Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Wanda Campbell - Hope Encourages Creativity

Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don't give up.
~Anne Lamott


During the week of October 4-11, 2010, I participated in Random Acts of Poetry at Wolfville Junior High (Wolfville, Nova Scotia) with students selected by the resource staff, and at Highbury Education Centre (New Minas, Nova Scotia), an experiential high school for students seeking an alternative to the traditional school environment. I met one on one with 25 students, and read them each a poem from my poetry collection entitled Grace that I thought they might find meaningful. I found out their names and something about them so I could individualize each book that I signed before giving it to them. They seemed thrilled to have a poetry collection with their name and mine at the front. This I had hoped for, but three delightful things I didn’t expect also happened.

1) Several students read poems of their own to me with metaphors and music that were surprisingly mature, testimony to the power of words to make us brave in the face of great challenges.

2) Two students from Highbury Education Centre found me as I was packing up to leave. They thanked me on behalf of their fellow students and gave me a mug with their school’s letters on it, and now when I drink my dark hot coffee from their gift I think of those letters HEC as Hope Encourages Creativity (and vice versa as we know).

3) The Wolfville Junior High teacher who organized my visit sent me this note the next day:
One student in particular was SO pleased to meet you! I think she may have shared with you some of her poems. She has newly moved here and is in need of "something" for her. Thanks for what you do. :)

Wanda Campbell's 2010 RAP report!!

WandaCampbell

Hope Encourages Creativity !

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Allan Rose reads from “The Greatest Canadian Love Poem and Other Treasures of the Heart”.

RANDOM ACTS OF POETRY 2010

ALLAN GLENN ROSE
at
KINCARDINE ARENA

Wow! What an afternoon and what a positive experience! We (Cathy, Lisa and myself; Cathy was my sign lady and Lisa took the photos) spent four hours with the young house leaguers of Kincardine who were enjoying many circuits around the rink in their annual Skatathon to raise funds for their community assisted hockey.

We were made welcome by all in attendance, and once I read to the first few children, we soon had a lineup of kids eager to hear a poem (or two) and receive their free books. Parents in attendance were just overwhelmed and so appreciative that their kids had been included in the RAP program. The youngsters enjoyed the poems about doing our part to protect the environment from “A Verdant Green”, but it was a real eye opener to see the enthusiasm for readings from “The Greatest Canadian Love Poem and Other Treasures of the Heart”, both from boys and girls. We heard “Please read another one” more than once. What poet doesn't love an audience like that?

The photographer/reporter from the Kincardine Independent showed up, interviewed me, and took a number of shots. The article should be ready in a few days and I'll send along a copy.

After we had given out all 50 books, the Captain of the local Junior C hockey team (they were there to “skate guard” and supervise the youngsters) skated over and started chatting with me about what we had been doing. Turns out he wanted to hear some love poems! So I went out to the truck and got whatever books I had left in there (about a half dozen) and read him “Hockey and the Girls”. He loved it and called his teammates over, telling them, “Ya gotta hear this guy! He's just like us, only a lot older.” I read four more love poems to these rough, tough hockey players and you could have heard a pin drop. Just goes to show the power of words – the power of poetry. Of course, being a retired high school teacher, it made me feel good inside to know I still could work the magic with this older age group. I didn't have enough books for all of them, but they promised to share what I was able to give them.

We just loved our day and it was an honour to be part of Random Acts of Poetry 2010. As one young lady told us in so many words: “We are lucky to have help from other people so we can play some hockey every week and we are lucky you all came here to read some poems for us. I try hard in school and English is my favourite subject. Now I can see how I can start writing my own poems too because they don't all have to rhyme.” We heard many very appreciative comments in the same vein and the children thought it was wonderful that a complete stranger (a writer/hockey player yet!) was taking such a keen interest in their academics, especially in their progress in their English classes. My words of encouragement did not fall on deaf ears.

Many of the children told me they would be taking their books to school, so I made sure to tell them to have their teachers contact me if they wanted me to do a poetry lesson (or two). I'm sure I'll be hearing from them.

When we left the rink, there was a group of little girls sitting in the lobby warming up, sipping on their hot chocolates, heads down, totally quiet, reading their treasured poetry books. What more could a writer ask for?

Allan Rose reads from “The Greatest Canadian Love Poem and Other Treasures of the Heart”.

Allan Rose reads from “The Greatest Canadian Love Poem and Other Treasures of the Heart”.

Genevieve Morin poeming at Maison Dauphine's street school...(Qu ébec city).

Genevieve Morin poeming at Maison Dauphine's street school...(Québec city).

Domenico Capilongo visits Thornhill Area Alternative Education Programs.

Domenico Capilongo visitsThornhill Area Alternative Education Programs.

Domenico Capilongo visits Toronto Youth Karate Program.

Domenico Capilongo visits Toronto Youth Karate Program.

Angela Leuck and teens, Jumping for Joy at the Dawson Community Centre!

Angela Leuck and teens, Jumping for Joy at the Dawson Community Centre!

Angela Leuck wth teens at Jeunesse 2000, N.D.G!

Angela Leuck wth teens at Jeunesse 2000, N.D.G!

Hugh MacDonald RAPs on CBC's Mainstreet with Karen Mair.

Hugh MacDonald RAPs on CBC's Mainstreet with Karen Mair.

Hugh MacDonald reads for the CBC's Island Morning with Matt Rainnie on board the ferry at Wood Islands.

Hugh MacDonald reads for the CBC's Island Morning with Matt Rainnie on board the ferry at Wood Islands.

RAP 2010 Photos from David Fraser!

RAP 2010 Photos from David Fraser!

RAP 2010 Photos from David Fraser!

RAP 2010 Photos from David Fraser!

Wendy Morton at Lauwelnew Tribal School, Saanich, B.C. grades 5 and 6.

Wendy Morton at Lauwelnew Tribal School, Saanich, B.C. grades 5 and 6.

Wendy Morton at Lauwelnew Tribal School, Saanich, B.C. grades 5 and 6.

Wendy Morton at Lauwelnew Tribal School, Saanich, B.C. grades 5 and 6.

Daniela Elza's photos from RAP 2010!

Daniela Elza's photos from RAP 2010!

Daniela Elza's photos from RAP 2010!

Daniela Elza's photos from RAP 2010!

RAP 2010 from Stratford with Charles Mountford!

RAP 2010 from Stratford with Charles Mountford!

RAP 2010 from Stratford with Charles Mountford!

RAP 2010 from Stratford with Charles Mountford!

Kate Marshall Flaherty's RAP pix! Kate with the students at the YMCA Academy in Toronto!

Kate Marshall Flaherty's RAP pix! Kate with the students at the YMCA Academy in Toronto!

Kate Marshall Flaherty's RAP pix! Kate with the students at the YMCA Academy in Toronto!

Kate Marshall Flaherty's RAP pix! Kate with the students at the YMCA Academy in Toronto!

Susan Stenson poeming kids at the Zen Zone at Claremont Secondary School.

Susan Stenson poeming kids at the Zen Zone at Claremont Secondary School.

Susan Stenson poeming up a storm!

Susan Stenson poeming up a storm!

Wednesday, October 06, 2010

RANDOM ACTS OF POETRY FOCUSES ON YOUTH






Poets across Canada will visit juvenile detention centres, alternative schools and youth centres October 4th to 9th, 2010, during the seventh annual Random Acts of Poetry event, sponsored by The Canada Council for the Arts.

For the first time, the event is focused on bringing poetry to young people. “We want to draw attention to youth literacy, which is a crucial issue for Canada’s future,” says Claire Rettie, executive director of the READ Society, a non-profit literacy organization serving children, youth and adults in Victoria, British Columbia.

READ supports the national event in conjunction with Sooke poet Wendy Morton, the event founder. During the week, 29 poets across Canada, from Victoria, B.C. to Pasadena, Newfoundland, will commit Random Acts of Poetry in their cities. Poets will read to youth and hand out copies of their poetry books.

“We will choose poems that speak to young people and hope to encourage them to find poems in their own lives,” says Morton, who will read at LÁU,WELNEW Tribal School in Saanich, B.C. She believes that poetry is a way into language for those who have barriers to it.

Since 1976, READ has provided tuition assistance for children and youth from low-income households in Victoria so they can improve their reading, writing, mathematics and study skills.

Across Canada poets will commit Random Acts in: Calgary, Edmonton, Elmvale, Fredericton, Gibsons, Kincardine, Laval, Montague, Montreal, Moose Jaw, Nanaimo, Ottawa, Pasadena,
Quebec City, Sooke, Stratford, Thamesford, Toronto, Vancouver, Verdun, Victoria, Windsor, Winnipeg and Wolfville.

Susan and Adrian

Susan Stenson with Claremont Student, Adrian Southin.

Kim Goldberg shares a RED ZONE poem of homelessness with Jeremy Tritschler in a combined Junior Alternate and Social Justice class.

Kim Goldberg shares a RED ZONE poem of homelessness with Jeremy Tritschler in a combined Junior Alternate and Social Justice class.

Nanaimo Secondary School student Tennille Giacomello studies a poem of homelessness from RED ZONE with Kim Goldberg.

Nanaimo Secondary School student Tennille Giacomello studies a poem of homelessness from RED ZONE with Kim Goldberg.

Monday, October 04, 2010

Hugh MacDonald

Poet, editor and novelist Hugh MacDonald of Brudenell is the new poet laureate for Prince Edward Island.
With nine books to his credit as author and editor, MacDonald is perhaps best known to Islanders through his Random Acts of Poetry which, for the past five years, have brought poetry to the streets and workplaces of P.E.I.
MacDonald retired after more than 30 years of service in the educational system of the province and, since 1999, has been a full-time writer. He has served on the executives of both the Prince Edward Island Council of the Arts and the P.E.I. Writers Guild. Recognition for his work and leadership includes awards and prizes in the P.E.I. Literary Awards including the L.M. Montgomery Children’s Literature Award for Chung Lee Loves Lobsters, a first prize for poetry from the Writers Federation of Nova Scotia.
In 2004, he was presented with the Award for Distinguished Contribution to the Literary Arts on Prince Edward Island.

Billeh Nickerson

Billeh Nickerson is a former competitive junior curler. He is not sure how this has impacted his writing, but he’s sure it has. He is the author three books including his most recent collection McPoems (Arsenal Pulp), which chronicles life on the other side of the fast food counter. He is currently working on a new anthology with Mariko Tamaki entitled Permanent Markers (Tightrope Books, forthcoming Fall 2012) and a cycle of poems about the Titanic entitled Impact: The Titanic Poems (Arsenal Pulp, fortchcoming Spring 2012. He lives in Vancouver, where he teaches creative writing at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.

David Fraser


David Fraser
Originally uploaded by random acts of poetry
www.davidpfraser.ca
www.ascentaspirations.ca
www.wordstorm.ca
www.patriciacarroll.ca

Rocco de Giacomo

Rocco de Giacomo is a widely published poet whose work has most recently been accepted in the literary journals Contemporary Verse 2 and Prism International and has recently appeared The Carolina Review and The Prairie Journal. On October 18th, 2009, his first full-length poetry collection, Ten Thousand Miles Between Us was launched through Quattro Books. Also, his fifth and latest chapbook collection of poems, Catching Dawn’s Breath (LyricalMyrical Press, Toronto) was launched in March of 2008.

Domenico Capilongo

Domenico Capilongo lives in Toronto, with his family. He teaches high school creative writing, alternative education and practices karate. He has had work published in several literary magazines including Geist, and Dreamcatcher. He short-listed for the gritLIT Poetry Contest 2009 and his first book of poetry, I thought elvis was Italian was published in the spring of 2008 with Wolsak and Wynn. His new book of jazz-inspired poetry, hold the note, is published this fall with Quattro Books.
( learn more at: sites.google.com/site/domcapilongo/)

Kate Marshall Flaherty

Kate Marshall Flaherty guides "Writing as a spiritual practice" and "Writing from Within" workshops, and teaches yoga and meditation. She was a founding member of the Toronto Peace Theatre, and now works with youth giving Leadership and Golden Rule retreats. "where we are going" is her fourth book of poetry.

Susan Stenson


Susan Stenson
Originally uploaded by random acts of poetry
Susan Stenson's work has appeared in many Canadian literary magazines, most recently, Fiddlehead, Geist, CV2 and sub Terrain and in the anthology Threshold: six women six poets. She won two first prizes in 2004: The ARC Poem of the Year Contest, and The Rona Murray Prize for Literature. She also won first prize in the Great Canadian Literary Hunt, This Magazine’s poetry contest 2000, the League of Canadian Poets National Contest in 1999 and the Hawthorne Poetry Chapbook Award in 1997, for her work, A Little Less Swing, A Little More Sway.

Her work rides the buses throughout British Columbia in the Poetry in Transit program and she participated in the first annual Random Acts of Poetry Week in 2004 and again in 2006 and 2007 in Victoria. Sono Nis Press published her first book of poems, Could Love a Man, next came My Mother Agrees With the Dead (2007), from Wolsak and Wyn. Her current book, Nobody Move, (2010) celebrates, without apology, Susan’s great loves, family, friends, the human heart.

She lives ecstatically in Victoria with her family where she co-publishes The Claremont Review, a literary magazine for writers aged 13 to 19 which was Write Magazine’s choice for magazine of the year, 2001. Susan teaches English and creative writing in Saanich School District and has taught at Waterford Kamhlaba’s United World College in Mbabane, Swaziland. Her students, both youth and adult, have won provincial, national and international prizes.

Bianca Lakoseljac

Bianca Lakoseljac holds M.A. and B.A. from York University and is the winner of Matthew Ahern Memorial Award in Literature. Bianca taught communication at Ryerson University and Humber College in Toronto . Memoirs of a Praying Mantis, a collection of poetry exploring environmental issues, legends and sculptures of Toronto ’s High Park , and horrors of wars was published in 2009. Bianca served as judge for a number of literary competitions. She is past president and program chair of the Canadian Authors Association, Toronto branch; a board member with Book and Periodical Council; member of the Writers Union of Canada; the League of Canadian Poets; PEN Canda; Algonquin Square Table, a U of T poetry group. Bianca does readings on a regular basis at writers’ festivals, libraries, and bookstores. www.biancalakoseljac.ca

Allan Glenn Rose

A member of the League of Canadian Poets and author of the critically acclaimed Griffin-nominated “Butterflies in Winter”, “So Much to Feel” and “The Girls of Saturday Morning”, Allan Glenn Rose has worn many hats over the years: construction laborer, steeplejack, high school English Literature and History teacher, organic market gardener, live music concert promoter and football coach. He has been involved in the hockey world over his lifetime as a player, scout, executive and coach.

Enjoy his vividly accessible verse just for its clarity of diction and emotion, or delve into its many layers; whatever approach you take, you will find his words strike a responsive chord in your heart.

He is one of the thirteen Canadian writers who contributed poems to the recently published “A Verdant Green”, Canada's national environmental anthology.

His latest book, “The Greatest Canadian Love Poem and Other Treasures of the Heart” explores the many aspects of this most basic and most fascinating of all human emotions. Its six sections will lead you on your own journey of the heart with stops along the way at love, loss and laughter; side trips to a beautiful garden and an enthralling cabaret, then a final stroll along the romantic roads of the past.

Sheri-D Wilson

Sheri-D Wilson
“The Mama of Dada”

In 2009 CBC called her one of the Top 10 Poets in Canada – she’s performed the world: Poetry Africa, Vancouver International Writers Festival, Montreal’s Blue Met, NYC’s Bowery Club, maelstrÖm Brussels, Taos Circus, Bumbershoot – 2003 she won the USA Heavyweight title.

w/ 7 collections, 2 CD’s, 4 VideoPoems. Way back, she attended Naropa, Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, & still practices Buddhism.

Artistic Director, Calgary International Spoken Word Festival
Director, Spoken Word Program at Banff Centre
www.sheridwilson.com
www.calgaryspokenwordfestival.com

Daniela Elza


Daniela Elza
Originally uploaded by random acts of poetry
Daniela Elza is a poet, and a free range scholar of the poetic consciousness.
She has released more than a 140 non-medicated/organic poems into the wor(l)d in over 42 publications.
Daniela is the recipient of this year's Pandora's Collective Citizenship Award.

Nellie P. Strowbridge

Nellie P. Strowbridge, the winner of provincial and national awards, has been published nationally and internationally. Her work is capsuled in The National Archives as Newfoundland’s winner in Canada’s Stamp of Approval Award.
Nellie Strowbridge, a former columnist and editorial writer, is also an essayist and an award-winning poet. She has been Writer in the Library, a mentor to young writers, an adjudicator in the Provincial Arts and Letters Awards, an assessor on the Newfoundland and Labrador Grants Committee and a judge on the Newfoundland and Labrador Alliance Book Awards. She has held school workshops in Canada and Ireland, and also hosted a Seminar/Gabfest for International Women’s Day in Cobh, Ireland, where she was Writer-in-Residence. The Canadian Embassy in Dublin also sponsored a reading and reception.

The author is a member of The Writers’ Alliance of NL, Page One, The Writers’ Union of Canada, The League of Canadian Poets. Books published: Widdershins Stories of a Fisherman’s Daughter, Doors Held Ajar (tri-author with Isobel Brown
& Peggy Krachun), Shadows of the Heart,Dancing on Ochre Sands (short-listed for the WANL E.J. Pratt Award 2005), Far From Home Dr Grenfell’s Little Orphan (4th printing, short-listed for The NL Historic and History Award 2006), The Gift of Christmas, (reviewed by the Aurora as "A Newfoundland and Labrador Christmas Classic", The Newfoundland Tongue, (3rd printing), Catherine Snow in the Eye of
the Rope (2nd printing). Maiden from the Sea (pub. date 2012).Other credits are:
Postcard and Bus Poetry, publication in No Choice but to Trust, Circle of Six: a collection featuring six Newfoundland poets. Her work is in the school series
Land Sea & Time. "Summer Job" in a Canadian textbook Passages 12 and CD.Second Prize in the Orion Prize for Poetry 2003 for "September 11, 200l in
Newfoundland," "The Fisherman's Hands", The Backyards of Heaven 2003, and "The Emerald Island and "The Fisherman's Wife" (published eight times) were included in The March Hare Anthology.

Susan Telfer


Susan Telfer
Originally uploaded by random acts of poetry
Susan Telfer's first book of poetry, House Beneath, was published by Hagios Press in 2009. She lives on the Sunshine Coast with her family and teaches high school there.

Leslie Piché


Leslie Piché
Originally uploaded by random acts of poetry
Née à Trois-Rivières, le 26 juillet 1961, vit à Laval. Étudie en littérature, puis en pédagogie. Enseigne pendant quinze ans le français au secondaire. Dès 2004, gagne le premier prix de la Quinzaine de poésie de Montréal avec Inventaire, inspiré d’un poème de Roland Giguère. S’enchaînent : prix Piché , mention, en 2004, pour la suite Nos petites morts; publication dans Virages,Voir en ligne, Brèves, Le Passeur; lectures publiques, récitals de poésie à Trois-Rivières en octobre 2006 et 2007; «performer» à la Galerie Presse-Papier avec Alain Fleurent et Carolane St-Pierre au Festival de Poésie en 2009. Finaliste aux prix de la Culture de Ville de Laval en 2006; finaliste au concours la poésie prend le métro et le bus. Lectures publiques avec la Société littéraire de Laval (dont elle assure la présidence depuis juillet 2010) ,participation au Marché de la Poésie. En décembre 2010, la Maison des Arts de Laval exposera sa suite poétique Développement inclus, accompagnée de 24 poses de Carolane St-Pierre.