Summer–there’s still some left!

I haven’t posted here for a couple of months.  I’d like to say it was because I was vacationing, swimming, and lolling about in the sun.  I did a little of that, but mostly a lot of work.  It happens every year that it takes me until the beginning of August to really get into summer mode, and then it’s almost over!  I’m determined to make the most of every day before the snow flies, though.  The garden produce is just about to start coming in in earnest, and that is a favorite time of year for me.  The beginning of the school year is also a favorite time–I love the feeling of “fresh start” it gives me.

A few bits of poetry news:  I’m just finishing my summer online class at The Loft–Poetry Inspired by Art–and it has been wonderful.  Great students, as usual, and the art we are working with is inspiring to me as well as to them.  I won’t be teaching online for the fall semester at The Loft, but will be back winter/spring session with a new class based on The Triggering Town by Richard Hugo.  I think it will be really worthwhile to work through the (very short) book chapter-by-chapter with a group of poets intent on learning. There will be discussion of the ideas and principles that the book brings up, as well as weekly poem prompts and feedback on drafts. I’m hoping to spend the fall semester in my own poetry study with Mark Wunderlich online through the Fine Arts Work Center.  The class he is teaching sounds like just the thing to keep the incantation poems coming.

I’ve recorded five poems in my own voice for The Beat, a poetry program offered by Northern Community Radio, KAXE, out of Grand Rapids, MN.  The first one will air Monday, August 13, between 7:30 and 8 am, and possibly at other times during the day.  After Monday, it will be available online in the archive, where many of my wonderful poet friends  have poems listed.  I’ve also had a poem written at my June retreat in Grand Marais (though not an incantation) accepted for the “Fragments” issue of qarrtsiluni, an excellent online journal.  Not sure when that one will be posted–I’ll let you know. It also comes with audio of me reading it.  Meanwhile, check out qarrtsiluni and the great work of their other contributors.

Enjoy the rest of your summer!