8th Biennial

MAY 15-18, 2014 Historic Downtown La Conner, Washington WELCOME to the eighth biennial Bright Scarlet by Derrick Jackson Skagit River Festival

Bright scarlet is a special color Scarlet is as bright OuR MiSSiOn as fire burning To support lifelong literacy and cultural diversity in long, dead grass. through the writing, reading, performing, and teaching of poetry A stop sign is scarlet. in Northwest Washington schools and communities. Scarlet is a row of roses in the field. Scarlet is the heart of love. The Skagit River Poetry Project is a work of love founded in 1998 Bright scarlet! and sponsored by eight local school districts. A volunteer committee composed of teachers, school administrators and community members works together throughout the year to coordinate the project.

The program provides immersion in poetry for teachers, allowing them to set the stage for poets to visit their classrooms and helping them prepare students for attendance at the biennial Skagit River Poetry Festival.

The festival is the capstone public event to the yearlong appearances by poets in classrooms throughout Skagit, Island, San Juan and Whatcom counties and features Northwest, national and internationally known poets.

We are delighted you are here to celebrate the sharing of poetry with us.

coveR “Samish Bay Choir” serigraph by F.L. Decker PERFORMANCE LOCATIONS

1. Museum of northwest Art 2. The Loft 3. Maple Hall / Maple Center 4. La Conner Seafood & Prime Rib 5. Methodist Church – upper 6. Garden Club 7. Gaches Mansion Quilt and Textiles Museum 8. Country inn Two Forks Room 9. Country inn Bird’s nest Room 10. Oddfellows 11. Elementary School

For your consideration… • There is a hill to climb to reach the Methodist church, oddfellows Hall and the Garden club. The shortest way to get up the hill is to take the steps from South First Street (see map). You’ll find a sturdy bench midway for you to catch your breath, as there are 67 steps. The longer, more gradual ascent would be to use South Second Street on either side of town.

• Tickets & will-call tickets: Thursday Maple center – 4:00 - 6:00 pm La conner elementary School Gym – 6:30 - 7:30 pm Friday Maple center – 1:00 - 9:30 pm Saturday Maple center – 7:00 am - 8:00 pm

• Please see accompanying map for site performance locations and parking spaces. Wheelchair accessible sites and handicapped parking areas are marked with a star on the map. • Please do not use flash photography during the sessions. • All events start on time. capacities of the sites vary. We encourage you to have a second choice should you find your first selection full. There are 30 minutes between sessions. Allow enough time to get to the next event. • As a consideration to others, please silence all cell phones, pagers, and other electronic devices. • MoNA is a no-food and beverage facility. Please finish your lattes prior to attending sessions. • For Lost and Found and other emergencies contact a Festival Board member at Maple Hall or call 360-840-1452.

2 3 FESTIVAL OFFERINGS FRIDAY May 16 Session 1 9:00 - 9:55 am HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS ONLY Poetry Sampler Poets introduce their poetry in readings THURSDAY May 15 Session 2 10:10 - 11:05 am HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS ONLY Family Matters Poets’ Table Dinner Kick Off Fund Raiser nature All Around: Paradise Lost? Maple Hall • 5:30 - 7:30 pm Good Poems for Hard Times Join Festival Poets for a sumptuous Northwest dinner featuring local wines and food. Word on the Street Chat with Festival poets at tables set up to promote conversation. Technology & the Future of Poetry Creating Poems: Stop Look and Listen An Evening with Sherman Alexie & Tom Robbins Poetry & Animals La Conner Elementary School Gym • 8:00 - 9:30 pm The Mess of Love After dinner we will enjoy an evening of quick wit and inspiring insights Lyrics & Licks with Sherman Alexie and Tom Robbins. Moderator ML Lyke Poetry & Publishing Poetry & Performance

30 minute Lunch Break and Open Mic

Session 3 11:44 am - 12:35 pm HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS ONLY Going Public with Private Feelings Craft & Poetry Bridging Cultures SPECIAL FESTIVAL EVENTS Beauty and the Violence in the Arts Slam unplugged: Writing While Walking your Dog Poets’ Table Dinner Good Grief: Poetry of Grief and Healing Thursday, May 15 – Maple Hall Carhartt Poetry: Poems & Work Writing to Change the World Bring a Poem; Consult a Poet Visual Artist, Poetry & Music The Earth as Muse Live Painting with Fritha Strand – Friday & Saturday Night Samplers Paintings auctioned after the Sampler each evening Session 4 12:55 - 1:50 pm HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS ONLY Poetry Sampler Poets introduce their poetry in readings Festival After Hours Join the Jefferson Rose Band & Festival poets Dinner Break for an after hours poetry & music jam La Conner Pub and Eatery • 9:30 to midnight • May 17 Session 5 7:30 - 9:30 pm OPEN TO THE PUBLIC Evening Readings Kwame Dawes, Robert Hass & the Jefferson Rose Band with visual aratist Fritha Strand

4 5 SATURDAY May 17 Session 1 8:00 - 8:45 am First Biennial Early Morning Poems with Lorraine Ferra PHYLLIS L. ENNES POETRY CONTEST Session 2 9:00 - 10:15 am judged by Ellen Bass Roundtable: How Poetry Helps us Live Our Lives Austen, Hass, Rose Politics & nature Goodrich, McNulty, Sheffield Poetry & Healing Gailey, Rich, Schumann Bridging Cultures de la Paz, Woody “What Man Has Made of Man” Doty, Ferra, McGriff Good Poetry For Hard Times Gano, Hunter Masks: The in Poetry Dawes, Lane, Warn Beauty & Violence in the Arts Alynn, Ascolan, Falconer Session 3 10:45 am - 12:00 noon Translation: The Mystery from within the Text Daley, Hass, McGriff Publishing: is it Still Possible Today? Craft, Goodrich Love & Loss Austen, Ferra, Rich Poetry, Music & the Visual Arts Alynn, Doty, Rose, Woody In Remembrance 1928 –2013 Poetry as the Pathway to the Spiritual Davio, McNulty, Warn How Poetry Helps us Live Our Lives Gano, Johnson As many of you know, long-time educator Phyllis Luvera Ennes believed the narrative: The Story in Poetry Dawes, Lane, Lau arts are essential to a complete education and fought hard to keep them in the Family Matters: Ties and Legacies de la Paz, Falconer, Sheffield curriculum. She directed the Anacortes School District Cultural Education Open Mic with host Steven Dolmatz Program from 1974-1992. Additionally, she sat on numerous boards, including Lunch Break 12:00-1:00 pm the Anacortes Public Library Foundation, Pop ‘n’ Art, the Anacortes Arts and Crafts Foundation and the Washington Alliance for Arts Education. Session 4 1:30 - 3:00 pm A Gathering of Poets All Festival Poets Read One Poem A talented writer, she was a member of the Skagit Valley College Senior English class at the Anacortes Senior Center. She wrote poetry, prose, and Session 5 3:30 - 4:45 pm short stories. As family historian, she collected and published family stories, a Word on the Street Ascalon, Gano, Lau cookbook of her mother’s recipes, and was nearing completion on her father’s nature as Muse Goodrich, Hunter, McGriff memoir Phyllis L. Ennes Poets Gailey, Lane, Schumann Poems From the Robert Sund Trust Poet Georgia Johnson She was a parent, friend, teacher, scholar, facilitator, lifelong learner and Sins & Virtues Davio, Rose mentor. Her influence has been boundless. In her honor and memory, the Technology & the Future of Poetry Rich, Warn Skagit River Poetry Foundation invited poems in all creative forms for the first Bridging Cultures Dawes, de la Paz, Woody biennial poetry contest. Dinner Break 4:45 - 7:00 pm Two-hundred-twenty-one poems were submitted to honor the memory of Session 6 7:30 - 9:30 pm Phyllis. Please join contest winners Patrick Lane, Tina Schumann and Jeannine Gailey at their reading on Saturday. Evening Sampler Mark Doty, Evelyn Lau, Emily Warn

6 7 FRIDAY SESSIONS FRIDAY SESSIONS Maple Maple Center Maple Center The Loft Museum of La Conner Prime Country Inn Country Inn Methodist Garden Gaches Oddfellows Hall Lower Level Upper Level Northwest Art Rib & Seafood Bird’s Nest Two Forks Room Church Club Mansion 275 35 40 50 175 100 15 75 100 100 25 60 FRIDAY Session 1 9:00 - 9:55 am STUDENTS ONLY FRIDAY Session 1 9:00 - 9:55 am STUDENTS ONLY

Poetry Sampler Poetry Sampler Alexie Dawes Hass Doty Lau Woody

Reading Reading FRIDAY Session 2 10:10 - 11:05 am STUDENTS ONLY FRIDAY Session 2 10:10 - 11:05 am STUDENTS ONLY

Family Matters Nature All Around: Good Poems Word on the Technology & the Creating Poems: The Mess of Love Poetry & Animals Lyrics & Licks Poetry & Poetry & Alexie Paradise Lost? for Hard Times Street Future of Poetry Stop, Look & Alynn Doty Hunter Publishing Performance Falconer McNulty de la Paz Ascalon Rich Listen Davio Woody Rose Goodrich Gano Sheffield McGriff Lau Warn Ferra Schumann Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Reading Reading Reading Reading Reading Workshop Reading Reading Workshop Workshop Workshop LUNCH 11:05-11:35 am OPEN MIC AT MAPLE HALL LUNCH 11:05-11:35 am OPEN MIC AT MAPLE HALL FRIDAY Session 3 11:45 am - 12:35 pm STUDENTS ONLY FRIDAY Session 3 11:45 am - 12:35 pm STUDENTS ONLY

Going Public with Craft & Poetry Bridging Cultures Beauty & Violence Slam Unplugged: Carhartt Poetry: Good Grief: Poetry Writing to Build a Poem, Earth as Muse Private Feelings Austen de la Paz in the Arts Ascalon Writing While Poems & Work of Grief & Healing Change the World Consult a Poet Goodrich Alexie Davio Woody Falconer Gano Walking Your Dog Johnson Gailey Lau McNulty Hunter Alynn Warn Ferra McGriff Lane, Rich Rose Schumann Sheffied Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Conversation/ Reading Workshop Reading Reading Workshop Reading Reading Reading Workshop Reading FRIDAY Session 4 12:55 - 1:50 pm STUDENTS ONLY FRIDAY Session 4 12:55 - 1:50 pm STUDENTS ONLY

Poetry Sampler Poetry Sampler Dawes Alexie Doty Hass Woody Lau

Reading Reading DINNER 5:00 - 7:00 pm DINNER 5:00 - 7:00 pm FRIDAY Session 7 7:30 - 9:30 pm OPEN TO THE PUBLIC FRIDAY Session 7 7:30 - 9:30 pm OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Evening Readings Dawes Hass & the Jefferson Rose Band

Maple Hall / Maple Center Information Center The Loft (upstairs) Museum of Northwest Art Methodist Church Garden Club Oddfellows Hall

8 9 SATURDAY SESSIONS SATURDAY SESSIONS Maple Maple Center Maple Center The Loft Museum of La Conner Prime Country Inn Methodist Garden Gaches Hall Lower Level Upper Level Northwest Art Rib & Seafood Two Forks Room Church Club Mansion 275 35 40 50 175 100 75 100 70 20 SATURDAY Session 1 8:00 - 8:45 am SATURDAY Session 1 8:00 - 8:45 am

Early Morning Salon: Poems Time for Ferra Reflection & Sharing

Reading SATURDAY Session 2 9:00 - 10:15 am SATURDAY Session 2 9:00 - 10:15 am

How Poetry Helps SMALL PRESS Politics & Nature Poetry & Healing Bridging Cultures “What Man Has Good Poetry for Masks: The Beauty & Violence Salon: Us Live Our Lives Goodrich Rich de la Paz Made of Man” Hard Times Persona in Poetry in the Arts Time for Austen McNulty Schumann Woody Doty Gano Dawes Alynn Reflection & Hass Sheffield Ferra Hunter Lane Ascalon Sharing Rose McGriff Warn Falconer

Roundtable Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading SATURDAY Session 3 10:45 am - 12:00 noon SATURDAY Session 3 10:45 am - 12:00 noon

Translation: SMALL PRESS Publishing: Is it Still Love & Loss Poetry, Music & Poetry as the How Poetry Helps Narrative: Family Matters: Open Mic The Mystery from Possible Today? Austen The Visual Arts Pathway to the Us Live Our Lives The Story in Poetry Ties & Legacies with host Within the Text Craft Ferra Alynn, Doty Spiritual Gano Dawes de la Paz Steven Dolmatz Daley, Hass Goodrich Rich Rose, Woody Davio, McNulty Johnson Lane Falconer McGriff Warn Lau Sheffield

Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading LUNCH 12:00 noon - 1:00 pm LUNCH 12:00 noon - 1:00 pm SATURDAY Session 4 1:30 - 3:00 pm SATURDAY Session 4 1:30 - 3:00 pm

GATHERING SMALL PRESS OF POETS All Festival Poets Read One Poem

SATURDAY Session 5 3:30 - 4:45 pm SATURDAY Session 5 3:30 - 4:45 pm

Word On The Street SMALL PRESS Nature As Muse Phyllis L. Ennes Poems from the Sins & Virtues Technology & the Bridging Cultures Salon: Ascalon Goodrich Poets Robert Sund Trust Davio Future of Poetry Dawes Time for Gano Hunter Gailey Poet Rose Rich de la Paz Reflection & Lau McGriff Lane Johnson Warn Woody Sharing Schumann

Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Reading Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading Conversation/Reading DINNER 4:45 - 7:00 pm DINNER 4:45 - 7:00 pm SATURDAY Session 6 7:30 - 9:30 pm SATURDAY Session 6 7:30 - 9:30 pm

Evening Sampler SMALL PRESS Doty Lau Warn

10 11 FESTIVAL WORKSHOPS Sunday, May 18 Putting Up with Nature Preserves – Paul Hunter In this workshop we will examine the strategies of past poets, how they made use of nature Session 1 9:00 am - 12 noon and all but owned it, forming habits of heart and mind that are still with us today. environmental problems, food concerns, the pace of global climate change—these dense thickets may leave the concerned poet nowhere to stand, nowhere to perch, much less sing. Ekphrastic Poetry – Jane Alynn But there may be hope in the practice of poetry, in cultivating what Keats termed Negative In this workshop ekphrasis , a verbal response to the visual or sculptural arts, will provide the capability, being present as if absent, quieting the self to let things outside and beyond us spark for good seeing and good poetry, moving beyond description by imaginatively entering have their say. We will brainstorm and in writing exercises explore several new ways to help into the artwork to create an embodied response. Participants will discuss examples of the world find its way out of the current dilemmas, where humans seem to be trampling ekphrastic poems, do in-class writing, and visit a museum to respond in language to works of nature while loving it to death. art seen from a stance of entering its frame and space and becoming its textures, gestures, moods, and memories. Please bring writing materials to the workshop. The Poet Doctor is In! – Evelyn Lau Lau, the Poet Laureate of vancouver, B.c., is offering individual consultations for writers. Singular Obsessions: Invigorating our writing – Oliver de la Paz Sign up for a 20-minute intensive individual critique of one of your poems. Lau will give you Through a series of prompts, exercises, and examples I will demonstrate ways writers can feedback in this safe and productive session and provide tips to put the final touches on a reinvigorate their own writing by looking closer at singular obsessions. We will find the secret poem. Poems must be submitted to Lau one week prior to the workshop. This workshop is door to our experience and open it. Perhaps it’s a door you’ve passed everyday and were afraid limited to eight. to open. Perhaps it’s an empty storefront you’ve seen as you’ve driven through your neighborhood. Yet you’ve imagined yourself opening that door. You’ve seen yourself taking a Coaxing Poems from Nature – Tim Mcnulty step and walking in and that image of yourself in relation to that door has obsessed you. We Join naturalist and poet Tim McNulty for a three-hour workshop that will combine venturing will not be looking for ways out, but for ways in. outdoors with field journals and writing poems based on observation and engagement with the natural world. Participants will spend a little time indoors. We’ll look closely at some Finishing Your Poem: When is it complete? – Blas Falconer poems drawn from the natural world, discuss working from field journals, and then venture During a recent Q&A, Brazilian poet Adélia Prado was asked how she knows when her out with journals in hand. We’ll record observations, impressions and images, and we’ll try poems are finished. Her answer (translated from Portuguese) was: “When they are better an exercise that will coax our rough notes into a poem. If time allows, we’ll share our works- than I am.” A poem often falls short because the poet decides that the poem is finished before in-progress. Bring a notebook or journal — and dress for unexpected weather. it is fully realized. In this workshop, we will look closely at poems that resist the easy out and challenge our own expectations as readers. Through this lens, we will then turn to some of Triggers, Investing and Lineage – Elizabeth Woody your own poems to consider if, why, and how you closed the poem too soon, and how you Learning our language often means immersion in oral traditions of our families. our living might push yourself to the very edge of your own limitations. open to students of all levels. literature develops you ear, shows how sight and smell triggers significant memory, memory Please bring a copy of one of your own poems. buoys imagination. Poets carry on in communities as language artists who live on the intellectual level as well as the gut level. We will explore some exercises and exchanges in the Finding the Flow – Matt Gano class as writing from a common every day level, to the sharpening up of the poem as it early 20th century approaches to writing brought us the exploration and dream language of reaches the page. Please bring writing instruments, paper, and a good story. the Surrealists. Automatic writing, or writing without censorship, opens new landscapes and possibilities for creative expression. Much in the vein of these writers, this workshop will focus on liberating the imagination, freeing language, and expanding your voice. We will explore the concept of automatic writing and discuss the merit of being in the moment and finding your flow. This workshop is open to writers of all abilities. Please bring writing materials.

12 13 Session 2 1:00 - 4:00 pm Not in Line: The Art of the Prose Poem – Charles Goodrich The line is the most recognizable element of poetry. Why on earth would anyone want to dispense with it? Some would insist that trying to write poems without lineation is simply Towards an Impure Poetry: Writing from the Body – Roberto Ascalon perverse. But there are so many fine contemporary poets who sometimes work in the prose Some say that the body and the poem are one and the same. How do poets reconcile what poem, and some – Gary Young, Louis Jenkins, and David Shumate come to mind – who we are with what we create? How can we craft poems that arise out of the richness of blood, write prose poems almost exclusively. What are some of the charms and the pitfalls, the bone and gristle? We will read and write visceral poems that revel in the stuff of the body. strategies and devices of writing the prose poem? In this workshop, we'll take a brief tour of “What should be plump and firm, resisting the touch to give itself in the mouth, is spongy and the history of the prose poem, look at some contemporary masters, then try our hand at blistered” – Jeannette Winterson, Written From the Body composing.

Metaphysical Poems, Contemporary Poets – Kelly Davio List, O, List the Minor Characters and Unnamed Things, Like, Right Now! – The metaphysical period of poetry may have officially ended in the seventeenth century, Derek Sheffield but there is still room in the literary landscape for the poetics of devotion and doubt, of In this encounter with language, we will use poems by Pattiann Rogers, William Stafford, intellectual challenge and spiritual questioning. In this workshop, we will examine Allen Braden, christian Wiman, and A.e. Stallings as triggers for our own new work. We contemporary examples of the metaphysical tradition across religious lines, and explore the will use the energy and attentiveness inspired by the festival to generate as much new work as ways in which we, as working poets with a wide range of backgrounds, can explore personal possible in the time we have. Attendees will need writing materials and must be prepared to conviction in the public context of poetry. experience plenty of onomatopoeia and perhaps even a snippet of synecdoche.

Walking Papers: Footnotes On Writing – Lorraine Ferra Crazy Making – Emily Warn In this workshop we will delve into the practice and importance of getting outside, observing Poems like to rebel. If you let them get away and stand on their own, you can discover new our surroundings, and keeping a notebook as a necessary tool for storing images from our ways to create form and meaning. In this workshop, we’ll look at common beliefs about how inner and outer landscapes. A portion of our time will be spent walking outside separately a poem “means” and then how to identify its accidental turns and meaningful gaps. By the and gathering notes, then returning to pursue strategies for writing. We will share our writing end of the workshop, you’ll see how crazy it is to bestow meaning on poems without their as - and offer comments on each other’s work, our goal being to leave this workshop with a solid sent. Please bring a really recent poem, one that you have not revised too much. open to draft of a poem or two in the making. anyone who has written some poems.

Selfies 19th Century Style – The Poem as Self- Portrait – Susan Rich Reading the Inarticulate – Publishing Tips from the Editor of Poetry NW – We will look at the 19th century self portraits of early women photographers – Myra Albert Kevin Craft Wiggins, Hannah Maynard, Frances Benjamin Johnson and Julia cameron – as a way into In his seminal essay “Feeling Into Words,” Seamus Heaney describes poetic technique as personal poetry. Let’s consider , spirituality, and multiple identities as a way to “the discovery of ways to go out of ... normal cognitive bounds and raid the inarticulate.” In - (re)construct our world(s). Bring notebook and pen; open to all. deed, much vibrant poetry exists in the tension between expectation and surprise, oscillating bewteen the inevitable and the ineffable. In this workshop, we’ll explore various practical ap - proaches and methods for “gleaning the unsaid off the palpable” (Heaney’s phrase again), for wresting the unexpected out of thin air and onto the page. We will also discuss the ins and outs of preparing work for publication, and cover tips and best practices when shopping your work around.

14 15 FESTIVAL POETS Kelly Davio has served as the managing editor of The Los Angeles Review and associate editor of the Fifth Wednesday Journal . She holds an MFA in Poetry from Northwest Institute of Literary Arts and teaches english as a Sherman Alexie is a preeminent poet, novelist, stand-up comic, and second language in the Seattle area. Her novel-in-poems, Jacob Wrestling , filmmaker. He has garnered high praise for his poems, short stories, and is forthcoming in fall of 2014. screenplays of contemporary Native American reservation life, including the National Book Award-winning book The Absolutely True Diary of a Ghanaian-born Jamaican poet Kwame Dawes is the award-winning Part-Time Indian and the acclaimed film Smoke Signals . His new book of author of sixteen books of poetry and numerous books of fiction, non- poetry What I’ve Stolen, What I’ve Earned , was published this year. Alexie fiction, criticism, and drama. He is the Glenna Luschei editor of Prairie lives in Seattle, Washington, with his wife and two sons. Schooner , and a chancellor’s Professor of english at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln. His book Duppy Conqueror: New and Selected Poems Elizabeth Austen is the Washington State Poet Laureate for 2014-16. was published in 2013. Her debut collection, Every Dress a Decision (Blue Begonia Press, 2011) was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award. She makes her living Oliver de la Paz is the co-editor of A Face to Meet the Faces: An at Seattle children’s Hospital, where she also offers poetry and Anthology of Contemporary Persona Poetry . He co-chairs the advisory board journaling workshops for the staff. of Kundiman, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of Asian American Poetry. De la Paz teaches in the MFA Program at Jane Alynn is a poet, writer, and fine art photographer. She is the Western Washington University in Bellingham. author of two collection of poems. The Anacortes artist received a William Stafford Award from Washington Poets Association in 2004. Mark Doty’s Fire to Fire: New and Selected Poems won the National Book Award for Poetry in 2008. In addition to eight books of poems, he New York city-born Roberto Ascalon is a poet, writer, arts educator, has published four volumes of nonfiction prose, including Dog Years , a and spoken-word performance artist. The recent recipient of the 2013 New York Times bestseller in 2007. His many awards include the Rattle Poetry Prize lives in West Seattle, currently works as a teaching distinguished T.S. eliot Prize in the U.K. Doty lives with his partner in artist and mentor for Arts corps, Youth Speaks Seattle, and the Service New York city and in east Hampton. Board. Blas Falconer is the author of The Foundling Wheel, A Question of Kevin Craft is the editor of Poetry Northwest and author of the poetry Gravity and Light, and The Perfect Hour . His awards include a 2011 collection Solar Prominence . He lives in Seattle, and directs both the National endowment for the Arts Fellowship and the Maureen egen Written Arts Program at everett community college and the University Writers exchange Award from Poets & Writers. He teaches at University of Washington’s Summer creative Writing in Rome Program. of Southern california and in the low-residency MFA program at Murray State University. Michael Daley planned to be a priest, not a poet. After leaving religious life, he was wild in the streets, protesting wars and seeking a life Lorraine Ferra teaches in schools across the country as a poet-in- of experience. Awarded by Bumbershoot, Seattle Arts commission, residence. She is founder/director of Wordtracks, a nature-based writing Artist Trust, Fulbright, and National endowment of the Humanities, program, and author of A Crow Doesn’t Need A Shadow: A Guide to Writing some of his books and chapbooks include: The Straits, Angels, Original Sin, Poetry from Nature. Her poems, critical reviews, and translations of Horace: Eleven Odes, Rosehip Plum Cherry, To Curve , and most recently, a Portuguese poetry have appeared in numerous literary journals and translation of Italian poet Lucia Gazzino’s Alter Mundus . He lives with his anthologies. She lives with her partner in Port Townsend, Washington. wife, Kathy Prunty, in Anacortes.

16 17 Matt Gano has represented Seattle at the National Patrick Lane is one of canada’s pre-eminent poets and winner of multiple years and is the 2008 Seattle Grand-Slam champion. He is numerous awards, including the Governor General’s Award for Poetry. author of Suits for the Swarm , a poetry collection from MoonPath Press, He is author of twenty-five volumes of poetry as well as award-winning and numerous chapbooks. He produced a poetry LP entitled “Music books of fiction and non-fiction. The vancouver Island poet brings the Maker,” and a live recording entitled “A Giant’s Pulse.” Gano is the grit of a hard-lived life and an enduring love of beauty to his captivating founder of “The Writing circle” at Youth Speaks Seattle. writing. He is the winner of the first biennial Phyllis L. ennes Poetry contest, judged by poet ellen Bass. Charles Goodrich is the author of three volumes of poems, including his latest, A Scripture of Crows . He also authored The Practice of Home , a Evelyn Lau is the 2011-2014 Poet Laureate for vancouver, canada. She collection of essays about nature, parenting, and the house he and his has published six collections of poetry and her prose books have been wife built in corvallis, oregon. Goodrich now serves as Director for the translated into a dozen languages. Her first book, Runaway: Diary of a Spring creek Project for Ideas, Nature, and the Written Word at oregon Street Kid , published when she was 18, was made into a cBc movie State. starring Sandra oh.

Jeannine Hall Gailey is the Poet Laureate of Redmond, Washington, M.L. Lyke worked for years as arts and entertainment editor and books and the author of three books of poetry: Becoming the Villainess, reporter at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer , where she published provocative Unexplained and She Returns to the Floating World . She volunteers as an interviews with such literary notables as Toni Morrison, Isabelle Allende, editorial consultant for Crab Creek Review , writes book reviews, and Russell Banks, e. Annie Proulx, e.L. Doctorow, and our own Tom teaches at National University’s MFA Program. Robbins. Her freelance work has been featured in The Washington Post , national magazines, and university publications. She is at work on a novel Robert Hass , Poet Laureate of the United States from 1995 to 1997, is about animal activists titled “Wild Thing.” one of contemporary poetry’s most widely read voices. His books of poetry include Time and Materials (2007), which won the National Book Michael McGriff has published two poetry collections, Dismantling the Award and the Pulitzer Prize. Hass is also author or editor of numerous Hills and Home Burial , as well as a co-translation of Tomas Tranströmer’s collections of essays and translations. He lives in california with his wife, The Sorrow Gondola . His awards include a Stegner Fellowship and a James poet Brenda Hillman, and teaches at the University of california, A. Michener Fellowship. McGriff is co-founder and co-editor of Tavern Berkeley. Books, an independent publisher of poetry in oregon.

For the past 19 years Paul Hunter has published fine letterpress poetry Tim McNulty is a celebrated Northwest poet, essayist, and nature under the imprint of Wood Works, including 26 books and over 60 writer. He is the author of three poetry collections: Ascendance, In Blue broadsides. His first of four collections of farming poems is Breaking Mountain Dusk , Pawtracks and seven chapbooks, including the recent Ground. The Seattle author also has a prose book on small-scale, Some Ducks . McNulty has authored eleven books of natural history. He sustainable farming, One Seed to Another . lives with his family in the foothills of the olympic Mountains.

Skagit valley poet Georgia Johnson fuels her passion for poetry by Susan Rich is the author of four collections of poetry including Cloud teaching culinary arts. She believes in the oral tradition, loves a good Pharmacy and The Alchemist’s Kitchen , named a finalist for the Foreword open mic, and lives with her family in La conner, Washington. She is the Prize and the Washington State Book Award. She has worked as a staff author of the chapbook Finding Beet Seed , published by Desert Rose Press. person for Amnesty International, an electoral supervisor in Bosnia Johnson has been selected to be the Robert Sund Poets’ House Trust poet Herzegovina, a human rights trainer in Gaza and the West Bank, and as a for this year’s biennial festival. Peace corps volunteer in the Republic of Niger, West Africa. She teaches at Highline community college in the Seattle area.

18 19 Iconic Pacific Northwest writer Tom Robbins is often hailed as a FESTIVAL MUSICIANS & ARTISTS comic/ spiritual chronicler of what he calls the “1960s renaissance.” But his nine novels and numerous articles and essays place him in a broader perspective as a futurist and sharp-eyed observer of American aesthetics. His books span a career of more than 35 years, beginning with Another Jefferson Rose Band is a tightly honed ensemble of Roadside Attraction in 1971. Soon to be released is Tibetan Peach Pie , a new world music players with a deep musical heritage, book chronicling his life and wild adventures. Robbins married Alexa bringing together a wild variety of influences into one D’Avalon in 1987 and the couple continues to live in La conner with their inclusive sound. Latin, caribbean and Flamenco sources favorite dog, Blini Tomato Titanium. permeate their songwriting and the combination of styles and personalities of the musicians is clearly vancouver, B.c. poet Rachel Rose has won numerous awards for her evident in their exciting stage show. JRB has played at poetry, fiction, and non-fiction, including the 2013 Pat Lowther Poetry Bumbershoot, Folklife, Anacortes Arts Festival and Award in canada, the 2013 Audre Lorde Poetry Award in the U.S. and a many other Northwest festivals and clubs. 2013 Pushcart Prize. Her poetry collections include Giving my Body to Science, Notes on Arrival and Departure , and Song & Spectacle . She also Fritha Strand was born and raised in Salt Lake city, Utah. works as a biographer, songwriter, and wrote a libretto for canada’s first She moved to Washington State and received a Bachelor’s lesbian opera, When the Sun Comes Out . Degree in Fine Arts from Washington State University. The epic terrains of both states led her to expressionistic, landscape Seattle poet Tina Schumann was awarded the Stephen Dunn Poetry painting. Now residing in Seattle, Washington, she has work in Prize in 2010 for her manuscript As If and was the recipient of the private collections throughout the country, exhibits in and American Poet Prize from American Poetry Journal. She is editor of the around the city, paints live frequently to music, poetry, and forthcoming anthology Two-Countries: U.S. Sons and Daughters of dance, and is a veteran of The Round at The Fremont Abbey Arts center. Immigrant Parents . Schumann holds an MFA from Pacific Lutheran She volunteers teaching elementary school children art. University

Derek Sheffield’s first book of poems, Through the Second Skin was a finalist for the Award and runner-up for the emily Dickinson First Book Award. He teaches poetry and nature writing at Wenatchee valley college and lives with his family in the eastern foothills of the cascades.

Emily Warn , the Webby Award-winning founding editor of poetryfoundation.org, has published five collections of poetry, including “I hope that everyone has had the experience that I’ve had Shadow Architect (2008), which explores the twenty-two letters of the where you read a poem so deeply that you feel almost as if you’ve written it, Hebrew Alphabet (alef-beit). She divides her time between Seattle and when, in fact, you’re only responding to it.” Twisp, Washington. – Edward Hirsch

Elizabeth Woody’s collections of poetry include Luminaries of the Humble and a winner of the American Book Award from the Before columbus Foundation. She received the William Stafford Memorial Prize for Poetry from the Pacific NW Booksellers Association. An enrolled member of the confederate Tribes of Warm Springs in oregon, she is a founding member of the NW Native American Writers Association.

20 21 BOOK SALES, BROADSIDES & THE SKAGIT RIVER POETRY FESTIVAL SMALL PRESS PUBLISHERS is made possible by generous donations from

Book Sales at Maple Hall BENEFACTORS

The Anacortes, Bellingham, Burlington-Edison, Concrete, Small Press Publishers at Maple Center, Lower Level La Conner, Mount Vernon, Oak Harbor and Sedro-Woolley School Districts Selling their books and broadsides during the Festival Spring Street International School, Friday Harbor Black Heron Press Skagit Valley College Jerome Gold, Seattle Allan & Inger Osberg Family Foundation Copper Canyon Press The Skagit Community Foundation Joseph Bednarik, Port Townsend Riverstyx Foundation La Conner Rotary Club East Point West Press Griffith Williams, Kenmore Jerry and Kathleen Willins Skagit Valley Food Co-Op 4% Friday Egress Studio Press A.K. Boyle, Belllingham Pacific Rim Tonewoods Rhode Island Foundation Rose Award Floating Bridge Press Jubilation Foundation Kathleen Flenniken, Seattle The Loyd Rockhold Special Children’s Foundation MoonPath Press and Concrete Wolf Rick Epting Foundation Lana H. Ayers, Bellingham Poetry Northwest Peasandques Press ShadowCatcher Entertainment Joseph Green, Longview Anacortes Arts Festival La Conner Soroptomists Rose Alley Press David Horowitz, Seattle and the hundreds of individuals who contributed to the Wood Works Paul Hunter, Seattle the Skagit River Poetry Foundation’s fund raising campaign

22 23 THE SKAGIT RIVER POETRY PROJECT BOARD

Board of Directors Bobbi Krebs-McMullen, President Bob Rose, Vice President Linda Talman, Secretary

Board Terri Bakke-Schultz Sherry Chavers Joan Cross Gail Davern Steven Dolmatz Heidi Herder Georgia Johnson Mary Lynn Lyke Sharon Sackett Kathy Willins How Quiet by Ella Cervantes Executive Director Molly McNulty How quiet the lovely Northern Lights are in the dark midnight sky. The colors light up the gentle snow Special Thanks to Our partners at: Museum of Northwest Art, the Skagit County Historical Museum, that sits on the ground. La Conner Quilt and Textile Museum, the La Conner Chamber of Commerce, The snow is lonely the Town of La Conner, the La Conner Seafood and Prime Rib Restaurant, and thinks that there is no hope. La Conner Country Inn, Methodist Church, Washington Bulb, Hedlin Farms, Compass Wines Until the Aurora Borealis sparkles again. And Especially to How quiet! the generous host families for housing the Northwest poets and musicians, all the enthusiastic project teachers and our many priceless volunteers

24 Perch

Perch on their water-perch hung in the clear Bann River Near the clay bank in alder-dapple and waver,

Perch we called “grunts,” little flood-slubs, runty and ready, I saw and I see in the river’s glorified body

That is passable through, but they’re bluntly holding the pass, Under the water-roof, over the bottom, adoze,

Guzzling the current, against it, all muscle and slur In the finland of perch, the fenland of alder, on air

That is water, on carpets of Bann stream, on hold In the everything flows and steady go of the world.

– Seamus Heaney 1939-2013