Yesterday, I participated in a poetry symposium that explored different understandings of the term "currency." The papers presented were academic (as was our location) but I was very pleased (and even reassured) to learn that many of the participants were also poets. Some had books out already or had published their work in a number of magazines journals, both in print and on line. Between panels, we talked a bit about balancing creative writing with the rigors of academic work. A hiatus from creative writing seems to be common but, thankfully, temporary. I found several texts by some of the authors I met on line and put together a sampler:
Ethel Rackin: "Let Song Birds Sing" and excerpts from The Forever Notes
Christopher Schmidt: Three Poems ("By the Sea" is a marvelous poem. In Schmidt's poem, "by the sea" isn't just a location or position but a state of feeling or being that the imagery of the poem fantastically destabilizes.)
Lucy Ives: "I Saw White Flowers Race to Cover My Eyes," "Epic," and "100 Views" (audio)
Anna Moschovakis: "THE FUTURE or Optimism, an Epic" (from The Moods)
In a 2006 interview with LA-lit, Moschovakis and Matvei Yankelevich, editors of Ugly Duckling Presse, read from their own work (this link takes you directly to the audio file and to the reading). Yankelevich started off with an excerpt of his long poem The Present Work, published by Palm Press. Moschovakis read from her first book The Blue Book.
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