Category Archives: poetry & poets

Houses Are Fields

17 Monday May 2010

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Silverman reads at Bookshop Santa Cruz

This week I attended a reading by Taije Silverman. Silverman read from her new book Houses Are Fields. (Published by LSU in 2009)

Amazing, soulful. Words hung on a loosely reorganized scaffold of iambic pentameter. A powerful reader whose quiet strength shines through metaphors, and leaves sensual images drawn from a mix of Greek tragedy and the sumptuous landscape of Virginia.

Looks like Santa Cruz has a very active current of poetry running through it, with its own Poet Laureate (Gary Young), amazing residents like Adrienne Rich (more on Rich and her upcoming book later) and an organization dedicated entirely to fostering poetry, Poetry Santa Cruz.

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Lovely song, sacrificed without a passing regret

23 Tuesday Mar 2010

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Poetry and the arts take an important place in the realm of influencing change, raising awareness and stirring the pot. Poets, writers and film makers have been my catalysts and guides along the sometimes confusing trail of conservation and direct action.

Hip Pocket Press publishes a newsletter sharing poets views on the environment. Named Canary for the unique place this lovely songbird held as a harbinger of deadly mine gas, this collection of loosely themed writings informs us of an inner life nurtured by nature.

“The canary in the coal mine” was a primitive early warning system used by miners to alert themselves to poison gases seeping into the mines.  If the canary was found dead, it was time to get out quick.  As a metaphor, its significance for me includes not only the salvation of the humans, but also the casual loss of the canary, that fragile and innocent bird with its lovely song, sacrificed without a passing regret….”—Gail Entrekin, Editor, Hip Pocket Press

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Falling Into Light

12 Friday Mar 2010

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The More Difficulty Beauty

Molly Fisk’s New Book

Molly Fisk’s new book, The More Difficult Beauty was released yesterday. Somewhere in the Sierra there was a great stirring and release party, I suspect.

See my short review in Sacramento News & Review, or read the full review below.

The More Difficult Beauty

by Molly Fisk

Publication Date: March 10, 2010

Pages: 96

Trim size: 5.5″ x 8.5″, soft cover

Price: $15.00

ISBN 10: 9780917658365

ISBN 13: 978-0-917658-36-5

Hip Pocket Press, 5 Del Mar Court, Orinda, California 94563

Reading Molly Fisk’s The More Difficult Beauty gave me the odd sensation of falling down a well, but instead of into darkness, I fell into light. Fisk’s words give us darkness and shadow, but these poems twist this into a kind of release, leaving the reader with a bittersweet, sobering hope. John Updike considers Fisk’s current poetic offering a “Fearless, clear-eyed work.”

This poet braves the more difficult places and reveals the world’s simple truths. —Dorianne Laux

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California State Poetry Society

02 Tuesday Feb 2010

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Just out in California Quarterly, my poem as tribute to Edward Abbey-


Abbey’s Gift

by Pamela Biery

Edward’s words

sear images into my eyes
making me yearn
for the widest spaces this planet
still offers
and call out
for the wild ones lurking
in the brush
and beg
to lie on the hard earth,
searching the sky.

Not too late
perhaps to save
a few river miles
surrounded by
Glen Canyon green
dipping water ouzels
and suspended,
temporary surety
of a river
still flowing
free.

Green remains,
but Edward and
the Glen Canyon
are gone.

A shadow dances
across the water
A fish? A leaf?
Racing with the current,
down the riffle,
into deep pools
swirling, twisting
out of sight
but present
as surely as
this passing day.