Watermarks Launched in Saskatchewan

I'm home again, after the Wild Sage Press launch of Watermarks and How to Be a River (Brenda Niskala). It was great to see so many friends all in one place. A standing-room-only crowd at Connaught Library in Regina enjoyed music by Seven Seas, and readings by the authors on a gorgeous fall evening in mid-October. Barbara Kahan, publisher, also produced some great collector cards based on poems - you can see them at Wild Sage Press. Rumor has it that some broadsheets, with poems and images, are also in the works. Here I am, about to start the reading. Great glasses, eh?

Next reading: November 26, North Kohala Library, 6:30 pm

Poem from the fair: tanka

How the poetry booth works: fair-goers give us ideas we call prompts. Prompts can be titles, themes, phrases, grocery lists, whatever comes to mind. We take the prompt, put pen to paper and see what emerges. Sometimes the poem even speaks to the topic! It's great writing practice and a good opportunity to send ego off to watch the spam-carving contest while the muse settles down at the table.

I've just been introduced to this "mother of the haiku" (sorry, don't know who I'm quoting). Here's a tanka (http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5793) I wrote yesterday at the Inkwell Booth:

The Green Path

Many-legged gap-toothed

path unseen by color-blind.

We stumble against

cherry trees. They shower us

with petals, soft as kindness.