Chaparral from the updrafts California Federation of Chaparral Poets, Inc. serving California poets for over 65 years Volume 67, No. 6 • September, 2006 President Michael Palmer wins Stevens Award James Shuman, PSJ The Academy of American Poets announced September 5 that Michael Palmer has First Vice President been selected as the recipient of the 2006 Wallace Stevens Award. The $100,000 prize David Lapierre, PCR recognizes outstanding and proven mastery in the art of poetry. Second Vice President The judges for the award were poets Robert Hass, which was short-listed for the Canadian Griffi n Poetry Katharine Wilson, RF Fanny Howe, Susan Stewart, Arthur Sze, and Dean Prize; Codes Appearing: Poems 1979–1988 (2001); Th ird Vice President Young. Robert Hass, on selecting Palmer to receive The Promises of Glass (2000); The Lion Bridge: Se- Dan Saucedo, Tw the award, wrote: Fourth Vice President lected Poems 1972–1995 (1998); At Passages (1996); Michael Palmer is the foremost experimental poet Donna Honeycutt, Ap Sun (1988); First Figure (1984); Notes for Echo Lake of his generation and perhaps of the last several Treasurer (1981); Without Music (1977); The Circular Gates generations. A gorgeous writer who has taken Roberta Bearden, PSJ (1974); and Blake’s Newton (1972). He is also the cues from Wallace Stevens, the Black Mountain Recording Secretary author of a prose work, The Danish Notebook (Avec poets, John Ashbery, contemporary French poets, Lee Collins, Tw Books, 1999). the poetics of Octavio Paz, and from language Corresponding Secretary Palmer’s work, which is both alluringly lyrical and poetries. He is one of the most original craftsmen Dorothy Marshall, Tw intensely avant-garde, has inspired a wide range of at work in English at the present time. His poetry Members-at-Large Chair poets working today. Palmer draws on many dispa- is at once a dark and comic interrogation of the Frances Yordan, FG possibilities of representation in language, but its continued on page two: ‘Palmer’ Monthly Contest Chair continuing surprise is its resourcefulness and its Cleo Griffi th, PSJ sheer beauty. Convention planning underway Convention Chair, 2007 Michael Palmer was born in New York City in At the Board Meeting in July, several major deci- David Lapierre, PCR 1943 and has lived in San Francisco for more than 30 sions were reached. Among these are the Theme for Convention Program Chair years. He is the author of numerous books of poetry, 2007, which will be Legends, and a slight change in Dan Saucedo, Tw including Company of Moths (New Directions, 2005), policy on which poems are eligible for the contest. Annual Contest Chair Please read the wording carefully: while it is still not Lisabeth Shuman, PSJ Rich, Silvers, and Epstein to acceptable to enter a poem which has won a prize, Youth Contest Chair receive special NBA honors or to enter one which is also under consideration Elaine E. Harper, Tw for another contest, CFCP will accept previously The National Book Foundation announced yes- published work, under certain guidelines. Children’s Poetry Fair and terday that poet Adrienne Rich and editors Robert Education Committee Chair Silvers and Barbara Epstein (posthumously) will The Board also agreed to reconsider whether to Linda McCarty, VW receive special honors at the National Book Awards hold all future conventions in the central part of the Publications Chair ceremony on November 15. state, and several possibilities have been advanced James Shuman, PSJ Rich, who won the National Book Award in po- for 2008. Roster and ByLaws Chair etry in 1974 and was a fi nalist in three other years, In the meantime, help is needed for the 2007 Jeremy Shuman, PSJ is the author of nearly twenty books of poetry. Poet convention. The Board decided not to continue the Archivist and Librarian Mark Doty will present her with the 2006 Medal gift basket donation and instead is strongly urging Katharine Wilson, RF for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters individuals and chapters to consider making cash Millennium Poetry in recognition of her “incomparable infl uence and donations to help fund the various prize categories, C. Joy Haas, RF achievement.” both for the Junior-Senior Contest and the Annual Web Site Robert Silvers and the late Barbara Epstein, co- Contest. Any amount will be accepted, although www.ChaparralPoets.org founders of the New York Review of Books, will re- it is nice to keep in mind the amounts of the vari- ceive the Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to ous prizes. Those who donate funds for an entire FEDERATION the American Literary Community. David Remnick, category will be recognized in the program and at of the editor of the New Yorker, will present the award the convention. CHAPARRAL to Silvers, who continues to edit the NYRB. Epstein Also, the Board has formally taken the position died of lung cancer on June 16. that chapters should endeavor to have at least one poets Lawrence Ferlinghetti will announce the fi nalists representative at the convention each year, and urges for the 2006 National Book Awards from City Lights local presidents to discuss plans for this with mem- CALIFORNIA inc. in San Francisco on October 11. bers of their groups. Copyright 2006 California Federation of Chaparral Poets, Inc. Chaparral Updrafts, Volume 67, No. 6, September 2006. All rights reserved. Poets retain rights to their poems. Copyright 2006 California Federation of Chaparral Poets, Inc. All rights reserved. Poets retain rights to their poems. Chaparral SF’s Palmer wins prestigious Stevens award updrafts continued from page one French, Russian and Portuguese. He edited rate poetic traditions to create a new voice, and contributed translations to Nothing The Sun Could Not Explain: Editor & Publisher .......James Shuman a voice that has opened up ways to write out of Twenty Contemporary 2521 Meadow Rue Drive Brazilian Poets (Sun & Modesto, CA 95355-3910 the confines of specific schools of poetry. Moon Press, 1997), and 209-523-6954 FAX 209-521-8778 Blue Vitriol (Avec Books, Palmer has brought 1994), a collection of Treasurer ...................Roberta Bearden his powers for synthe- poetry by Alexei Parsh- P O Box 1750, Empire, CA 95319 sis to his collaborations chikov. He also trans- 209-522-9600 with artists in several lated Theory of Tables Corresponding Secretary mediums. For over 30 (1994), a book written ............................Dorothy Marshall years he has collaborated by Emmanuel Hocquard, 430 Eleventh St, Pomona, CA 91766 with the Margaret Jenkins a project that grew out of 888-308-7488 Dance Company, and he Hocquard’s translations created the text for their Please send news and information items to of Palmer’s “Baudelaire the editor one month in advance of intended piece “Danger Orange.” Series” into French. publication date. Visual artists he has col- For questions involving membership, either laborated with include Palmer’s honors in- new or renewal, please contact the treasurer. Gerhard Richter, Micaëla clude two grants from the Be sure to visit our new web site: Henich, Sandro Chia, photo © 1988 by Thomas Victor National Endowment for http://www.ChaparralPoets.org Jess Collins, and Augusta the Arts, a Lila Wallace- Talbot. Palmer has also translated work from Reader’s Digest Writer’s Award, a Guggen- heim Foundation fellowship, and the Shelley Palmer sometimes called a ‘Language Poet’ Memorial Prize from the Poetry Society of In 1963, Michael Palmer attended the conscious of the role that poetry can play as America. In 1999, he was elected a Chancel- Vancouver Poetry Conference, taking part resistant to and as a critique of the discourse lor of the Academy of American Poets. in three weeks of workshops, readings, and of power by undermining assumptions about Palmer will be the featured speaker at discussions. While where, he met Robert meaning and univocality. But also by occupy- the Academy of American Poets Award Duncan, Robert Creeley, and Clark Coolidge, ing, hopefully without marginalization, the Ceremony & Reading on November 8, 2006. who each became important infl uences on the margins of the cultural landscape, working This event, held in New York City and open development of Palmer’s poetics. on the boundaries. to the public, will provide those on the East Coast a rare opportunity to hear a poet who Palmer is frequently associated with Here’s an example of one of his short Language Poetry, a connection which he poems: has shaped American poetry for decades. responded to in a recent interview in Jubilat Dearest Reader For more information, visit www.poets. org/calendar. by saying: “It goes back to an organic period by Michael Palmer when I had a closer association with some of About the Award. The Wallace Stevens Award those writers than I do now, when we were a He painted the mountain over and over again is given annually by the Academy of American generation in San Francisco with lots of poetic from his place in the cave, agape Poets to recognize outstanding and proven mas- tery in the art of poetry. Established in 1994, the and theoretical energy and desperately trying at the light, its absence, the mantled award carries a stipend of $100,000. The previ- to escape from the assumptions of poetic skull with blue-tinted hollows, wren- like bird plucking berries from the fi re ous recipients are W. S. Merwin, James Tate, production that were largely dominant in Adrienne Rich, Anthony Hecht, A. R. Ammons, our culture. My own hesitancy comes when her hair alight and so on lemon grass in cafe in clear glass. Jackson Mac Low, Frank Bidart, John Ashbery, you try to create, let’s say, a fi xed theoretical Ruth Stone, Richard Wilbur, Mark Strand, and Dearest reader there were trees matrix and begin to work from an ideology Gerald Stern.