by Deb Scott
Did you tell whoppers, fillet the facts, keep truth locked out of the writing room for a while? Tell us how the exercise went for you and leave us a link to your new poem (and it doesn’t have to be in response to last week’s prompt, either).
Please read this page to find out how the Get Your Poem On and Read Write Prompt posts work.
Remember that work linked from this post is shared in precisely that spirit: sharing, as opposed to critiquing.
If you haven’t done so already, please read all the pages under About in the navigation bar.
If you participate in a Read Write Prompt, we ask that you link back here in your posts, either with a link to Read Write Poem or by using the Read Write Poem badge in your post. Sidebar links are great but it helps others find the site when you link in every post you contribute to the project. It’s not a lot to ask in acknowledgment of the work everyone is doing in providing prompts for members to use.
 Deb Scott is community and news director for Read Write Poem. In her other life she plays with words, her pets, bugs and her husband, in a random but rotating order. She blogs at Stoney Moss.
by Dana Guthrie Martin
 Apologies to an Apple, by Maya Ganesan “Maya seems unable to get through a single day without writing poems.”
Welcome to our second Read Write Poem Virtual Book Tour. For more detail about the tour, if you are new to this series, take a look at this post.
About Apologies to an Apple
Maya Ganesan, a poet who lives in the Seattle area, finished this collection up when she turned 11 years old. At this age, poetry was already the center of her life.
“Maya seems unable to get through a single day without writing poems,” writes Katherine Grace Bond, author of The Legend of the Valentine and Considering Flight. Bond, who has worked with Ganesan privately on her poetry, also has this to say about her:
I had only to give her a few pointers and her already resonant work took a leap forward. Soon she was devouring issues of Poets and Writers, as well as the work of Mary Oliver, David Wagoner, and Li-Young Lee. It wasn’t long before I could speak to her as a fellow poet, trusting her instincts for revision (and occasionally indulging in mutual fits of giggles).
We are thrilled to feature Apologies to an Apple for this month’s Read Write Poem Virtual Book Tour. When you sit down with these poems, you realize age really doesn’t matter. What matters is that this poet has a gift, one we can’t wait to open again and again. And besides, how could anyone resist a poet who describes her occupation on her Read Write Poem profile as: “having a blast.” I know I can’t.
To learn more about Ganesan and her collection, visit her site, MayaGanesan.com and her blog, Allegro.
Tour stops for Apologies to an Apple
Sept. 24* :: Kelli Russell Agodon :: Book of Kells
Oct. 1 :: Donna Vorreyer :: Put Words Together. Make Meaning.
Oct. 6 :: Amulya Rajan :: Piper in the Desert
Oct. 8 :: Kimberlee Titus Gerstmann :: Scraps and Sass
Oct. 13 :: Ben Lawless :: Pencilied in Designs
Oct. 15 :: Dana Guthrie Martin :: My Gorgeous Somewhere
* This is also Ganesan’s birthday.
Get involved!
Would you like to get involved in the tour as a reviewer? Just join the Read Write Poem Virtual Book Tour group, and then add your name to the forum thread titled “Sign up to be a Virtual Book Tour reviewer.”
Want to get your book on the tour? We’ve already set up partnerships with a number of presses, and we’re booked out several months. We also do the tour only once a month, which means we’re extremely limited in terms of what we can include. With that in mind, feel free to have your publisher send a query to virtualbooktour (at) readwritepoem (dot) org.
Next month, the Read Write Poem Virtual Book Tour will feature Ed Skoog’s Mister Skylight, new from Copper Canyon Press.
 Dana Guthrie Martin is the founder of Read Write Poem. She writes things and stuff. Most of the time, her things and stuff happen to be poetry, or at least they call themselves poetry. She has a robot named Feldman. He’s writing a book of poems.
by Dana Guthrie Martin
For this installment of O Video!, I asked Dave Bonta if he had featured anything recently at the video-poetry site he curates, Moving Poems, that he felt would be especially good for us to showcase here at Read Write Poem. He mentioned Gamalinda’s piece because it’s an example not only of video poetry but also found poetry.
I watched the video and was taken with it. Dave’s right — it’s a natural complement to both our Video Poetry and Found Poetry groups here at Read Write Poem. I’m very interested in what members of those groups, and the Read Write Poem membership as a whole, think of Gamalinda’s work.
So watch the piece, then strike up a conversation about it in the comments section.
Dana Guthrie Martin is the founder of Read Write Poem. She writes things and stuff. Most of the time, her things and stuff happen to be poetry, or at least they call themselves poetry. She has a robot named Feldman. He’s writing a book of poems.
by the Read Write Poem Staff
Welcome to Off the Shelf, another one of our occasional columns here at Read Write Poem. In this column, we’ll share the latest five books Read Write Poem members have read or are currently reading.
For this installment, we’ve asked Niina Pollari to share her latest reads, along with a brief comment on each collection. Here’s what she had to say. (And to be fair, we posed this question to her more than a month ago, so who knows what she’s actually reading now!)
Have you read any of the collections or authors on Niina’s list? If so, share, share, share in the comments. If not, Niina says, “Seek them out if you haven’t. They’re totally worth it.”
Rising, by Farrah Field
The only book I’ve repurchased twice for two separate friends. This book gets called “Southern” because it has a very heavy sense of place, though I think the word “Southern” as a descriptive doesn’t get at the book’s crux. Really, neither can I in a couple short sentences. But it’s full-blooded, emotional and really beautifully written.
Stranger, by Laura Sims
Poems both terse and raw. They’re rather like blurry close-ups of the most beautiful kind.
Poemland, by Chelsey Minnis
Minnis is the kind of writer who makes me laugh and feel uncomfortable at the same time. Let me just quote the book to explain: “It’s like drinking a bottle of champagne in a roadside bathroom.”
Hallelujah Blackout, by Alex Lemon
Lemon’s second book. In this book, he abandons the crystal-sharp, cool distance that inhabited the poems of his first book, Mosquito, and proceeds to shake around a little.
A Plate of Chicken, by Matthew Rohrer
A kind of philosophy of the everyday, acutely aware of its own domesticity. Also worth noting that the book is really enjoyable to hold; Ugly Duckling Presse makes these gorgeous letterpress projects, and Rohrer’s book, complete with illustrations, is no exception. It’s proof that print will never die — book fetishists like us won’t let it.
If you want to share your latest five reads, send an email with your titles and comments for each book to info (at) readwritepoem (dot) org.
by Deb Scott
We write poetry for lots of reasons, reasons as varied as every individual and every circumstance. Sometimes we communicate, connect, explain, cajole or invoke. Some people like to spin tales as entertainment. Many want to excavate or explore truth in one of its many forms, often as a gnarled, knuckled fact set in a specific place and time. Real. Concrete. Facts you can touch and carve your name into.
This week I suggest we try a different way to get at truth. Instead of examining facts, let’s explore fantasy. The fantasy of lies. The stuff of stories. Let’s play with truth and see what it tells us.
I’ve heard some advice about lying over the years, and some of it is contradictory. “If you’re going to tell a lie, make it a whopper.” “If you’re going to tell a lie, make it believable.” This week, you can go either way. Or both. (But I’m betting you’ll get more out of this exercise if you go where you are less comfortable.)
To get started, free-write for 10 minutes. Tell some outlandish lies, such as what fairy tales or myths or get-out-of-trouble stories are made of. Or fiddle and fool with small white lies that color a scene frothy instead of calm. Write for 10 minutes and then review. Don’t make any judgments. (This is only an exercise; you don’t have to tell your spouse, best friend, or therapist what you wrote.) Pull out one line, maybe two lines, that you want to explore. Now write a poem around that line or lines.
Here are a few ideas to get you started (or make up your own!):
- the day I photographed an extinct bird
- the time I saved the good-looking neighbor’s life
- the time the Dalai Lama and I made peach jam
I just know you have a great lie to tell — do it!
Go crazy in the privacy of your notebook. Then pick and choose a line or two and write a poem around it (or them) to share next week. (Have fun!) I can hardly wait to see where this experiment leads.
P.S. Funny how this prompt works so well with Ren Powell’s post this week. I hadn’t even seen her piece when writing mine.
Deb Scott is community and news director for Read Write Poem. In her other life, she plays with words, her pets, bugs and her husband, in a random but rotating order. She blogs at Stoney Moss.
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read write poem news- read write poem napowrimo anthology
June 20, 2010 | 1:36 pmThe Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Anthology is still in production. Selection, placement, layout and copyediting are taking longer than anticipated. Thank you for your patience. I hope to have the piece completed in July. For those who have emailed asking if they can be included, the May 7 deadline for submission of work stands. Those who met that deadline will be included. Please check the post on this site listing who I received submissions from by that date. If you submitted your work by the May 7 deadline in accordance with our guidelines and your name is not listed, send an email to info (at) readwritepoem (dot) org.
- read write poem napowrimo anthology
May 5, 2010 | 3:09 pmRemember that Friday* is the deadline for submitting work to the Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Anthology. Check out the guidelines for submission in the main column (to the left). On May 8, we’ll post a news item listing everyone we’ve received work from. If you submitted work and your name is not on that list, please let us know. Thanks!
*I initially said “tomorrow,” but I meant to say “Friday.”
- napowrimo congratulations, and a reminder
April 24, 2010 | 12:05 pmIt’s the final week of the Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Challenge! Just 7 days left. With that, a reminder that Read Write Poem will culminate with the anthology featuring work from those who complete the challenge. A post with details for submitting to the anthology will be published May 1. Be sure you remove any information from the site that you want preserved — such as group content and personal messages. Those elements of the site will be removed May 1 as well. The main site will remain up as an archive.
- ‘underlife’ tour at january gill o’neil’s blog
April 20, 2010 | 8:11 pmJanuary Gill O’Neil’s virtual book tour has moved to her site and is underway now. Check out the lineup at Poet Mom.
 Archive for read write poem news »
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thank you and farewell As of May 1, 2010, Read Write Poem is no longer active.
In late May, an anthology featuring work from those who completed the Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Challenge will be published here and on issuu.com.
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