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Wakefield Lit Fest

Title: Wakefield Lit Fest

Location: Wakefield, UK
Description: Festival events will include readings from nationally acclaimed writers, workshops with schoolchildren and young people, master classes for local writers, readers events, a book swap and a ‘Poetry Party’ event. We will also commission a new wo
rk to explore the place of writing and reading in a contemporary city centre, which will be performed as part of the festival.

Learn more here.

Start Date: September 22, 2012
End Date: September 30, 2012

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Carl Phillips and Eduardo C. Corral read at Folger Shakespeare Library

Title: Carl Phillips and Eduardo C. Corral read at Folger Shakespeare Library

Location: Washington, DC, US
Description: The Yale Series of Younger Poets champions the most promising new American poets. Awarded since 1919, past winners include Muriel Rukeyser, Adrienne Rich, William Meredith, W.S. Merwin, John Ashbery, John Hollander, James Tate, and Carolyn Forché. In April 2010, Carl Phillips was named as the new judge of the Yale Series of Younger Poets, replacing Louise Glück. Phillips has chosen Eduardo C. Corral’s Slow Lightning as the 2011 competition winner. Both Phillips and Corral read from their works. Reception and book signing to follow.

Learn more here.

Date: September 17, 2012

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Charles Simic reading and conversation with author Tea Obreht at Strand Bookstore

Title: Charles Simic reading and conversation with author Tea Obreht at Strand Bookstore

Location: New York, New York, US
Description: Come to the Strand Bookstore for a reading by former Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize winning poet Charles Simic, followed by a discussion with Simic and Tea Obreht, author of The Tiger’s Wife. Both Slavs, these two will discuss their backgrounds, their influences and Simic’s work.

Learn more here.

Date: September 10, 2012

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No Angels in This Death Poem

Priscila Uppal

copyright ©2006 by Priscila Uppal



Absolutely no angels in this death poem.
Half-baked poets offer angels for consolation
the way neighbours offer fruitcake at Christmas.

Absolutely no talk of Christmas in this death poem.
Resurrection went out with yesterday’s trash and
holy stars and wise men appear on hockey jerseys.

Absolutely no wise men in this death poem.
Wise men have never made dying understandable.
They’ve drawn no pie charts or graphs for the soul.

Absolutely no mention of souls in this death poem.
THe soul is not a ship, or a bird, or a flag, or a flower.
We have no power of attorney over it, no death connection.

Absolutely no mention of death in this death poem.
Angels are listening and the wise men are sketching.
Look at where all these souls are headed and tell no one.

Notes on the Poem

At first glance, Priscila Uppal's "No Angels in This Death Poem" seems breezy and irreverent. The poem seems to defy and mock the thought of death by taking it head-on in a form of address that is both sing-song and verging on sarcastic.

On even closer examination, the regularity of the words, phrasing, verse structure and overall rhythm is almost like a chant. Is Uppal in fact invoking an incantation to maybe ward something off ... perhaps death?

Uppal weaves a slender, steady thread of connections from one verse to the next, through repeated words and phrases ("Christmas" to "wise men" to "souls" to "death" itself). What is the effect of this sequence or thread of words? You could imagine it's an exercise of holding hands, both to link something together and to barricade something out ... perhaps death?

The phrase "Absolutely no" at the beginning of each verse seems emphatic at first, but then each edict it issues is swiftly broken in the following lines of the poem. So, they are tough but ineffectual words, overly emphatic in the face of something feared.

Uppal's poem ends up evoking many of the things disavowed or supposedly scorned earlier in the poem. In conclusion, the poem isn't as bold as it sets out to be, is it?
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Walt Whitman Award submission deadline

Title: Walt Whitman Award submission deadline

Location: US
Description: The Walt Whitman Award brings first-book publication, a cash prize of $5,000, and a one-month residency at the Vermont Studio Center to an American who has never before published a book of poetry. The winning manuscript, chosen by an eminent poet, is published by Louisiana State University Press. The 2013 judge is John Ashbery.

Learn more here.

Date: November 15, 2012

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Walt Whitman Award submissions open

Title: Walt Whitman Award submissions open

Location: US
Description: The Walt Whitman Award brings first-book publication, a cash prize of $5,000, and a one-month residency at the Vermont Studio Center to an American who has never before published a book of poetry. The winning manuscript, chosen by an eminent poet, is published by Louisiana State University Press. The 2013 judge is John Ashbery.

Learn more here.

Date: September 15, 2012

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Influency Salon registration deadline

Title: Influency Salon registration deadline

Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Description: This unique lecture-reading course features a series of lectures and readings by eight contemporary Toronto guest poets in person. The Fall 2012 line-up is: Aisha Sasha John, Sandra Ridley, David McGimpsey, Angela Carr, Nicole Markotic, Helen Guri, George Elliott Clarke and Mark Goldstein.

Learn more here.

Date: September 7, 2012

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Seamus Heaney ‘in conversation’ with Alasdair Macrae

Title: Seamus Heaney ‘in conversation’ with Alasdair Macrae

Location: Stirling,Scotland, UK
Description: In association with the Royal Society of Literature, the University of Stirling is delighted to welcome to the campus, Nobel Laureate and University of Stirling Honorary Graduate Seamus Heaney. On this occasion, he will be ‘in conversation’ with Alasdair Macrae, literary critic and retired senior lecturer at the University.

Learn more here.

Date: September 14, 2012

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Summer Sport Poetry Competition winners announced

Title: Summer Sport Poetry Competition winners announced

Location: Canada
Description: Go for poetic gold! Pick any summer sport, any style, any form. Bring your competitive spirit. Established poets and first-time participants welcome.

Winners to be judged by Griffin-nominated poet Priscila Uppal. Three winners will be chosen and awarded “gold,” “silver,” or “bronze” prize packs. The poem that takes “gold” will be published online and in print in Literary Review of Canada.

Learn more here.

Date: September 24, 2012