THE JACK MUELLER POETRY FESTIVAL
OCTOBER 4TH & 5TH 2019• FRUITA, COLORADO
Join us for The Jack Mueller Poetry Festival!
Featuring:
Yuko Otomo
Steve Dalachinsky
Neeli Cherkovski
Wendy Videlock
Eric Mingus
Tate Swindell
Art Goodtimes
Kyle Schlesinger
Laurie James
Tahirih Bochmann
& more!
In honor of Jack Mueller, the festival will celebrate the publication of two new Lithic Press books, Anonymous Landscape by Yuko Otomo and On Valencia Street by Jack Micheline (edited by Tate Swindell, with an introduction by Eric Mingus), and will offer readings, workshops, open mics, and a film screening (Portolano: A Film About Jack Mueller). A complete schedule will be added soon! All festival events are free and open to the public. They will take place at Lithic Bookstore & Gallery unless otherwise noted.
Lithic Bookstore & Gallery
138 S. Park Square #202
Fruita, CO 81521
For more information email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call (970) 858-3636
***
TENTATIVE SCHEDULE:
Friday, October 4th
7pm • Yuko Otomo, Steve Dalachinsky, Neeli Cherkovski & Art Goodtimes (reading)
Saturday, October 5th
10:30am-12:30pm • Workshop
12:30pm-2pm • Lunch Break
2pm-3:15pm • Portolano: A Film About Jack Mueller
3:15pm-5:00pm • The Moving Medium: An Exploration with Wendy Videlock (workshop)
7pm • Tate Swindell, Eric Mingus, Kyle Schlesinger & Wendy Videlock (reading)
8:30pm • Poetry Open Mic
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4TH
7pm - Yuko Otomo*, Steve Dalachinsky*, Neeli Cherkovski, Art Goodtimes, Laurie James & Tahirih Bochmann
*Danny and Kyle met Steve Dalachinsky and Yuko Otomo about a year and a half ago in North Beach at Jack’s memorial celebration. I asked Yuko if she had a manuscript and would like to do a book with us. Anonymous Landscape is the result! Over the past year we’ve been in touch frequently as we worked on her book and then as we planned for them to visit the Lith where they were to read as part of our 2nd Jack Mueller Poetry Festival. After reading at the Islip Art Museum on Long Island on September 14th, Steve had a massive stroke and passed away the next day. Our thoughts are with Yuko.
ABOUT YUKO OTOMO — Yuko Otomo is a visual artist & a bilingual poet/writer of Japanese origin. She writes poetry; haiku; art criticism; travelogues & essays. Her publications include Garden: Selected Haiku (Beehive Press), Genesis (Sisyphus Press), Small Poems (Ugly Duckling Presse), The Hand of The Poet (UDP), STUDY & Other Poems on Art (UDP), Elements (Feral Press), KOAN (New Feral Press) & FROZEN HEATWAVE: a poetry collaboration project with Steve Dalachinksy (Luna Bisonte Prods). She lives in New York City.
ABOUT STEVE DALACHINSKY — Steve Dalachinsky is a New York downtown poet, active in the music, art, and free jazz scene. He has written poetry for most of his life and has read frequently at Michael Dorf's club the Knitting Factory, the Poetry Project and the Vision Festival, an Avant-jazz festival held annually on the Lower East Side of New York City. Dalachinsky has also read his works in Japan, France and Germany. He has collaborated with many musicians, writing liner notes for artists: William Parker, Susie Ibarra, Matthew Shipp, Roy Campbell, Daniel Carter, Sabir Mateen, Jim O'Rourke and Mat Maneri. Dalachinsky has authored numerous books including a compendium of poetry written while listening to saxophonist Charles Gayle perform throughout New York City, and a collection of poems which focused on his time as a superintendent at an apartment building in Soho. Along with pianist Matthew Shipp, he co-authored the book Logos and Language: A Post-Jazz Metaphorical Dialogue and collaborated with French photographer Jacques Bisceglia on Reaching Into The Unknown. His spoken word albums include Incomplete Directions and a collaboration with Shipp on the album Phenomena of Interference. Dalachinsky's works have also appeared in several journals and anthologies as well. He is a 2014 recipient of a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, received the Franz Kafka Prize, Acker Award, PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award and was nominated for a 2015 Pushcart Prize. He currently lives in Manhattan with his wife, painter and poet Yuko Otomo.
ABOUT NEELI CHERKOVSKI — Neeli Cherkovski is the author of many books of poetry, including Elegy For My Beat Generation (2018), From the Canyon Outward (2009), and The Crow and I (2015). He was the coeditor of Anthology of L.A. Poets (with Charles Bukowski) and Cross-Strokes: Poetry between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Cherkovski also wrote biographies of Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Charles Bukowski, as well as the critical memoir Whitman’s Wild Children (1988). His papers are held at the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. He has lived in San Francisco since 1974.
ABOUT ART GOODTIMES —Poet, weekly newspaper columnist, and Rainbow Family elder, Art Goodtimes of Norwood weaves non-traditional coil baskets, grows organic heirloom potatoes and retired two years ago after completing his fifth term Colorado’s only Green Party county commissioner. Poet-in-residence of the Telluride Mushroom Festival since 1981, founder and director of various Talking Gourds poetry events since 1989 (www.tellurideinstitute.org/talking-gourds), poetry editor for the national mycological magazine Fungi (fungimag.com) and co-editor of an on-line poetry zine, Sage Green Journal (sagegreenjournal.org), Art served as the first Poet Laureate of Colorado’s Western Slope (2011-13) and his most recent book is Dancing on Edge: the McRedeye Poems (Lithic Press, 2019)
ABOUT LAURIE JAMES — Laurie James lives on a hill of sand with a pocket gopher, eighteen salamanders, and herds of well-fed birds. She can be found in Salida, picking up twigs on the edge of eternity. She’s performed with The River City Nomads for many years, and co-founded Sparrows, the Salida Poetry Festival.
ABOUT TAHIRIH BOCHMANN — Tahirih Bochmann is from Fruita, CO, and is trying on the role of poet to see how it fits. She likes the feel of it so far.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 5TH
10am - A Conversation On Poetics with Neeli Cherkovski & Friends
Join Neeli Cherkovski & Friends for a conversation on poetics!
ABOUT NEELI CHERKOVSKI — Neeli Cherkovski is the author of many books of poetry, including Elegy For My Beat Generation (2018), From the Canyon Outward (2009), and The Crow and I (2015). He was the coeditor of Anthology of L.A. Poets (with Charles Bukowski) and Cross-Strokes: Poetry between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Cherkovski also wrote biographies of Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Charles Bukowski, as well as the critical memoir Whitman’s Wild Children (1988). His papers are held at the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. He has lived in San Francisco since 1974.
11:30-1:00pm - LUNCH BREAK
1:00 - Amor Amoris Fati: A Talk on the Poetics of Jack Mueller by David Rothman
ABOUT DAVID ROTHMAN — David J. Rothman is the president and CEO for the Jackson Hole Center for the Arts. He is the author of My Brother’s Keeper (Lithic Press, 2019), Belle Turnbull: On the Life & Work of an American Master (co-edited with Jeffrey Villines, Pleiades, 2017), The Book of Catapults (White Violet Press) and Part of the Darkness (Entasis Press). His poems, essays and scholarly work have appeared widely, in journals including Agni, Appalachia, Atlantic Monthly, Gettysburg Review, Hudson Review, Kenyon Review, Mountain Gazette, New Criterion, Poetry, Sewanee Review, Threepenny Review and scores of other newspapers, journals and books. In 2018 he won a Pushcart Prize for the poem “Kernels,” which originally appeared in The New Criterion. He co-founded the Crested Butte Music Festival, was the founding Publisher and Editor of Conundrum Press, and served as Resident Poet with Colorado Public Radio and as Poet Laureate of Colorado’s Western Slope.
2pm - Portolano: A Film About Jack Mueller
Directed by Kyle Harvey
Documentary / 53 min
Fall 2018
ABOUT PORTOLANO: A FILM ABOUT JACK MUELLER — Portolano weaves together interviews with literary icons such as Neeli Cherkovski and Jack Hirschman, archival photographs, audio recordings and ephemera of the legendary North Beach, San Francisco scene of the 70’s and 80’s to create a vibrant, poetic portrait of Jack Mueller. Mueller was a poet, educator, organizer, ocean sailor, mountain climber and cultural leader in the arts. In the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s, Mueller gained a reputation among the post-Beat poets in the Bay Area literary scene with his readings and cultural performances. Lawrence Ferlinghetti, renowned poet and co-founder of the landmark City Lights bookstore in San Francisco, said, “Jack Mueller is the biggest-hearted poet I have ever known.”
ABOUT KYLE HARVEY — Kyle Harvey is a poet, filmmaker, artist and musician. He is the author of the poetry collection, Hyacinth, a finalist for the Colorado Book Award, and a winner of the Mark Fischer Poetry Prize. His work has appeared in A Dozen Nothing, American Life in Poetry, Dirty Chai, Dream Pop, Empty Mirror, Entropy, Heavy Feather Review, HOUSEGUEST, Metatron, Pilgrimage, Pith, Poems-For-All, SHAMPOO, Think Journal, The Wallace Stevens Journal, and elsewhere. He has published two serial poems, July and Farewell Materials (Lithic Press), as well as a package of broadsides titled The Alphabet’s Book of Colors (Reality Beach). Harvey is now at work on a film about Neeli Cherkovski titled It's Nice To Be With You Always. He lives with his wife and children in Fruita, Colorado, where he designs books for Lithic Press and manages Lithic Bookstore & Gallery.
3:15pm - The Moving Medium: An Exploration with Wendy Videlock (workshop)
ABOUT THE MOVING MEDIUM — William Blake tells us, “In this universe there are things that are known, and things that are unknown, and in between, there are doors”. In this class Wendy will guide you through a series of landscapes and random doors designed to emphasize and cultivate your sense of ambiguity, the spirit of poetic inquiry, and the heart of your creativity. There will be scribbling and doodling and discussion. Bring an old notebook and a pen or pencil. All other materials and mediums provided.
ABOUT WENDY VIDELOCK — Wendy Videlock’s poems have appeared widely, most notably in Poetry, Hudson Review, Rattle, The New Criterion, Poetry Review (UK), and The New York Times. She is the author of the chapbook What’s That Supposed to Mean (Exot Books), and three full-length collections including Nevertheless (Able Muse Press 2011, a finalist for the 2012 Colorado Book Award in poetry) and The Dark Gnu (Able Muse Press 2013), the latter a book for “children of all ages.” Her newest book, the satirical Slingshots and Love Plums, also appears from Able Muse Press. Wendy is a visual artist who often works in alcohol inks, and her work has been shown in several Colorado galleries. She lives with her husband in western Colorado.
5:00pm - DINNER BREAK
7pm - Tate Swindell, Eric Mingus, Kyle Schlesinger & Wendy Videlock followed by an Open Reading
ABOUT TATE SWINDELL — Archivist, Poet and Photographer, Tate Swindell is the founder of Unrequited Records, which specializes in poetry records released on the vinyl format. The latest release was an album of rare Gregory Corso readings from the late 1970s that included previously unpublished poems. In addition to an album of rare Bob Kaufman recordings due out in 2020, he recently edited On Valencia Street: Poems & Ephemera by Jack Micheline (Lithic Press 2019), and co-edited the Collected Poems of Bob Kaufman for City Lights Books (City Lights 2019). Tate, and his brother Todd, worked extensively on the Harold Norse archives, which were donated to the Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley. He is currently writing a memoir about his experiences as a pioneer in the San Francisco medical cannabis movement. His previous collections of writings include Palpitations, The Creation of Deadlines and Fotopomes.
ABOUT ERIC MINGUS — Eric Mingus is a bit of a polymath when it comes to his music. Trained classically as a vocalist, he sings the blues like nobody's business, improvises with the best of them, and plays a fierce bass. Creates worlds with his words whether he speaks or sings. When famed producer Hal Willner needs that special moment in his multi artist shows, he calls Eric. Hubert Sumlin loved the way Eric brought “soul” to the blues. When Elliott Sharp wanted a vocalist for his project Terraplane, he knew Eric was the right voice to bring the contemporary blues to his musical vision. Eric has a unique sensibility when bringing music to film, and has scored two documentaries on boxing for ESPN. His passion to write and perform poetry was encouraged by the likes of Allen Ginsberg, Jack Micheline and Lou Reed. Timeout.com describes Mingus as, “...operatic, unhinged, punk and terrifying..."
ABOUT KYLE SCHLESINGER — Kyle Schlesinger was born in Providence in 1976. He studied poetry and pedagogy at Goddard College, and went on to study poetics with Robert Creeley at the University at Buffalo, where he earned his doctorate in 2005. The author of over twenty books of poetry and criticism, Schlesinger currently lives in Austin, where he runs Cuneiform Press and directs the Graduate Program in Publishing at UHV. His collection, A New Kind of Country, is forthcoming from Chax Press early in 2020.
ABOUT WENDY VIDELOCK — Wendy Videlock’s poems have appeared widely, most notably in Poetry, Hudson Review, Rattle, The New Criterion, Poetry Review (UK), and The New York Times. She is the author of the chapbook What’s That Supposed to Mean (Exot Books), and three full-length collections including Nevertheless (Able Muse Press 2011, a finalist for the 2012 Colorado Book Award in poetry) and The Dark Gnu (Able Muse Press 2013), the latter a book for “children of all ages.” Her newest book, the satirical Slingshots and Love Plums, also appears from Able Muse Press. Wendy is a visual artist who often works in alcohol inks, and her work has been shown in several Colorado galleries. She lives with her husband in western Colorado.
For those planning to attend here is some general information about Fruita, Colorado…
Fruita is the gateway to canyon country. The entrance to Colorado National Monument is just a few miles south of town. The Colorado National Monument preserves one of the grand landscapes of the American West. But this treasure is much more than a monument. Towering monoliths exist within a vast plateau and canyon panorama. You can experience sheer-walled, red rock canyons along the twists and turns of Rim Rock Drive, where you may spy bighorn sheep and soaring eagles, all complete with cellphone coverage. Just to the west of the Monument are the Devil’s Canyon and Pollack Canyon trailheads, as well as the Fruita Paleontology Site, which are all wonderful places to mosey, wander or hike.
For those whose backs, legs and lungs have not yet given out, Fruita has become known as a mecca for mountain biking. Amazing trails abound for the novice and the expert. There are two friendly full-service bike shops just down the street from the bookstore ready to help get you on your way.
Some possibilities for lodging:
Hotels:
Comfort Inn (970) 858-1333
Super 8 (970) 858-0808
Balanced Rock (970) 858-7333
La Quinta (970) 858-8850
Campgrounds:
Colorado River State Park (970)434-3388
North Fruita Desert BLM Campground (970) 244-3000
Colorado National Monument (970 )858-3617
Monument RV Park (970) 858-4405
Vacation Home Rentals:
Fruita Crash Pad (970)309-0253
Jack Mueller, San Francisco 1980.
THE JACK MUELLER POETRY FESTIVAL
AUGUST 25th, 26th & 27th, 2017• FRUITA, COLORADO
Lithic Press is honored to organize and host the first Jack Mueller Poetry Festival. In addition to the wide impact Jack Mueller has had, and continues to have, on poets throughout Colorado, he was also instrumental in the birth of Lithic, which arose from the manuscripts and loose papers piled on his dining room table. In addition to poetry and theatrical readings, symposiums and discussions, we will pay homage to Jack by reading his essay in open form, The Gate, followed by a discussion and open reading.
All festival events are free and open to the public. They will take place at Lithic Bookstore & Gallery unless otherwise noted.
Lithic Bookstore & Gallery
138 S. Park Square #202
Fruita, CO 81521
For more information email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call (970) 858-3636
Congratulations to Neeli Cherkovski on being awarded the Jack Mueller Poetry Prize!
The tentative schedule is as follows:
Friday, August 25th
4pm - Film: The Line Has Shattered
The Line Has Shattered is an invaluable teaching tool as well as a fascinating sketch of the community that came together for the legendary Vancouver Poetry Conference. Historians, poets, and lovers of poetry must give thanks to director Robert McTavish for rescuing rare footage from the archives and contextualizing the socio-political landscape that informed North American experimental poetry in the mid-1960s. This documentary does much to explain the trajectory of the Open Field practices that began with the San Francisco Renaissance and unfurled from coast to coast for the next five decades. You can view the trailer here.
5:30pm - Welcome: Food & Drink
7pm - Reading featuring Art Goodtimes, Judyth Hill, Adam Houle, & Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer followed by an Open Reading
Poet, weekly newspaper columnist, and Rainbow Family elder, Art Goodtimes of Norwood weaves non-traditional coil baskets, grows 25+ varieties of organic heirloom potatoes and recently completed his fifth term in San Miguel County as Colorado’s only Green Party county commissioner. Poet-in-residence of the Telluride Mushroom Festival since 1981 (www.telluridemushroomfest.org), founder and director of various Talking Gourds poetry events since 1989 (talkinggourds.weebly.com), poetry editor for the national mycological magazine Fungi (www.fungimag.com) and co-editor of an on-line poetry zine, Sage Green Journal (sagegreenjournal.org), Art served as the first Poet Laureate of Colorado’s Western Slope (2011-13) and his most recent book is Looking South to Lone Cone: the Cloud Acre Poems (Western Eye Press, 2013).
Judyth Hill, poet, editor and writing teacher, has published nine books of poetry, including Hardwired For Love; Men Need Space; Dazzling Wobble and Tzimzum. Her newest book, Love Called Me Here, is forthcoming in 2018. Her poems are included in numerous anthologies, and she is the author of the internationally acclaimed poem, Wage Peace, published world ‘round, and set to music and recorded twice: by the Cincinnati Women’s Chorus, 2009, and by the St Olaf’s Choir, 2015. Judyth served as Literary Projects Director for New Mexico Office of Cultural Affairs, and is the current President of PEN International in San Miguel de Allende. Educated at Sarah Lawrence College, Judyth studied with poet Robert Bly and Deep Ecologist Dolores LaChapelle. She is the recipient of grants from the Witter Bynner Poetry Foundation, McCune Foundation, and New Mexico Endowment for the Humanities.
Adam Houle’s poems have appeared in journals such as AGNI, Shenandoah, Guernica, Barrow Street, Post Road, Cave Wall, Poet Lore, Blackbird, Hayden’s Ferry Review, and his fiction can be found in Cimarron Review. Claudia Emerson selected his work for Best New Poets 2010. Nominated for both a Pushcart and for Best of the Net, he was also a semi-finalist for the Boston Review / “Discovery” Prize and a finalist for the Art & Letters Rumi Prize in Poetry. He earned a PhD from Texas Tech and currently lives in Darlington, South Carolina with writer and editor Landon Houle.
Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer's poetry has appeared in O Magazine, in back alleys, on A Prairie Home Companion and on river rocks. She was appointed Poet Laureate of Colorado's Western Slope (2015-2017) and co-directs the Talking Gourds Poetry Club. Since 2006, she's written a poem a day. Favorite one word mantra: adjust.
Saturday, August 26th
10:30am - Breakfast Symposium: Belle Turnbull & The History of Poetry in Colorado by David Rothman
Belle Turnbull (1881-1970) was the first strong poet to live in and write about the mountains and high mining towns of the Colorado Rockies. Well-known during her life but long out of print,Turnbull’s lyrics of sublime alpine wilderness and her narratives about the harsh and dangerous world of hard rock mining offer us a profoundly original vision of the American west that transcends the region. David Rothman recently edited, Belle Turnbull: On the Life & Work of an American Master, which was published by Pleiades Press. Rothman serves as the Director of Western’s Graduate Program in Creative Writing, along with also directing the Poetry Concentration. His most recent volumes of poetry, both of which appeared in 2013, are The Book of Catapults (White Violet Press) and Part of the Darkness (Entasis Press). A book of essays about mountains and mountain towns, Living the Life (Conundrum Press), also appeared in 2013. His poems, essays and scholarly work have appeared widely, in journals including Appalachia, Atlantic Monthly, Gettysburg Review, Hudson Review, Kenyon Review, Poetry, and scores of other newspapers, journals and periodicals.
2pm - Multitudes: A One-Man Play About Walt Whitman
Fruita's own Zephyr Stage presents an original work written by Valerie and Kim Nuzzo. "Multitudes" is a one-man show about the great gay father of American poetry Walt Whitman! The play addresses death, sexuality, slavery, the Civil War and Whitman’s poetic vision of democratic ideals. Kim Nuzzo, a resident actor with Zephyr Stage, performs the role of Walt Whitman. Kim is a visual artist and published poet. He’s performed many roles for Aspen’s Hudson Reed Ensemble including Scrooge and Julius Caesar, among others. He was also the titular star of the film Bumps Jackson: The Last American Ski Bum. Valerie Haugen Nuzzo is the Executive Artistic Director of Zephyr Stage, and has written several plays, most recently co-writing Passionate Collaborators: Burns & Allen. She’s performed in more than 50 productions with Thunder River Theatre Company in Carbondale, including playing all the big Greek girls - Lysistrata, Medea and Antigone.
4pm - Memorial Reading & Discussion of Jack Mueller's The Gate by Danny Rosen
The Gate is an essay in open form–or a poem as essay. It represents part one of an ongoing work. This poetic essay had its origns in a series of conversations in the basement of the Golden Flyer restaurant on the waterfront in San Francisco. Irregular sessions were attended by Kirby Doyle, Tisa Walden, Howard Hart, Gregory Corso, Neeli Cherkovski and other poets and painters from North Beach. The meetings only continued for a few months, but the talk was passionate and productive. During that time I kept a notebook of my own thoughts towards an evolving poetics. The notebook, an orange German school issue had the words “Tell Notiz” on its cover. That was the original title of the essay, and it resonated neatly with my investigations at the time into the linguistic and archeological findings of Tell Mardikh in Syria–studies that point to the origins of written language in the West. Some of the remarks and ideas brought up in our talks found their way into the essay. In most cases, those remarks are in quotations and attributed to the speaker (or author) of the statements.
In addition to the hardcover and saddle-stitched editions, Lithic Press has a free PDF available for download/print if you would like to familiarize yourself with the work before the event: The Gate FREE PDF
Jack Mueller was a well known poet among poets, long active in the legendary North Beach, San Francisco scene, as well as New Orleans and the Western Slope of Colorado. He was a literary icon, educator, organizer, ocean sailor, mountain climber, poet and cultural leader in the arts. In the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s, Mueller gained a reputation among the post-Beat poets in the Bay Area literary scene with his readings and cultural performances. Lawrence Ferlinghetti, renowned poet and co-founder of the landmark City Lights bookstore in San Francisco, said, “Jack Mueller is the biggest-hearted poet I have ever known.” Read more...
7pm - Reading featuring Sommer Browning, Neeli Cherkovski & Wendy Videlock followed by an Open Reading
Sommer Browning writes poems, draws comics, and tells jokes in Denver. She is the author of YOU'RE ON MY PERIOD (Counterpath, 2016), THE CIRCLE BOOK (Cuneiform Press, 2015), BACKUP SINGERS (Birds, LLC, 2014), PRESIDENTS AND OTHER JOKES (Future Tense Books, 2013), and EITHER WAY I'M CELEBRATING (Birds, LLC, 2011). She is a librarian.
Neeli Cherkovski was born in Los Angeles and attended Los Angeles State College (now Cal State Los Angeles). He is the author of many books of poetry, including Animal (1996), Leaning Against Time (2005), From the Canyon Outward (2009), and The Crow and I (2015). He is the coeditor of Anthology of L.A. Poets (with Charles Bukowski) and Cross-Strokes: Poetry between Los Angeles and San Francisco (with Bill Mohr). He has also published bilingual editions in Austria, Mexico, and Italy. A facsimile edition of one of his notebooks was published by Viviani Edizione in Verona, Italy. Cherkovski also wrote biographies of Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Charles Bukowski, as well as the critical memoir Whitman’s Wild Children (1988). His papers are held at the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. He has lived in San Francisco since 1974. His collection Elegy For My Beat Generation is forthcoming from Lithic Press.
Wendy Videlock’s poems have appeared widely, most notably in Poetry, Hudson Review, Rattle, The New Criterion, Poetry Review (UK), and The New York Times. She is the author of the chapbook What’s That Supposed to Mean (Exot Books), and three full-length collections including Nevertheless (Able Muse Press 2011, a finalist for the 2012 Colorado Book Award in poetry) and The Dark Gnu (Able Muse Press 2013), the latter a book for “children of all ages.” Her newest book, the satirical Slingshots and Love Plums, also appears from Able Muse Press. Wendy is a visual artist who often works in alcohol inks, and her work has been shown in several Colorado galleries. She lives with her husband in western Colorado.
Sunday, August 27th
10am - Breakfast Symposium: Gourd Circle with Art Goodtimes (at Lithic founder Danny Rosen's house)
Poet, weekly newspaper columnist, and Rainbow Family elder, Art Goodtimes of Norwood weaves non-traditional coil baskets, grows 25+ varieties of organic heirloom potatoes and recently completed his fifth term in San Miguel County as Colorado’s only Green Party county commissioner. Poet-in-residence of the Telluride Mushroom Festival since 1981 (www.telluridemushroomfest.org), founder and director of various Talking Gourds poetry events since 1989 (talkinggourds.weebly.com), poetry editor for the national mycological magazine Fungi (www.fungimag.com) and co-editor of an on-line poetry zine, Sage Green Journal (sagegreenjournal.org), Art served as the first Poet Laureate of Colorado’s Western Slope (2011-13) and his most recent book is Looking South to Lone Cone: the Cloud Acre Poems (Western Eye Press, 2013).
For those planning to attend here is some general information about Fruita, Colorado…
Fruita is the gateway to canyon country. The entrance to Colorado National Monument is just a few miles south of town. The Colorado National Monument preserves one of the grand landscapes of the American West. But this treasure is much more than a monument. Towering monoliths exist within a vast plateau and canyon panorama. You can experience sheer-walled, red rock canyons along the twists and turns of Rim Rock Drive, where you may spy bighorn sheep and soaring eagles, all complete with cellphone coverage. Just to the west of the Monument are the Devil’s Canyon and Pollack Canyon trailheads, as well as the Fruita Paleontology Site, which are all wonderful places to mosey, wander or hike.
For those whose backs, legs and lungs have not yet given out, Fruita has become known as a mecca for mountain biking. Amazing trails abound for the novice and the expert. There are two friendly full-service bike shops just down the street from the bookstore ready to help get you on your way.
Some possibilities for lodging:
Hotels:
**Comfort Inn (970) 858-1333
**Super 8 (970) 858-0808
Balanced Rock (970) 858-7333
La Quinta (970) 858-8850
**Offering special rates for Poetry Festival attendees.
Campgrounds:
Colorado River State Park (970)434-3388
North Fruita Desert BLM Campground (970) 244-3000
Colorado National Monument (970 )858-3617
Monument RV Park (970) 858-4405
Vacation Home Rentals:
Fruita Crash Pad (970)309-0253
