Hello, friends!
April brings us National Poetry Month. (It’s also “National Fresh Celery Month” but I feel like poetry is a better fit for this particular list, though “National Sexually Transmitted Infections Awareness” was also a contender, you sexy animals.)
Over the years, I have been supplied many copies of books by Michigan poets or people who are being published through the Michigan State or Wayne State university presses. Sometimes I buy poetry from friends or just because.
It will surprise nobody that I am very behind on my reading. I have a stack of perfectly lovely poetry volumes itching to be read.
My goal for April 2020 is to make it through one book a day, with some caveats for the longer ones.
I’ll aim for daily emails but may fall short because my real job (reporter at the Cadillac News) means sometimes Stuff Comes Up.
I also have a sweet and snuggly baby that I don’t even want to resist. So, you know. I’ll try.
The list of poetry books
“Toward the Wild Abundance” by Kristin Brace
“As If a Leaf Could Be Preserved” by Alice Cone
“Respect: The Poetry of Detroit Music” edited by Jim Daniels and M.L. Liebler
“Strings Attached” by Diane DeCilis (Diane and this book were featured on the old Michigan Volumes podcast)
“The Unauthorized Audobon” by Laura B. DeLind and Anita Skeen (I have taken Anita’s community writing class a couple of times and she is a delight)
“Lying in the River’s Dark Bed” by Michael Delp
“The Infinity Room” by Gary Fincke
“A Generation of Insomniacs” by Anthony Frame (he is a FB friend from when we both worked on a literary journal together for a brief time)
“Smuggling Elephants Through Airport Security” by Brad Johnson
“Anxiety is a Rambling Dagger” by Ian Kahl
“Heart Radicals” by Les Kay, Sandra Marchetti, Allie Marini and Janeen Pergrin Rastall
“Motherland Fatherland Homelandsexuals” by Patricia Lockwood (I have read most of this but it’ll be fun to dive back in)
“The Fish and the Not Fish” by Peter Markus
“Redoubted” by R. Vincent Moniz, Jr.
“Objects May Appear Closer” by Janeen Pergrin Rastall
“Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice” edited by Ron Riekki and Andrea Scarpino
“Premonitions” by Elizabeth Schmuhl
“Citizens of Beauty” by Jean Sénac
“Saving the Lamb” by bg Thurston
“Nightwalking” by bg Thurston (full disclosure, bg is my college bestie’s mom and I LOVE HER SO)
“Civil War Poetry and Prose” by Walt Whitman
Make sure you’re getting the daily updates on this list of fine poetry volumes (I think, I hope!) by signing up for the Michigan Volumes newsletter — currently free.
On the screen
We’re almost done with Tiger King, which I love but I’ve been reading some apt criticism that makes me feel like loving the show is mean-spirited and anti-feminist and … sigh. This piece by Willa Paskin talks a little about it. I think she’s right but my personal addendum would be that the sanctimonious and duplicitous animal “rescuer” is a common trope in online conversations but one I have seldom seen in docutainment, and I think that’s part of what people are responding to.
Eating
Today’s lunch is leftover waffles with gravy. The dog wants it bad. There’s also a banana and a Diet Coke that my husband is grabbing for me right now hurry up I need it thank you.
Now about you
What are you reading? Watching? Listening to?