Poetry News:

1. — Blas Falconer’s collection of poems, A Question of Gravity and Light, is about nameless people, perennial outsiders who find themselves in situations they hadn’t planned upon —
2. — Professor denied tenure. Reason? Flarf. —
3. — Bangor publisher suing Amazon in anti-trust case —
4. — For the first time, anyone with access to the Internet can hear tapes of Robert Penn Warren’s 1964 interviews with prominent Civil Rights activists like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Malcolm X and the Rev. James Lawson —
5. — Surrealism’s founding texts sold —
6. — A collection of 35 of William McGonagall’s poems fetched more than $13,000 at auction. —
7. — Isn’t it a little bit late to be claiming you wrote “Footprints in the Sand” —
8. — Queen is asked to appoint first female Poet Laureate after 22 men in 340 years —
9. — It pains me to say it, but I used to hate Emily Dickinson —
10. — Frieda Hughes reflects on the aviary she built in her garden —

I had a nice visit with my sister. It was weird to visit Knoxville again after almost (exactly!) a decade. (My M.S. degree is from UT.) Some things looked different, some things looked the same. Looks like they fixed up World’s Fair Park and that area by the Tennessee Theater downtown. I’m really looking forward to having my sister only a few hours away, though I know she’ll be busy with grad school. We had a lot of fun together — always do — and she cut my bangs for me, whoo! I cried when I dropped her off at the airport yesterday, though I’ll see her again in July LOL.

Thanks for your support of my book. I haven’t got any complaints but I guess the people who think that I’m a blowhard or that I’m talentless aren’t apt to email me about it. I am also behind on my email right now — I’m not ignoring anybody.

Poetry News:

1. — State names new poet laureate —
2. — Readers Not Wanted: Student Writers Fight to Keep Their Work Off the Web —
3. — New book by former NEA chairman gives vision for arts in America; Bill Ivey of Vanderbilt’s Curb Center is author of Arts, Inc. —
4. — Writer and poet Firas Saad was sentenced to four years in prison on 9 April on the same charges as Tariq Biassi —
5. — Poems by the man ridiculed as “the world’s worst poet” are expected to fetch up to £6,500 at auction. —
6. — A former court poet for North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has become a best-selling author and media sensation in South Korea, where his poems about the brutality of everyday life in North Korea have now been published for the first time —

Poetry News:

1. — Her early writing is set in a structured style with familiar rhyming schemes, yet its tone foreshadows her charged works to come —
2. — Consistencies Found In Synaesthesia: Letter ‘A’ Is Red For Many; ‘V’ Is Purple —
3. — Poet Giovanni honored with historic marker —
4. — Poems not only rhymed but the syllables of each line were exactly calculated; to make matters trickier, there were tonal patterns as well, dictated by the pitch accents of the language. —
5. — Though he is best known for his medicine–related poems, Peter Pereira successfully exploits his devotion to anagrams and other word games in poems that celebrate the malleabality and surprises possible in language —
6. — Twas the year 2008, when the world’s worst poet got his day - a little late —
7. — The true legacy of the inventor of LSD, who died yesterday aged 102, is in the music, literature and visual arts that were produced as a result of acid —
8. — The problem of describing trees —

This country sure is going to hell in a handbasket. Maybe someone else will do an Idiocracy-type movie that won’t be as terrible.

Poetry News:

1. — The Happy Endings Foundation hoax —
2. — Vendor of verse: It’s personal at NYC street ‘poem shop’ —
3. — “Poetry arises out of a mind that feels itself in some way to be cracked” —
4. — Editorial: A Muse Unplugged —
5. — In three books, over eight years, Matthea Harvey has moved to the front of the pack of interesting poets writing in English —
6. — New Tay disaster: William McGonagall faces challenge to title of world’s worst poet —
7. — Greeks Go for All the Marbles In Effort to Get Back Artifacts —
8. — A monument to the outstanding poet Joseph Brodsky will be set up nearby the American Embassy —
9. — Former state poet laureate Grace Paley was remembered in a memorial service —

– Physics Nobel winner(s) will be announced today. This link’ll probably tell you the winners.

– Your cabbage: now with 100% more anti-depressants and oral contraceptives.

– Ron Paul was in Nashville this weekend & I attended. He seems like the only antidote to this, to me. I think our Constitutional Republic has been replaced by a corporate-controlled oligarchy. There are a bunch of videos of the rally at You Tube.

Poetry News:

1. — Poet laureate finds rhyme and reason in ordinary life —
2. — Prostitutes are target audience for India’s latest magazine —
3. — Love him or loathe him, William McGonagall is a Scottish literary legend —
4. — The Diameter of the Bomb by Yehuda Amichai —
5. — The Lost Poems of Joe Dimaggio —
6. — Why literary blogging won’t save our literary culture —
7. — Proceeds from Walton Arts Center performance to go toward the creation of the Miller Williams Poetry Prize —

Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest 2007 Results

Poetry News:

1. Seems strange that an avant-garde poet lives surrounded by antimacassars and ferns —
2. Exhibit dedicated to ‘worst poet’ —
3. Councillor suggests a battle between poet laureates —
4. Dice-K haiku finalists —
5. Whishaw to shine as Keats —
6. Just how much help do you need to write? —

The story behind the pet food recall By Christie Keith