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Useful Resources : Websites for Poets and Writers : Individual Poems and Poets
Amanda Auchter
Richly textured, passionate poems on birth, loss and discovery from the editor of the Pebble Lake Review (Pebble Lake Review). Visit her blog at http://www.alauchter.blogspot.com/ for news of publications and readings.
| | Barbara Lefcowitz Poetry
Poems and lyrical essays on themes from nature, spirituality, and the body.
| | C.H. Connors
Lawyer-turned-poet Carolyn Connors publishes her lyrical, philosophical poetry online as C.H. Connors. These finely crafted formal verses range from spiritual and nature poetry to sketches of historical figures both admirable and comical.
| | Christine Rhein
Personal experience is a gateway to political and spiritual insight in the lyrical writing of Christine Rhein, who became an award-winning poet after a career in mechanical engineering. Her poetry collection 'Wild Flight' won the Walt McDonald First-Book Competition from Texas Tech University Press. Visit her site for sample poems and ordering information.
| | Clayton Eshleman
Poet and scholar Clayton Eshleman's areas of expertise range from prehistoric cave paintings to translations of experimental poetry. We especially liked the poem on his website titled 'Deeds Done and Suffered by Light,' which blends humor, philosophy and the macabre in a manner reminiscent of Ginsberg's 'Howl.' His book Conductors of the Pit, an anthology of surrealist and experimental verse, has just been reissued.
| | Diane Gilliam Fisher
Fisher's stark, plain-spoken verse shows a gift for inhabiting the voices of her characters and the world they inhabit. We especially recommend her second book, Kettle Bottom, which tells the story of the West Virginia coal miners with tenderness and a quiet rage for justice. See: http://www.perugiapress.com/books2004_kettle.html; http://www.litline.org/Spoon/Issues/PDF/282fisher1.pdf; http://www.litline.org/Spoon/Issues/PDF/282fisher2.pdf; http://www.litline.org/Spoon/Issues/PDF/282fisher3.pdf; http://www.litline.org/Spoon/Issues/PDF/282fisher4.pdf
| | Djelloul Marbrook
Award-winning poet and journalist's weblog features essays on contemporary poets, contextualized with reflections on politics and culture.
| | Elisha Porat
Born in an Israeli kibbutz in 1938, winner of Israel's Prime Minister's Prize for Literature, Porat often explores themes of war. He writes in Hebrew, but much has been translated into English. Says one reviewer, "Elisha’s works are not items to be read, they are items to be experienced. You will walk away exhausted with tears in your eyes, and aching legs from the many roads you have traveled, but with a sense that your life has been enriched through the experience." Bio, reviews, new stories and poems.
| | Elizabeth Bear
Widely published author of speculative, fantasy and science fiction. Visit her website to read her short stories and find out about upcoming publications.
| | Ewuare X. Osayande
Black activist, poet and social critic applies his rhetorical powers to fighting oppression in all its forms. Hard-hitting essays on his website include "Spittin' Acid at the Sistahs: Rap(e) and the Assault of Black Women" and "Bling Bling into Oblivion: Hip Hop, Globalization and Third World Oppression". Capitalists and gangsta rappers, beware.
| | F.J. Bergmann
Non sequiturs like bear traps plunge you through the surface of this poet's world into an absurd, slightly sinister, often funny alternate reality. We especially love the William Carlos Williams parody 'An Apology'. Buy her prizewinning chapbook, 'Sauce Robert', from Pavement Saw Press.
| | G.K. Chesterton's Works on the Web
This fan site maintained by British computer scientist Martin Ward offers the full texts of books and articles by the prolific turn-of-the-century poet, fiction writer, journalist and popular theologian Gilbert K. Chesterton, best known today for his "Father Brown" mystery stories.
| | Gabriel Gudding: Conchology
Poems, commentary and the turbid stream of Gabriel Gudding's consciousness. Gudding is the maverick genius author of A Defense of Poetry, from the University of Pittsburgh Press.
| | Gail Golden
Activist poet speaks with eloquence and compassion about war and peace, the blessings of family life, and her Jewish heritage. Visit her other website, http://www.goldenwrites.com, for her prose writings about racism, domestic violence and social justice.
| | Hotel Douve: The Works of Leonard Gontarek
God rubs shoulders with ghosts and mailmen in Gontarek's dreamy verses, which hover on the edge of abstraction like a Turner painting, and are often suffused with the same melancholy golden light. As he writes in 'Amnesty':
"When the earth & snow is apricot for seconds & your dreams fall fast as water
Out the window, wouldn’t you say in the middle of that uncontestable joy, is sorrow,
Like a metal sliver?"
| | Jeff Walt
Prizewinning author's site features edgy, honest poems laced with sometimes-melancholy wit, plus pages of useful literary links.
| | Judith Goldhaber
Award-winning formalist poet, playwright, science writer and journalist. Her collection 'Sonnets from Aesop', a retelling of 100 fables in verse (beautifully illustrated by Gerson Goldhaber), is available from Ribbonweed Press.
| | Kathryn Magendie
Co-editor of acclaimed e-zine The Rose & Thorn posts eloquent personal essays about the writing life and the environment, plus photos of the Great Smoky Mountains landscape and wildlife. Visit her Writers' & Artists' Blog (linked on this site) for interviews.
| | Live Hope Love
Kwame Dawes, the University of South Carolina's poet-in-residence, launched this multimedia site to chronicle the experiences of HIV patients and caregivers in Jamaica. The site features his own profound and lyrical poetry as well as video interviews and background stories of the people who inspired him.
| | M. Miriam Herrera
These mystical, earthy poems from Herrera's collection 'Kaddish for Columbus' (currently seeking a publisher) juxtapose images and folklore from many cultures - Native American, Jewish, Chicano - to explore the ambiguity of multiple identities.
| | Ogden Nash (1902-1974)
Master of American light verse. "How are we to survive?" asks Nash. "Solemnity is not the answer, any more than witless and irresponsible frivolousness. I think our best chance - a good chance - lies in humor, which, in this case, means a wry acceptance of our predicament." Bio: http://www.poets.org/poets/poets.cfm?prmID=690. Celebrating the 100th anniversary of his birth: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2002/07/cohen-g.htm. Large collection of poems: http://www.westegg.com/nash/. Poems by topic: http://www.aenet.org/poems/ognash2.htm. On bugs and animals: http://www.veeceet.com/kids/nash.html. Teacher Resource File: http://falcon.jmu.edu/~ramseyil/nash.htm. Audio interview: http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/audiointerviews/profilepages/nasho1.shtml
| | Patricia Smith
Poet, spoken-word performer and writing teacher has won four National Poetry Slam individual championship titles, as well as a National Poetry Series prize for her book 'Teahouse of the Almighty'.
| | Ricky Rapoport Friesem
Poetry by Ricky Rapoport Friesem, a writer and documentary filmmaker whose honors include the 2007 Writer's Digest Self-Published Book Award. She says of her work, "Because poetry distills experience and offers it to us in an incisive, condensed form, it can often convey what many long articles have failed to express. I believe my poetry has a lot to say about what it's like to be a woman, a mother, an idealist in our battered Middle East. What it doesn't convey is hatred. And it is for that reason that I hope it will be read now."
| | Russell Edson: Poetry
Quirky and memorable, a favorite of Jendi's.
| | Shel Silverstein (1930-1999)
Prolific author of children's verse, cartoonist for Playboy, author of nearly 800 songs. Short bio and the poem "Sick": http://www.poets.org/poets/poets.cfm?prmID=105. Selected song lyrics, including "A Boy Named Sue": http://www.nassio.com/silverstein/ps.html. Books for children: http://www.nassio.com/silverstein/bookindex.html. Audio samples from his last album, Underwater Land: http://www.underwaterland.com/listen.htm. Teacher Resource File: http://falcon.jmu.edu/~ramseyil/silverstein.htm
| | Shelly Jackson: The Body
Linked prose poems and short-shorts in a novel use of the Internet.
| | Short Fiction by Nick Antosca
'Movies and Kids,' winner of the 2004 fiction contest from Painted Bride Quarterly, is a brilliant, disturbing story that could have been written by Shirley Jackson or Patricia Highsmith.
| | Susan Tepper
Website of Pushcart Prize-nominated poet and fiction writer Susan Tepper, author of 'DEER and Other Stories' (Wilderness House Press, 2009) and the poetry chapbook 'Blue Edge' (Cervena Barva Press, 2006).
| | Taylor Mali
Poetry slam champion and teachers' advocate Taylor Mali is also a driving force behind the award-winning Urbana Poetry Slam team, which performs every Tuesday night at the famed Bowery Poetry Club in New York City.
| | The Walt Whitman Archive (1819-1892)
Scholarly archive includes complete text of Leaves of Grass plus biographical materials and literary criticism.
| | Timothy Steele
Website of neo-formalist poet Timothy Steele, a professor of English at California State University, Los Angeles, includes selections from his poetry and critical essays as well as a useful introduction to traditional poetic forms and meters.
| | Wiasi
Website of writer and anthropologist Don Mitchell, who has written fiction and essays about his work with the Nagovisi people of Bougainville Island.
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