Greetings friends and neighborhs,

I’m delighted to be the featured presenter at the next Young Willamette Writers meeting, set for Jan 3, 2012 at the Old Church in downtown Portland. You can find out more about the Young Willamette Writers here.

We’ll be doing an hour of poetry, starting at 7 p.m. The Old Church is located at SW 11th and Clay, and the event is FREE. It’s a great way for young writers to start the new year off with some new words.

Vancouver-area poet, Christopher Luna, runs a wonderful monthly reading series that people around the Portland area (and beyond, for that matter) should check out. The next reading is TONIGHT – here’s the info:

Open Mic Poetry, hosted by Christopher Luna 7:00pm Thursday, September 10, 2009, and every second Thursday at Cover to Cover Books, 1817 Main Street, Vancouver McLoughlin Blvd. & Main Street.

TONIGHT’S FEATURED READER: Eileen Elliott:

Eileen Davis Elliott came from a 1950′s Midwest isolation still reeling from the Great Depression and World War II, and has been a time traveler ever since. She has explored the emerging Eastern Europe, women moving from school marms to combat pilots, and her own spirituality, stopping at Buddhism, shamanistic ideas, and revisiting the wisdom of the Golden Rule. She is a psychologist, (PhD from University of Missouri), artist (self-taught), and writer of prose and poetry. She also makes a passable apple pie and has recently taken up mah jongg. Prodigal Cowgirl is a collection of 120 poems summarizing a lifetime of seeking and occasional resolution with the world including the rural Midwest, Central Europe emerging from the Cold War, and the guy on the freeway off ramp. This book asks the questions of who we are and what we might want to do about it.

AN EXCERPT: From CROW’S NEST IN CORN FIELD

Long ago, when a family could make it on a quarter-section
I would climb our windmill by the south pasture
Every time Dad sent Ma to town
To buy parts for mower
Or the combine
Or whatever else lost heart and abandoned him before the final round

I would hang on the ladder by one crooked elbow
And lean way, way out
Filling myself up with the emptiness of the place
The view of flat, and clean, and corn stalks everywhere

I’d drink in white butterflies
And road ditches of wild roses
And hums of tiny insects
On adventures of their own

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VISIT Christopher Luna’s blog to learn more about the series, his own work, and tonight’s event.

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Seattle poet and publisher, David Horowitz, will lead a discussion on rhyme this Monday, 7/27 at Looking Glass Books in Portland. David’s a wonderfully gifted poet and citizen of poetry, and it’s a pleasure to know he’ll be spending some time in the Rose City.

David’s discussion will focus on using unpredictable, compelling rhyme, and how subtle changes of perspective on rhyme can help writers recognize its potential to subvert expectation, deepen meaning, and sound completely contemporary. He will also address issues of meter and rhythm.

Visit Rose Alley Press, David’s imprint, to learn more about his work. He has also been a guest writer on the site, and has contributed his time in way of an interview.

ABOUT THE EVENT

Improve Your Rhyming, or How to Avoid the “Moon/June, True/Blue” Syndrome

• When: Monday, July 27, 7 p.m.
• Where: Looking Glass Bookstore (7983 Southeast 13th Avenue, Portland)

ABOUT DAVID HOROWITZ

DAVID D. HOROWITZ founded and manages Rose Alley Press, which primarily publishes books featuring Pacific Northwest rhymed metrical poetry. His new poetry collection, from Rose Alley Press, is Stars Beyond the Battlesmoke. Other collections, from Rose Alley, include Wildfire, Candleflame; Resin from the Rain; and Streetlamp, Treetop, Star. Many of his poems have been published in fine literary journals, such as The Lyric, Candelabrum, and The New Formalist. Some of his recent essays have appeared in Exterminating Angel and the IBPA Independent, a journal specializing in helping small press publishers. In 2005, David won the PoetsWest Achievement Award. In 2007, he edited, as well as published, the Rose Alley Press anthology: Limbs of the Pine, Peaks of the Range. David gives frequent readings in and around Seattle, where he lives.

It’s time for another installment of everyone’s favorite public display of self effacing storytelling: BackFencePDX.

THE FACTS

WHERE AND WHEN: Get to the Mission Theatre (1624 NW Glisan) to enjoy some strutting swimsuits (with bodies in them) by 7:15 this Wednesday, 6/17 (the stories start at 7:30)

THEME: “Caught Red-Handed”

WHO: This month’s storytellers include stripper and author Viva Las Vegas, UX engineer Rael Dornfest, Saint Cupcake owner Jami Curl, playwright and ghostwriter Pema Teeter, geologist Eric Schniewind, comic artist Nicole Georges and preacher’s son Jeff Hardison.

BROUGHT TO YOU BY: Frayn Masters and Melissa Lion, the BackFence ladies!

BUY TICKETS: Go here.

ONE MORE REASON TO COO: It’s BackFence’s one-year anniversary show!