Author Archives: Jeff Schwaner

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About Jeff Schwaner

Poet: three published books of verse and two novels. Studied poetry at Cornell University, where I was awarded the Dorothy Sugarman Poetry Prize and George Harmon Coxe Award for Contributions to Creative Writing. Entrepreneur: Co-founder in 2000 of Booksurge, an author-initiated self publishing and Print On Demand (POD) site purchased by Amazon in 2005. Working guy: manager at LexisNexis. Family man: husband and father of three. New England native and current Virginia resident. Big fan of Blue Ridge mountains and hills and trees in general.

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet Patsy Asuncion

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

Patsy Asuncion will be reading her poetry on  Friday, January 16th, at 10:00am.

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Public education, her ticket from poverty, instilled passion for words in all its creative forms. Professional writing morphed into poetry and short stories, featured in Prevention Magazine and numerous anthologies (most recently in Chatter House Press’ Reckless Writing, SUNY’s Healing Muse, L.A. Loyola’s The Truth About the Fact, National Federation of Poetry Society’s Encore) as well as online journals, UK’s Female First and Laughing Fire Press. Her poetry collection, Cut on the Bias, will be published by Laughing Fire Press in early 2015.

Here’s a new poem about growing up in Chicago’s inner city:

Jalopy

She was stolen shiny new outside
a tenement for a joy ride then abandoned
in a back alley No anti-theft devices
in those days just next of kin to fender
troublemakers When they found her
they thought she was lucky just
a busted headlight bloody dents
and pigeon-toed tires probably
the reason thieves dumped her

Once healed she proved a good car
who kept good traction whenever
she drove her stepmother home
from the neighborhood tap Mechanics
saw her potential caught her interest
with books Interior lights a tough
engine ensured high performance
in school despite being left
alone a lot on the street

Tomboy antics in the alleys scarred
all four tires but she put up a poker-face
Two crashes shorting her electrical
started migraines every time she used
her turn signals Surgery on ball joints
and quality oil seemed to quiet cranky
squeaks when she rolled She paid
attention keeping her trim in top shape
to slow depreciation unlike some friends

Maintenance doesn’t stop life’s odometer
Rust spots on her once flawless finish
increased each winter Young cracks
in her underbody began puckering her
mainframe Cheap gas had been no
problem but then started upsetting her gut
Chronic allergies insisted more air filter
changes Not surprised each time she
was traded She didn’t choose her
owners

Sold now as vintage she is adept
a classic from the day the only one
to make it out of the old neighborhood
While memory settings have lost old
details she recalls important choices
running even in bad weather starting
while missing parts finding her way
regardless of confusing road signs
optimizing her standard components

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet KC Bosch

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

KC Bosh will be reading his poetry on  Thursday, January 15th, at 2:30pm.

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KC Bosch is a photographer and woodworker who lives and writes in Rappahannock County, Virginia. His poetry can be found at literary journals such as Camel Saloon, Poetry Breakfast, Dead Mule, and Vox Poetica. His work was twice nominated for Best of the Net.

Stealing Days

when we arrive the calm dark is
rudely broken by generator and lamps
a million details to tend to

set the plates, fasten the sills
take the measure
run adhesive and sheet the deck
build the walls and stand in place

bring in the rafters
tip them up and nail them down
an ancient story of feet and inches

thirty-eight and seven-sixteenths skinny
short to short, three times
cripples and dead-men and bents
valleys and peaks and studs

stopping for lunch almost
while plotting …
sandwich in one hand
plans in the other

all afternoon more of the same
but different …

ok shut it down, tie it down,
pack it up

out to the truck
racing to Manny’s
pork rinds and beer
down 997 toward home

hat stuck to my head
sweat stain tie-dyed shirt
wearing enough sawdust and dirt
to … be … arrested … for … theft.

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet R.G. Evans

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

R.G. Evans will be reading his poetry on  Sunday, January 18th, at 10:00am.

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Excited to be a part of the 2015 Bridgewater International Poetry Festival!

Visit my website to see my bio and links to some online poems, interviews and videos:http://www.rgevanswriter.com.

Here’s a poem from my book Overtipping the Ferryman:

MONTH WITHOUT A MOON

Any night I like, I can rise instead of the moon
that has forgotten us, not a thought of our sad lot,
and roam the darkened oblongs of the dunes.

Once you said the moon was some pale god
who turned away his face to cause the tides,
and once you said that, I of course believed

that you were mad. Now the ghost crab guides
me to the edge where land is not land, sea not sea,
and all the sky above is one dark dream.

This is the month with no full moon. You
were its prophet, and I am standing on the seam
between belief and what I know is true.

I gave you a diamond. It should have been a pearl.
It should have been a stone to hang above the world.

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet Pia Taavila-Borsheim

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

Pia Taavila-Borsheim will be reading her poetry on  Saturday, January 17th, at 10:00am.

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Thanks for hosting this, Jeff. Can’t wait to meet / see everyone.

Check out my web page for some poems, my resume (with my publishing history) as well as a listing of my forthcoming readings and book signings. Thanks!

http://piataavilaborsheim.wordpress.com

Early Morning, January, Outside

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Early Morning, January, Outside

 

I have seen crows measure themselves against a hawk
to secure territory.  A single crow settles into a branch

a few limbs away from a red tailed hawk, hopping awkwardly
closer then gawping its recognition and the echoes

of recognition bring more crows as if the crows
themselves were the echoes coming back. We know

how this ends, with the hawk taking flight and shrugging
them off, literally–with a few flicks of its shoulder

it is gone. But stronger or not, in the end it leaves.
This morning the crows behind my house

were raising a racket but nothing was rising
over the treeline. They hopped agitated from

tree to tree but kept to the lower branches.
Overhead like staples in the gray sky a hundred vultures

circled and swerved, like figure skaters
freed of all pretension of looking human

but they did look human, these angels
of death, or maybe turning to go back inside

I caught their reflection in the kitchen window
as if they were already inside the house,

waiting for me there, a semblance of the thing
that has crows giving ground without lifting

a wing. That after all there’s no owned territory,
that there’s something recognition alone won’t harry.

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet Stan Galloway

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

Stan Galloway will be reading his poetry on  Thursday, January 15th, at 1:30pm.

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Stan Galloway hosts the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival in alternate years. It is a global event in a small town atmosphere. He also writes poetry himself (which fuels his desire to meet all these outstanding poets). Here is an early poem which can be found in Scratching Against the Fabric, an anthology of poems from the last poetry festival, and scheduled for release next week.

 

Failed Romance

The little boy offers his best fire truck
and invites her to the box
while she sees the castles that he
has not built and the prince who
has not ridden to the rescue.
He says he likes the way she shows the
ribbon in her hair, meaning he likes
the way she shows the ribbon in her hair,
while she hears the one-tenth
surface to a nine-tenths depth he
won’t reveal.
He reaches out to tie the shoe
string that falls loose and she
begins to list the hundred other
broken things he’s failed to see, thinking
love and entropy are opposites.
He drives his cars around her,
happy that she chose to squat with him
for a time, and she wonders
why he needs her there while
he does his own thing oblivious.
Then she begins to talk and talk and he
turns his ear to her and finally says,
again, he likes the ribbon and
she turns away and leaves the box
to the shallow boy
with the one-track mind.

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet Ras Takura

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

Ras Takura will be reading his poetry on  Thursday, January 15th, at 3:30pm.

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RasTakura, was nominated for the International Reggae and World Music (IRAWMA) award in 2011 – Dub Poet of The Year. Founder of the Royal African Soldiers Movement

As the tides change in the Reggae landscape that maintain the Rootical vibration from the days of the founding fathers to the Today era of the Reggae Revival, Dub Poetry as always been playing a great rule in the brand of Jamaican Reggae .

RasTakura is one such Poet who carry on in the tradition of people like Oku Onora, Linton Kwesi Jonson and Mutabaruka who is like a Mentor and a Father Figure and has been featured on the ‘Food War’ album in the track titled ‘The Science of Agriculture’

He has performed on some of Jamaica’s major shows including Reggae Sumfest, St. Mary Mi Come From, Capleton & Frenz, Fiwi Sinting, Rebel Salute , Heineken Startime, plus numerous appearances in schools, Colleges and Universities across the Island. He has also Toured and performed across the Caribbean. He is the founder of the annual Dis Poem Wordz & Agro Festival, an all day Poetry festival and expo of Agricultural Products, which was started on the campus of the College of Agriculture Science and Education in Portland Jamaica in 2011.
His work covers not only modern issues but critical ones that need to be brought to the forefront. He performed on Word Sound Power that was featured on BETJ. He classified Himself as a Jamaican Reggae Dub Poet, recording and performing artist, Farmer, Painter, conscious Rastaman.

RasTakura gains his inspiration from H.I.M. Haile Selassie I, Marcus Garvey, Mutabaruka, Andrea Williams-Green and Capleton Peter Tosh, Bob Marley. His agricultural and environmental roots were deepened at the Knockalva Agricultural School, and the College of Agriculture, Science & Education (CASE).

In 2003 Takura was featured on the Multicast Poetz CD – a compilation album produced by Mackonen Blake Hannah & Eric Dixon.

He has been featured on IRIE FM’s programs – Running African, the Entertainment Buzz and Elise Kelly’s Easy Skanking show. plus numerous international interviews, He has been featured on T.V.J, CVM TV, as well as in several local print media such as : The Star, The Gleaner and The Observer Newspapers.

He is “A Potent, Afrocentric Political Poet with a cause” – Rooted with two underground compilation CD’s, Run-Away-Slaves & Dragon Slayers, and a DVD, produced by C.P.T.C. RAS Poetz.

RasTakura was born in the beautiful parish of St. Ann, in a small community neighboring Nine Miles, the home of Reggae Legend Bob Marley. He spent his earlier years growing up on a farm with his Grandparents then later lived with his single mother in a neighboring District. He recognized his talent while attending Bensonton All Age School where he gladly used the opportunities given to perform on every school and community concert as a Dancehall Deejay. Now Dub Poet RasTakura

Look forward to the voice of the future, living in the present. Look forward to the ‘Food War’ album. Look for RasTakura.

For booking information please call 1-876-573-1851 or email rastakura@yahoo.com

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet Lesley Wheeler

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

Lesley Wheeler will be reading her poetry on  Friday, January 16th, at 3:30pm.

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Lesley Wheeler is a poet and professor born in New York, raised in New Jersey, and residing in Virginia since 1994. Her books include the poetry collections The Receptionist and Other Tales, Heterotopia (winner of the Barrow Street Press Poetry Prize), and Heathen as well as two scholarly studies and the co-edited anthology Letters to the World: Poems from the Wom-po Listserv. Her next poetry collection, Radioland, is forthcoming in September. Now the Henry S. Fox Professor of English at Washington and Lee University, Wheeler has held fellowships from the Fulbright Foundation (New Zealand), the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Virginia Commission for the Arts. In 2011 she received an Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council for Higher Education in Virginia. Recent poems and essays have appeared in Poetry, The Gettysburg Review, and the Tahoma Literary Review. Find more information and her poetry blog at http://lesleywheeler.org/.

 

Côte Sauvage

Although the borderland is stony
and slicked by vivid seaweed,
the old man walks again without a cane—
his silhouette disrupts the glare.
No use shouting. Parents and children
never hear each other. Or
they pick up the faintest
impatient huff. Blackout
yields to voice as randomly
as suns broadcast their flares.

This terrain’s all surf and precipice.
Mirror pools bristle with mussels.
Generations break into foam around
boulders. Ahead, an absolute Atlantic.

But a limestone cliff at our backs
reflects the roar, as if we stand
within a shell whose whorls affirm
each listener’s inner ocean. Touch
the wall and feel a bass-line throb.

And there’s my son, leaning into
this green noise. Locked mollusk.
My daughter’s magnetic waves assail me.
Gods and fathers rarely signal,
but rock vibrates
sympathetically. What else
could it say? Echo
a kind of love, of
parley.

from Turbine: http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/iiml/turbine/Turbi14/poetry/t1-g1-g1-t17-g1-t1-body-d1.html

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet Lynn Martin

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

Lynn Martin will be reading her poetry on  Saturday, January 17th, at 3:30pm.

You can listen to Lynn read one of her poems at the link below

http://lynnmartinandthesonsoforpheus.yolasite.com/resources/Lynn%20Martin%20and%20the%20Sons%20of%20Orpheus%20-%20Shiver.mp3

Readings: Bridgewater Fest Poet Sarah Elizabeth Murphy

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Over the next week I’ll be posting information on the poets who will be reading from their work at the Bridgewater International Poetry Festival, Jan 15th-18th. 

Sarah Elizabeth Murphy will be reading her poetry on  Saturday, January 17th, at 4:30pm.

Some of her work can be found here:

http://www.theredthreadsociety.tumblr.com