I am very grateful that Mass Poetry has used one of my poems for “Poem of the Moment.” It will be up until April 17. Check it out:
poetry and art
Silkworm 11 Is Open for Submissions
Silkworm, the annual review of Florence Poets Society, is open for submissions! You are invited to submit your poems to be considered for Silkworm 11–The Eleventh Hour to be published in fall 2018.
Please submit up to 3 poems of no longer than 50 lines each on the theme of “the eleventh hour.” The theme may or may not be taken literally. Deadline for submissions is April 15, 2018.
Please include a 30-word bio with your submission. Only electronic submissions will be accepted, as an MS Word document attached in an email sent to info@florencepoets.com. There is no fee to submit your poems for consideration. Members and non-members of Florence Poets Society are encouraged to submit. Please visit their website for more information: www.florencepoets.com
Simultaneous submissions are acceptable so long as you inform them right away if your poem is accepted elsewhere. They claim first American publication rights, with rights reverting to the author after the initial publication period; please give us credit in future publications. We prefer work that has not been previously published.
Submissions from within the United States that are accepted for publication will receive a contributors copy of Silkworm 11. For international submissions that are accepted for publication in Silkworm 11, we reserve the option to send contributors an electronic PDF copy rather than a print copy. This is because of the high cost of international postage. Florence Poets Society does not and never will require a fee for submissions.
They look forward to reading your poems!
From the Nicaraguan Poet Francisco de Asis Fernandez
Anunque el cuerpo se marchite
Hay un misterio que sobrepasa mi llanto y mi sobriedad.
¿Qué esconden las tinieblas? ¿Qué disrazan las sombras?
Cuando era niño lloraba
No entendia la noche
Que tiene un dulce aroma de tierra pisada por las pajaros,
Y ahora no entiendo la muerte,
Aunque sepa que es cuando la luz se abre en el infinito
Y los ojos dejan de llorar.
Although the body may fade
There is a mystery greater than my weeping and my sorrow.
What does darkness hide, what do shadows disguise?
When I was a boy I used to cry.
I did not understand night
With its sweet aroma of earth softly trodden by birds,
and now I do not understand death,
although I am aware that it is when light opens to infinity
and eyes cease weeping.
Festival Internacional de Poesia Grenada, Nicaragua Poetry is Alive and well in Central America
Quabbin Writers Read at Great Rapids Spoken Word Festival last Saturday night
Great Falls Word Festival
The Quabbin Writers Salon of Western Massachusetts will read at the Great Falls Word Festival at 6:30 pm, Saturday, October 14 at the Harvest Restaurant in Turner’s Fall.
They are reading for the first time from their newly published Anthology, a collection of poetry and prose that explores nature, love and the labyrinths of lives fully lived. Members of the Quabbin Writer’s Group have published widely in literary magazines and books. but this is our first collaborative effort and include Epi Bohdi, D. Dina Friedman, Marianne Gambaro, Kathryn Holzman, Jane Johnson and Eileen P Kennedy. Join us for the reading and the rest of this wonderful festival, which will run October 12-15 in Turner’s Falls.
Almost Bloomsday Forbes Writing Room
Wednesday morning from 9:30- 12:30, writers of every description — novelists, poets, memoir writers, essayists, journalists and more gather for companionable writing time. The Writing Room has been open for seven years.
Bloomsday is a commemoration of the life of the Irish writer, James Joyce. It’s celebrated on June 16, the day on which Ulysses is set. I will facilitate the Writing Room on Wednesday June 14. Since Bloomsday is just two days following, I will provide you with prompts based on James Joyce quotes.
I look forward to writing with you.
Poetry Reading Saturday May 20
Reading and Book Party
Journey into Space. Ina Anderson
Saturday, May 20, 2017, 3 p.m.
120 Pulpit Hill Road, North Amherst
(Pioneer Valley Cohousing Common House)
From her origins in England through a life well lived in Vermont, poet Ina Anderson will transport her audience through universal experiences of childhood, love and loss in a reading from her new collection Journey into Space. Maine poet laureate Baron Wormser has written of Journey into Space, “Ina Anderson’s poems show us scenes from a fully lived and deeply appreciated life. The poems hail from that legendary land called The Past, each poem brimming with convincing details and nuances of feeling. Her British origins feel at once far away and familiar, for the terrain her poems traverse is thoroughly human—the stuff of tales told by the eternal hearth.”
The reading is free and open to the public.
Please join us!!
The Pioneer Valley Cohousing Writing Group and
Quabbin Writers’ Salon
More information available at: antrimhousebooks.com/anderson-ina.html
contact: Kathryn Holzman, kbholzman@gmail.com
II
Ina Anderson will be reading her new book “Journey Into Space” in Western Massachusetts on Saturday, April 8, 2017 at the Pioneer Valley Co-Housing Common Room at 3pm.This is surely to be an interesting reading by this accomplished Scottish poet. This event is sponsored by the Pioneer Valley Co-Housing Writers Group.
Red Thread Writers Circles Begin This Week
Julie Rosier, writer extraordinaire and facilitator of writing groups for 10 years in Western Massachusetts, is starting her Red Thread Writing Circles on December 7. Two 10-week writing workshops, one will run on Wednesday evenings in Easthampton and on Thursday evenings in Northampton. Contact Julie at jrosier06@gmail.com for more details.
Eileen P. Kennedy Author 