"Perfume Bottles Momentarily Unstopped": A Perspective on Two Collections of Interviews
Interviews / Reviews

“Perfume Bottles Momentarily Unstopped”: A Perspective on Two Collections of Interviews

by B. Lussier on Mar 30, 2013 •
One hopes that in this new age, interviewers and editors continue to value the in-person, in-home interview, though they are out of vogue and more difficult to schedule and execute.     Tony Leuzzi’s Passwords Primeval: American Poets in Their Own Words (BOA Editions, NY 2012) is a collection of...
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Here Come the Blurbies!
Humor / News

Here Come the Blurbies!

by L.A. Grove on Feb 24, 2013 •
And now we honor the poetry books of 2012 and the blurbs that adorn them. Ladies and gentlemen, we give you the Blurby Awards!   BLURB OF THE YEAR   “When I look out the window of my Winnebago I want to see a Sandra Simonds’ poem on the billboard...
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An Interview with Poet & Artist Bianca Stone
Interviews

An Interview with Poet & Artist Bianca Stone

by B. Lussier on Nov 23, 2012 •
It’s just what Stein was talking about: letting images (just as words) go where they want. It’s about allowing imagination into your process.   Bianca Stone is the author of several poetry chapbooks, including I Want To Open The Mouth God Gave You Beautiful Mutant (Factory Hollow Press) and I Saw The Devil With HIs...
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Scientific Materialism and Poetics: An Interview with Eleni Sikelianos
Interviews

Scientific Materialism and Poetics: An Interview with Eleni Sikelianos

by Megan K. Fernandes on Nov 7, 2012 •
I think maybe I’m an animist at heart. I know I’m an animal, and am part of a lineage of animals. I tend to see commonality and exchange between species and beyond (say, rocks and bones) rather than demarcations.   “Language is simply alive, like an organism… Words are the...
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Latest entries
Dark Elderberry Branch: Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva A Reading by Ilya Kaminsky and Jean Valentine
Reviews

Dark Elderberry Branch: Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva A Reading by Ilya Kaminsky and Jean Valentine

by S. Wilde on Mar 19, 2013 •
In Dark Elderberry Branch: Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva, Ilya Kaminsky and Jean Valentine take a new approach to Marina Tsvetaeva’s work by interspersing poems with fragments of prose from her “daybooks,” prose books described by one critic as a “lyric diary.” The book is formatted as an assortment of tasty Tsvetaeva tidbits: poems juxtaposed with...
Anne Carson & Lucie Brock-Broido at AWP 2013
Readings

Anne Carson & Lucie Brock-Broido at AWP 2013

by B. Lussier on Mar 11, 2013 •
The following are notations and excerpts from the closing reading of the 2013 Associated Writers and Writing Programs conference. From Jennifer Benka’s introduction of Anne Carson: Benka quoted Carson as saying, “I never find it possible to think without thinking of myself thinking.” From Anne Carson’s reading: Carson first read selections from her series “Life...
Derek Walcott: Origins
Po-Chops

Derek Walcott: Origins

by L.A. Grove on Jan 29, 2013 •
“Beetles lift the dead elephant into the jaws of the forest.”   This line from Derek Walcott’s poem “Origins” creates a powerful metaphor for the cycle of life and specifically the process of decay. The “jaws of the forest” are the mouthparts of the beetles. As they consume dead organic matter, such as an elephant...
The Continued Exile: Tomasz Różycki’s The Colonies
Reviews

The Continued Exile: Tomasz Różycki’s The Colonies

by Dean C. Robertson on Jan 22, 2013 •
Tomasz Różycki’s collection of poems, The Colonies, addresses issues of dislocation, abandonment, and borders shifting beyond tongue and national identity. When Poland’s borders shifted west after World War II, Różycki’s family was forced to move from Lwów, Poland (now Lviv, Ukraine) to Opole, where he was born in 1970. Translator Mira Rosenthal notes in her...
Gabrielle Calvocoressi: The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart
Po-Chops

Gabrielle Calvocoressi: The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart

by Carrie Moniz on Jan 13, 2013 •
“Because it’s always like that. One day, walking through a room, you realize what you were holding is gone and you can’t find it, even when you get down on your knees.” These lines appear in part five of the ten part title sequence, which depicts the profound sense of loss and confusion widely experienced...
Quinn Latimer's Rumored Animals
Reviews

Quinn Latimer’s Rumored Animals

by B. Lussier on Jan 9, 2013 •
We could not read any other poet and have the experience that we have reading Latimer. Rumored Animals, winner of the American Poetry Journal book prize and published by Dream Horse Press in 2012, is the first volume by Quinn Latimer, and it positions her as one of a new generation of poets who belongs...
Kathleen Graber: The Telephone
Po-Chops

Kathleen Graber: The Telephone

by M. Zobel on Dec 23, 2012 •
  … once I fell in love with a beautiful voice passing through the wire. I remember the drop of it, a man talking about something he’d read, turning to a page with an audible rustle & breath, whispering, Listen. These are the lines that haunt. It’s not that the skin has no function, only...
Injecting Dreams into Cows by Jessy Randall
Reviews

Injecting Dreams into Cows by Jessy Randall

by L.A. Grove on Dec 4, 2012 •
Jessy Randall’s Injecting Dreams into Cows attempts to dismantle quibbles by critics who claim they are unable to engage with new poetry. Randall’s intent becomes clear in “The Nonexistent Orchard.” The poem opens with an epigraph from the New York Times Book Review which paints leading critic Helen Vendler as out of touch and disinterested...
Lidija Dimkovska: National Soul
Po-Chops

Lidija Dimkovska: National Soul

by M. Zobel on Dec 2, 2012 •
And we look for the Macedonian soul among the number-plates on God’s East-West highway in cardboard boxes labeled ‘Do not open! Genes!’ loaded on the backs of the transparent dead. But one cannot rely on the dead. The dead are illegal immigrants, their swollen organs penetrating other peoples’ lands . . . Lidija Dimkovska’s collection...
Eleni Sikelianos: Experiments with Minutes
Po-Chops

Eleni Sikelianos: Experiments with Minutes

by Gina Barnard on Nov 10, 2012 •
“a piece of radish spit into the sink with the toothpaste, its purple shred & white / flesh rattle around the mind, a bit of life”   These lines appear in the long sequence, “Experiments with Minutes,” from Eleni Sikelianos’ sixth book, Body Clock (Coffee House Press 2008). The lines radiate from the page because...
"Two Puffy Afros Going Down the Road": On Lucille Clifton's Influence
Op-Ed

“Two Puffy Afros Going Down the Road”: On Lucille Clifton’s Influence

by Afaa Michael Weaver on Nov 1, 2012 •
Nowadays when I think back to how Lucille and I were with each other, I think that she was in many ways my poetry mama.                 EDITOR’S NOTE: One morning in May 2012, tweets from Afaa Michael Weaver lit up my screen:   “Lucille Clifton taught me—in the...
A Letter to Lucille Clifton
Op-Ed

A Letter to Lucille Clifton

by Afaa Michael Weaver on Nov 1, 2012 •
Delivered at “Won’t You Celebrate with Me?” a memorial for Lucille Clifton at the Enoch Pratt Main Library in Baltimore, Maryland. June 14, 2012 ____________________________________ May 21, 2012 Somerville, Massachusetts Dear Lucille,   In case you’re wondering why I’m taking the time to write a letter to you that I plan to read in public,...

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We publish original reviews and criticism of poetry from across the globe, as well as interviews with poets and translators of poetry. We also draw attention to, and offer commentary on, compelling reviews, criticism, and interviews published elsewhere. We hope you enjoy CalJoPo and join in the conversation!

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