Lay your WORD down

On June 20, two weeks from today, AJ Dolman will visit Cobourg to share her poetry collection, "Crazy / Mad" (Gordon Hill Press) as part of our monthly Third Thursday Reading Series. Here is a poem of hers that is apt for Pride Month.

Three Cobourg-area poets will execute a plan for a friendly take-over of Toronto ... well, at least a take-over of Toronto's Art Bar this Monday (June 3). All three compose excellent work and have wonderful books. Go by. Go, buy.

Antony Di Nardo's most recent poetry collection is "Forget ∙ Sadness ∙ Grass" (Ronsdale Press). In Cobourg four days from now -- on Thursday, May 16 -- he will present his writing as one of three feature poets in our evening Third Thursday Reading Series event.

Antony is a member of the Cobourg Poetry Workshop and splits his time between our Town and Sutton, Québec.

Here is the view I wrote for the release of his 6th published poetry collection, "Through Yonder Window Breaks" (Wet Ink Books).

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Antony Di Nardo composes personally ­revealing poems about ordinary days and experiences in ways that sound like his part in an everyday conversation. Do not be fooled. Each piece is shaped, carefully and with purposeful craft, in lines such as these:

"Standing on both feet, / a notion I’m a tree about to burst / a split second / away from getting started"

"Don’t let the crow fool you. / That’s not its purpose."

"The gulls that I remember ripping a seam in the sky / And squeezing through until they disappeared."

When Di Nardo seems ordinary, he is very good; when he takes us into his greatest devices, his imagery is unique and spectacular.

~ James Pickersgill
~ Poetry Activist and Impresario

In four days, on Thursday, May 16, Cassidy McFadzean will visit Cobourg ... and ... she will facilitate an afternoon writing workshop, then later, give an evening poetry reading.

The May 16 afternoon session is "Lists and Litanies- A Generative Poetry Workshop with Cassidy McFadzean"

Cassidy has issued 3 books, the latest of which is "Crying Dress" published by Anansi. Both of her earlier full collections were published by McClelland & Stewart -- "Hacker Packer," and, "Drolleries."

Here is a link to an excellent, long(ish) interview with Cassidy conducted by Paula Turcotte for "Canthius, feminism & literary arts."

Paula Turcotte in Conversation with Cassidy McFadzean — Canthius There’s definitely an encyclopaedic urge in my writing to try to fit everything into a poem, to push against the boundaries of what a poem can contain. I think it varies for each project, but in Crying Dress I rarely sat down to write a poem from beginning to end.