldrich Press, 2014) and two chapbooks: Earth Lust (2014) and Come To Me and Drink (2012), both from Finishing Line Press.
She is a recipient of an Artist Enrichment Grant from Kentucky Foundation for Women and a residency at Sundress Academy for the Arts. Her poems have appeared in Waccamaw, Four Way Review, diode, storySouth, Prime Number Magazine, burntdistrict, The Rumpus, Midwestern Gothic, Blue Lyra Review, and Verse Daily.
She is co-editor of the journal Border Crossing and an Associate Poetry Editor at Connotation Press: An Online Artifact. She teaches composition and creative writing at Lake Superior State University.
Julie’s website: http://www.juliebrooksbarbour.com
Where to get Julie’s book Small Chimes:
Check out Earth Lust!
https://finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=2113
Come to Me and Eat
https://finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=723
More from Julie online:
At Connotation Press: http://www.connotationpress.com/poetry/1793-julie-brooks-barbour-poetry
At Negative Capability: http://www.negativecapabilitypress.org/blog/2015/3/22/featured-poet-julie-brooks-barbour
At Verse Daily: http://www.versedaily.org/2012/aboutjuliebrooksbarbour.shtml
A Great Interview with Julie:
Happy Reading!
xo
Mary
This week, meet Annie Finch, an American poet, author, playwright, spiritual writer, and entrepreneur, author of six books of poetry, many books and anthologies on poetic form, and numerous verse plays and poetic collaborations with composers, dancers, and artists.
Annie’s most recent books are Spells: New and Selected Poems, Measure for Measure: An Anthology of Poetic Meters, and A Poet’s Craft: A Comprehensive Guide to Making and Sharing Your Poetry. Her poetry has appeared in The Paris Review, Poetry, The Norton Anthology of World Poetry, and The Penguin Book of Twentieth-Century American Poetry.
A mesmerizing performer of her work and a beloved poetry teacher, Annie is the founder of PoetcraftCircles.com (on Facebook as Poetcraft Circles), where she loves to hang out, teach, and discuss poetic meter and form.
Praise:
”Annie Finch’s Spells is a pure tone that calls us home to the first impulse of poetry. We link to mystery. We lift off.”~Joy Harjo
About Spells
Spells: New and Selected Poems brings together Annie Finch’s most memorable and important poems written over forty years. Finch’s uniquely mysterious voice moves through the book, revealing insights on the classic themes of love, spirituality, death, nature, and the patterns of time. Finch is celebrated for her extraordinary love and knowledge of poetic craft, and Spells displays her virtuosity in a broad range of genres and forms. The book also includes a number of new and previously unpublished poems.
Annie’s website: http://www.anniefinch.com/
More about Annie’s most recent book Spells:
http://www.anniefinch.com/spells-new-and-selected-poems/
Annie also writes about feminism and women’s spirituality for The Huffington Post and elsewhere, and is completing a book on her spiritual path called American Witch.
She is the founder of American Witch Community & Marketplace, a craft collective of witchy products and online membership community based in female-centered spirituality.
Learn more about American Witch at www.americanwitch.com, or on Facebook as American Witch.
Magical Tools for Your Inner Goddess https://american-witch.myshopify.com/
More Annie online:
Annie’s Work at The Poetry Foundation: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/annie-finch
Hear Annie read her work: http://www.anniefinch.com/audio/
Annie on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Arcfinch
Happy Reading!
xo
Mary
This week, meet Diane Lockward, author of The Crafty Poet: A Portable Workshop (Wind Publications, 2013) and three poetry books, most recently Temptation by Water. Her previous books are What Feeds Us, which received the 2006 Quentin R. Howard Poetry Prize, and Eve’s Red Dress. A new poetry collection, The Uneaten Carrots of Atonement, is scheduled for publication in 2015. She is also the author of two chapbooks, Against Perfection and Greatest Hits: 1997-2010. Her poems have been included in such anthologies as Poetry Daily: 360 Poems from the World’s Most Popular Poetry Website and Garrison Keillor’s Good Poems for Hard Times, and in such journals as Harvard Review, Southern Poetry Review, and Prairie Schooner. Her work has also been featured on Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, Gwarlingo, and The Writer’s Almanac. She is the Poet Laureate of West Caldwell, New Jersey, where she runs two annual poetry events: The West Caldwell Poetry Festival and Girl Talk. She publishes a free monthly e-mail Poetry Newsletter and is happy to have new subscribers.
She blogs at Blogalicious, http://www.dianelockward.blogspot, and keeps a website at www.dianelockward.com.
Crafty Link to Amazon:
For information about The Crafty Poet: A Portable Workshop
http://www.dianelockward.blogspot.com/p/the-crafty-poet-portable-workshop.html
Description: The Crafty Poet: A Portable Workshop is a poetry tutorial to inform and inspire poets. It contains model poems with prompts, writing tips, and interviews contributed by fifty-six poets, including thirteen former and current state Poets Laureate. An additional forty-five poets contributed sample poems. Geared for experienced poets and aspiring poets, this book is ideal for individual use at home or group use in the classroom or workshop.
Review by Lynn Domina
Review by Christine Veladota
http://maybesopoetry.com/2014/12/20/the-crafty-poet-a-portable-workshop-by-diane-lockward/
Comments from readers:
I LOVE the poet interviews sprinkled in with the craft tips. These alone are worth the price of the book. I highly, highly recommend it to any poet writing today. It brings forth much fruit! Do go and secure a copy immediately. (C.A. LaRue)
Here is a must for teachers of poetry. . . a feast of poems and instructions. (Grace Cavalieri)
Sample Bonus Prompt
http://adelekenny.blogspot.com/2013/10/prompt-166-word-chain-poem-by-guest.html
Sample Prompt with model poem
http://adelekenny.blogspot.com/2014/11/prompt-210-loveliness-of-words-by-guest.html
Happy Reading—and Writing!
xo
Mary
This week, meet Melissa Eleftherion, the author of huminsect (dancing girl press, 2013), prism maps (dusie kollektiv, 2014), Pigtail Duty (dancing girl press, 2015), and several other chapbooks and fragments. Melissa grew up in Brooklyn.
Recent work appears or is forthcoming in Bone Bouquet, Bukowski Erasure Poetry Anthology, Delirious Hem, Dusie, Entropy, Finery, Manifesting the Female Epic, Mom Egg Review, Open Letters Monthly, Poet as Radio, So to Speak, & TRUCK.
She works as a librarian with Mendocino County Libraries, and created, developed, and currently manages the Poetry Center Chapbook Exchange.
Melissa’s website: www.apoetlibrarian.wordpress.com
Follow Melissa on Twitter! @apoetlibrarian
Where to find Melissa’s books:
Pigtail Duty
http://dulcetshop.myshopify.com/collections/frontpage/products/pigtail-duty-melissa-eleftherion
Huminsect
https://dulcetshop.myshopify.com/products/huminsect-melissa-eleftherion
Check out this very cool project!
Poetry Center Chapbook Exchange: http://poetrychapbooks.omeka.net/
Happy Reading!
xo
Mary
Monday Must Read!
This week, meet Jessica Goodfellow, author of Mendeleev’s Mandala (Mayapple Press, 2015) and The Insomniac’s Weather Report (Isobar Press, 2014).
Her chapbook, A Pilgrim’s Guide to Chaos in the Heartland, won the 2006 Concrete Wolf Chapbook Competition.
Her work has appeared in Best New Poets, Verse Daily, and NPR’s The Writer’s Almanac. Jessica received the Chad Walsh Poetry Prize from the Beloit Poetry Journal, as well as the Linda Julian Essay Award and the Sue Lile Inman Fiction Prize, both from the Emrys Foundation. Her work was made into a short film by Motionpoems (May 2015) and screened at the Minneapolis/St Paul International Film Festival and AWP 2015. Jessica has graduate degrees from Caltech and the University of New England. She lives and works in Japan.
Praise for Jessica Goodfellow “Here is a poet who has boldly refused to abide to the expectations of genre—but instead, pushes language and form as a means of asking the most urgent questions. The result is a courageous and kaleidoscopic, at times tender and vulnerable, exploration of motherhood and family—set against the backdrops of science, history, religion, myths, and mathematics. When a poet embarks on a book as myriad and borderless as this one, we are gifted the rare chance to stand at the threshold of a formidable human storm. And from here, it is clear that Goodfellow’s Mendeleev’s Mandala is an electric book. But its lines are not limited to lightning. They move more like thunder, startling, resonant, and suddenly everywhere in the mind at once. –Ocean Vuong, author of Night Sky With Exit Wounds
Jessica Goodfellow has a joyous intelligence and electric tongue. Reading this book a first time, my only regret was that I couldn’t read it a second first time. But then I read it a first second time and a first third. You see what I’m doing? I’m reading this book over and over, without ever completely taking it in. I think you will too. And like me, want only one thing from Jessica Goodfellow – more. – Bob Hicok
Jessica’s website: http://www.jessicagoodfellow.com/
Links to some poems from Mendeleev’s Mandala: http://www.diodepoetry.com/v6n2/content/goodfellow_j.html http://www.versedaily.org/2007/roadtrip.shtml http://www.thrushpoetryjournal.com/march-2012-jessica-goodfellow.html
Happy Reading!
xo
Mary
Another poetry house concert to tell you about from this fabulous weekend, but in the spirit of this whole adventure of getting more poetry out into the world, I’m going to start a lil sumpin-sumpin here weekly, promoting other contemporary poets out there making the world beautiful with their words!
I’m gonna post links etc for fabulous poets out there in the world right now, a post I’m calling
Monday Must Read!
This week, meet Karen Paul-Holmes, author of Untying the Knot, from Aldrich Press, a memoir in poetry, telling the story of the end of long marriage and the healing that follows.
Tom Lux says this lovely book is written with “grace, humor and self-awareness and without a dollop of self-pity,” and William Wright says the book “possesses the potential to teach us ways to navigate and ultimately transcend the difficulties of divorce and the feelings of loss and grief such division engenders.”
Karen, in support of other writers, also hosts a critique group in Atlanta and a Writers’ Night Out in the Blue Ridge Mountains. You can see more about Karen and Untying the Knot at the following links
Untying the Knot on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/untying
Karen Paul-Holmes at P&W: http://www.pw.org/content/karen_holmes
Four Poems from Karen at The Dead Mule: http://www.deadmule.com/poetry/karen-paul-holmes-four-poems/
Untying the Knot on Extract(s): http://dailydoseoflit.com/2015/02/27/excerpt-karen-paul-holmes/
Happy Reading!
xo
Mary
Mary Carroll-Hackett: Poetry and Prose 
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