WRITTEN IN ARLINGTON, Katherine E. Young Edits Exciting New Anthology of Poetry
The former Poet Laureate of Arlington, VA, Katherine E. Young, curates this collection of contemporary poetry which shines a light on singular art from outside the big city.
From the book:
The eighty-seven authors in this collection include poets born in Arlington and Arlington transplants from literally all over the world. Sandra Beasley, Andy Fogle, Hailey Leithauser, David McAleavey, Heather McHugh, and Karenne Wood are just some of the poets who have written about Arlington; they join page, performance, and spoken word poets of all ages and backgrounds to compose a portrait in poetry of the community that sits just across the Potomac River from Washington, DC.
The poems in Katherine E. Young’s Woman Drinking Absinthe concern themselves with transgressions. Lust, betrayal, guilt, redemption: Young employs fairy tales, opera, Impressionism, Japonisme, Euclidean geometry, Greek tragedy, wine, figs, and a little black magic to weave a tapestry that’s as old as the hills and as fresh as today’s headlines.
Featured Poetry: “Burial at Shanidar” by Elizabeth Hazen
This is no modern tradition, says Elizabeth Hazen. It is not only now that humans ornament their dead with flowers. “See,” she says in her rumination on tradition and humanity, Burial at Shanidar, “Even from a distance we dream of gardens where there should be stone.” And on Christmas especially, it is so wonderful to curl up with a book of poetry, even to read out-loud to one’s family, and bask in the ways we make words, just like the long winter days of dark, meaningful with light and tradition.
Mark A. Pritchard Reads from His Novel, “Billy Christmas”
It’s that time of year again. As I’m sure you know. That time of year to rediscover all those things one loves and yet stores in boxes during the sunnier months–ornaments, heirlooms, wax statues, wreaths, and the classics. And although one should not consider Billy Christmas a novel pigeon-held by its festive nature, for it is good any day of the year, (as are the classics!) we are so happy the holiday season is here to give us an opportunity to promote Mark A. Pritchard’s incredible young adult novel.
Grace Cavalieri’s November 2018 Exemplars of Poetry
Every month for the Washington Independent Review of Books, the amazing Maryland Poet Grace Cavalieri, author of Other Voices, Other Lives, does a round-up style review of the best recently released independent books of poetry and books about poetry…