Map by David McCloskey
Who are the quintessential poets of Cascadia; that area (according to one scholar) from Cape Mendocino in northern California east to Yellowstone Lake, up the Continental Divide to (& including) the Alaska panhandle, most of British Columbia, all of Washington, Oregon, Idaho and some of Montana?
Theodore Roethke, Gary Snyder, Sam Hamill, Heather McHugh, Robin Blaser, George Bowering, Tess Gallagher, Lissa Wolsak, Robert Bringhurst, Fred Wah, Charles Potts, Philip Whalen, bill bissett, Michael McClure, Lew Welch, Richard Hugo, who else?
What are the qualities in the best poetry from this region? Who best demonstrates a sense of place?
Bring your thoughts, your poems of Cascadia, your honest opinions and hear about plans for a Cascadia Poetry Conference March 23-26 at Doe Bay on Orcas Island. Paul Nelson facilitates. There will be critique of your writing, if you desire, after the Cascadia discussion. Suggested donation $5 to keep SPLAB open. SPLAB is at 3651 S. Edmunds in the former Columbia School, just three blocks from the Columbia City Link Light Rail stop. Parking is available on site. There are only five more Living Room sessions until our summer break at the end of June. If you can’t make it May 31, please feel free to comment below and stay tunes to SPLAB.org for info on the March 2012 conference.
About Splabman
Poet & interviewer Paul E Nelson founded SPLAB (Seattle Poetics LAB) & the Cascadia Poetry Festival. Since 1993, SPLAB has produced hundreds of poetry events & 600 hours of interview programming with legendary poets & whole systems activists including Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Joanne Kyger, Robin Blaser, Diane di Prima, Daphne Marlatt, Nate Mackey, George Bowering, Barry McKinnon, José Kozer, Brenda Hillman & many others. Paul’s books include American Prophets (interviews 1994-2012) (2018) American Sentences (2015) A Time Before Slaughter (2009) and Organic in Cascadia: A Sequence of Energies (2013). Co-Editor of Make It True: Poetry From Cascadia (2015), 56 Days of August: Poetry Postcards (2017) and Samthology: A Tribute to Sam Hamill (2019) Make it True meets Medusario (2019), he’s presented poetry/poetics in London, Brussels, Nanaimo, Qinghai & Beijing, China, has had work translated into Spanish, Chinese & Portuguese & writes an American Sentence every day. Awarded a residency at The Lake, from the Morris Graves Foundation in Loleta, CA, he’s published work in Golden Handcuffs Review, Zen Monster, Hambone, and elsewhere. Winner of the 2014 Robin Blaser Award from The Capilano Review, he is engaged in a 20 year bioregional cultural investigation of Cascadia and lives in Rainier Beach, in the Cascadia bioregion’s Cedar River watershed.
Who else?
For starters –
• Poets: Robert Sund, Tim McNulty, Ghandl of the Qayahl Llaanas, Jerry Martien, Skaay of the Qquuna Qiighawaay, and, in her later years, Denise Levertov.
• Sculptors: Tom Jay and Tony Angell.
• Artist: Morris Graves.
• Photographer: Mary Randlett
• Other writers: Ken Kesey, Don Berry, Robert Michael Pyle.
• Biologists: Numerous — all those who study and protect denizens of forest, shore and air: Orcas, moss, frogs, murrelets, auklets, salamanders, slugs, geoducs, beavers, elk and thatch ants. Especially the dean of forest canopy research, Nalini Nadkarni.