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Celebrating International Women’s Day

Today, March 8th, is International Women’s Day! A great way to commemorate a day—and womens’ history month—is to read a book written by or about a woman. Here are just a few of our favorite books by or about our favorite females. In its new paperback edition, Connecticut state senator Donald E. Williams’s Prudence Crandall: The Fight…

#tbt: Kazim Ali, “Bright Felon Deleted Scene 3”

This week’s selection for Throw Back Thursday is “Bright Felon Deleted Scene 3” from Kazim Ali’s collection Sky Ward (2013). It contains its own “throwback,” a reference to Bright Felon, Ali’s 2009 book.    Ali reinvents possibilities for the personal lyric and narrative in his writing. While in Bright Felon, he works through exile and criminality, Sky Ward…

#tbt: Dennis Hinrichsen, “Autobiography”

This week’s selection for Throw Back Thursday is “Autobiography” from Dennis Hinrichsen’s Collection The Attraction of Heavenly Bodies (1983). His newest collection of poetry entitled Kurosawa’s Dog (2009) was published by the Oberlin College Press and is available through University Press of New England.                     Autobiography The city of my birth…

#tbt: Joe Wenderoth, “After”

Today’s Throwback Thursday poem is Joe Wenderoth’s “After,” from Disfortune (1995). Wesleyan University Press also published his book It Is If I Speak (2000).                                                           After Knowing then like anyone only what I…

#WCW: Sophie Blanchard (1778–1819)

“The higher we go, the more glorious our death will be!” Everyone’s heard of Amelia Earheart, the first female to fly solo across the Atlantic. But have you heard of Sophie Blanchard, our Woman Crush Wednesday honoree?   This French balloonist was the profession’s first female flyer, who carried off sixty-seven successful ascensions. Her daring contributions…

Sarah Blake & Motion Poems

Sarah Blake’s poem “A Day at the Mall Reminds Me of America” from her debut poetic collection Mr. West has been featured in a short film by Ayşe Altinok. MotionPoems “catalyzes the remix of poetry with other forms to create compelling hybrid artworks,” and it is a beautiful creation at that.   Watch this amazing film adaptation of…

#tbt: Barbara Guest, “Coal”

This week’s Throw Back Thursday selection is “Coal” from The Collected Poems of Barbara Guest (2008). It was originally published in her 2002 collection entitled Miniatures and Other Poems.      COAL The black curtain has fallen over the moon, yet stars are out tonight. Dust falls through the curtain. We are asleep. Night descends into another…

Wishing Clayton Eshleman a Happy 80th Birthday!

Today we wish Clayton Eshleman a happy 80th birthday! Eshleman has been at the heart of American poetry since the early 1960s. His poems, critical essays, and translations of noteworthy poets as diverse as César Vallejo, Aimé Césaire, Pablo Neruda, Antonin Artaud, Vladimir Holan, Michel Deguy, Henri Michaux, and Bernard Bador have earned him international…

#tbt: Don Bogen’s “A Muse”

This week’s selection for Throw Back Thursday is “A Muse” from Don Bogen’s collection The Known World (1997). Another volume, Luster (2003), is also available from Wesleyan University Press.