new from above/ground press: carisse, Landers, Logan, Benedict, Strath, Levy, Shirley, FitzGerald, Jaeger, fitzpatrick, Inniss + Touch the Donkey #43,

poetry and labour / is concrete, russell carisse $5 ; SIDEWALK NATURALIST, Sue Landers $5 ; THERE’S NOTHING OUT THERE, Nate Logan $5 ; Touch the Donkey [a small poetry journal] #43, with new poems by Lisa Samuels, Tom Jenks, Nate Logan, Henry Gould, Sandra Doller, Kit Roffey, Leesa Dean and Scott Inniss $8 ; Fragments of a Mirrored-Voice For a Friend, Alexander Hammond Benedict $5 ; Inconsistent Cemeteries, Mckenzie Strath $5 ; To Assemble an Absence, John Levy $5 ; CASSETTE POEMS, factory practice-room cassette-recording responses, Vik Shirley $5 ; Each Mouthful Dripping… poems from slogans, Ian FitzGerald $5 ; SELECTED MEMOIRS, Peter Jaeger $5 ; Spectral Arcs, ryan fitzpatrick $5 ; Back Shelve, Scott Inniss $5 ;

keep an eye on the above/ground press blog for author interviews, new writing, reviews, upcoming readings and tons of other material; oh, and you heard that 2025 subscriptions are now available, yes?

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
August-October 2024
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy of each

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button (above). Scroll down here to see various backlist titles, or click on any of the extensive list of names on the sidebar (many, many things are still in print).

With forthcoming chapbooks by: Brook Houglum (two!), Nathanael O'Reilly, Orchid Tierney, Andy Weaver, Catriona Strang, Penn Kemp, Jason Heroux and Dag T. Straumsvag, Alice Burdick, Susan Gevirtz, Carter Mckenzie, Maxwell Gontarek, Conal Smiley, Noah Berlatsky, JoAnna Novak, Julia Cohen, Ryan Skrabalak, Terri Witek and David Phillips; and probably others! (yes: others,

Spotlight series #100 : Nate Logan

The ONE HUNDREDTH in my monthly "spotlight" series, each featuring a different poet with a short statement and a new poem or two, is now online, featuring Indiana poet Nate Logan.

The first eleven in the series were attached to the Drunken Boat blog, and the series has so far featured poets including Seattle, Washington poet Sarah Mangold, Colborne, Ontario poet Gil McElroy, Vancouver poet Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Ottawa poet Jason Christie, Montreal poet and performer Kaie Kellough, Ottawa poet Amanda Earl, American poet Elizabeth Robinson, American poet Jennifer Kronovet, Ottawa poet Michael Dennis, Vancouver poet Sonnet L’Abbé, Montreal writer Sarah Burgoyne, Fredericton poet Joe Blades, American poet Genève Chao, Northampton MA poet Brittany Billmeyer-Finn, Oji-Cree, Two-Spirit/Indigiqueer from Peguis First Nation (Treaty 1 territory) poet, critic and editor Joshua Whitehead, American expat/Barcelona poet, editor and publisher Edward Smallfield, Kentucky poet Amelia Martens, Ottawa poet Pearl Pirie, Burlington, Ontario poet Sacha Archer, Washington DC poet Buck Downs, Toronto poet Shannon Bramer, Vancouver poet and editor Shazia Hafiz Ramji, Vancouver poet Geoffrey Nilson, Oakland, California poets and editors Rusty Morrison and Jamie Townsend, Ottawa poet and editor Manahil Bandukwala, Toronto poet and editor Dani Spinosa, Kingston writer and editor Trish Salah, Calgary poet, editor and publisher Kyle Flemmer, Vancouver poet Adrienne Gruber, California poet and editor Susanne Dyckman, Brooklyn poet-filmmaker Stephanie Gray, Vernon, BC poet Kerry Gilbert, South Carolina poet and translator Lindsay Turner, Vancouver poet and editor Adèle Barclay, Thorold, Ontario poet Franco Cortese, Ottawa poet Conyer Clayton, Lawrence, Kansas poet Megan Kaminski, Ottawa poet and fiction writer Frances Boyle, Ithica, NY poet, editor and publisher Marty Cain, New York City poet Amanda Deutch, Iranian-born and Toronto-based writer/translator Khashayar Mohammadi, Mendocino County writer, librarian, and a visual artist Melissa Eleftherion, Ottawa poet and editor Sarah MacDonell, Montreal poet Simina Banu, Canadian-born UK-based artist, writer, and practice-led researcher J. R. Carpenter, Toronto poet MLA Chernoff, Boise, Idaho poet and critic Martin Corless-Smith, Canadian poet and fiction writer Erin Emily Ann Vance, Toronto poet, editor and publisher Kate Siklosi, Fredericton poet Matthew Gwathmey, Canadian poet Peter Jaeger, Birmingham, Alabama poet and editor Alina Stefanescu, Waterloo, Ontario poet Chris Banks, Chicago poet and editor Carrie Olivia Adams, Vancouver poet and editor Danielle Lafrance, Toronto-based poet and literary critic Dale Martin Smith, American poet, scholar and book-maker Genevieve Kaplan, Toronto-based poet, editor and critic ryan fitzpatrick, American poet and editor Carleen Tibbetts, British Columbia poet nathan dueck, Tiohtiá:ke-based sick slick, poet/critic em/ilie kneifel, writer, translator and lecturer Mark Tardi, New Mexico poet Kōan Anne Brink, Winnipeg poet, editor and critic Melanie Dennis Unrau, Vancouver poet, editor and critic Stephen Collis, poet and social justice coach Aja Couchois Duncan, Colorado poet Sara Renee Marshall, Toronto writer Bahar Orang, Ottawa writer Matthew Firth, Victoria poet Saba Pakdel, Winnipeg poet Julian Day, Ottawa poet, writer and performer nina jane drystek, Comox BC poet Jamie Sharpe, Canadian visual artist and poet Laura Kerr, Quebec City-area poet and translator Simon Brown, Ottawa poet Jennifer Baker, Rwandese Canadian Brooklyn-based writer Victoria Mbabazi, Nova Scotia-based poet and facilitator Nanci Lee, Irish-American poet Nathanael O'Reilly, Canadian poet Tom Prime, Regina-based poet and translator Jérôme Melançon, New York-based poet Emmalea Russo, Toronto-based poet, editor and critic Eric Schmaltz, San Francisco poet Maw Shein Win, Toronto-based writer, playwright and editor Daniel Sarah Karasik, Ottawa poet and editor Dessa Bayrock, Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia poet Alice Burdick, poet, writer and editor Jade Wallace, San Francisco-based poet Jennifer Hasegawa, California poet Kyla Houbolt, Toronto poet and editor Emma Rhodes, Canadian-in-Iowa writer Jon Cone, Edmonton/Sicily-based poet, educator, translator, researcher, editor and publisher Adriana Oniță, California-based poet, scholar and teacher Monica Mody, Ottawa poet and editor AJ Dolman, Sudbury poet, critic and fiction writer Kim Fahner, and Canadian poet Kemeny Babineau.
 
The whole series can be found online here.

Nate Logan, Wrong Horse

 

At the end of a tough week, I treat myself to some curbside steak, broccoli, and brick of bread. I wait for the bill and see right into the restaurant. A hostess rolls her eyes so far in her head, I feel a little sick. Some child uses a red crayon with disturbing flourish. A slice of cheesecake is put in front of an elderly couple. I’m the only person in the designated to-go parking area. The wind nudges the car with a sock foot. (“Parking Lot”)

The second full-length collection by Wisconsin prose poet and editor Nate Logan, following Inside the Golden Days of Missing You (Magic Helicopter Press, 2019), as well as a small array of chapbooks (including one by above/ground press), is Wrong Horse (Chicago IL: Moira Books, 2024). I’ve been following for a while the curious trajectory of the American prose poem, one that appears to have been furthered quite prominently by the late Russell Edson [see my review of his posthumous selected poems here], a form that leans rather hard into what others might suggest as a very short or postcard story. There seem a handful of poets following that particular influence: Sarah Manguso’s early work, for example, or that of Evan Williams, Elisa Gabbert or Benjamin Niespodziany. Logan’s narrative prose poems, through Wrong Horse, might share certain elements of all of the above, but not necessarily the surrealist and cinematic elements of Niespodziany, or the theatrical gestures and impulse of Gabbert, yet the same elements of scene-composition remain. Logan’s approach, instead, offers a curious and even kinetic push against endings, refusing to provide those easy or expected landings. Logan’s poems offer a calm, almost unsettling sense of quiet, writing something slightly off in the narrative, unsettling the very foundation of the narrative; not in a surrealistic way, but something else, other. There is such a fantastic subtlety to the way Logan approaches each prose-block, each poem, a quietude that might allow inattentive readers to not fully appreciate just what it is his work provides. His poems put all those narrative parts into play, into motion, but stops just short of the implications, allowing the reader to fill in the rest. “To spend the equinox in a hammock,” he writes, to close the poem “The Home Stretch,” “wasting my life. Or not breaking the backs of mothers walking a Weimaraner. And there’s the mannequin again with an egg in its mouth.” As Logan wrote as part of a statement on prose poems last fall, for periodicities: a journal of poetry and poetics:

There are frequent stops when traveling by prose poem; for me, this is one of its unique charms, maybe thee charm that keeps me coming back. Unlike another poem that can move between a line that spans across the page and a zig-zag all within the same piece, I know, and the reader knows, the prose poem will start and stop, then start and stop again. Being invited to sit with sentences, poetic sentences in no particular hurry, is a pleasure. Furthermore, the tendency for the prose poem to wind around surrealism (neosurrealism?) is a nudge to the reader to stay with sentences longer—the associative leaps lend themselves to contemplation (this is a whole other essay). The “radicalness” of the prose poem still lies in its form, but the beat has changed. And when the poem does end, either at one paragraph or a few pages, if it goes especially well, the accumulation of sentences stirs a reader, which is what all good poetry should do (even still, Charlie, I didn’t mean to make your mom cry).

 

the book of smaller : two further reviews, (plus a bunch of others,

My 2022 poetry title, the book of smaller (University of Calgary Press) has garnered two further reviews over the past week! Nate Logan was good enough to write up a review for DIAGRAM, and Eric Schmaltz was good enough to write up a review for Canadian Literature. Thanks so much!

As well, I've even managed to put together a page on my author page linking all the reviews I've managed to find from over the years of various of my work. I mean, that only took how many years to get around to compiling? There are far more reviews of my books (and chapbooks, even) than I had thought! So that was good also. Check that out here.

Touch the Donkey supplement: new interviews with Hunter, Nećakov, Logan, Thomas, Brandt + Buuck, (and 8th anniversary subscription sale!

Anticipating the release later next week of the thirty-third of Touch the Donkey [a small poetry journal], why not check out the interviews that have appeared over the past few weeks with contributors to the thirty-second issue: Carrie Hunter, Lillian Nećakov, Nate Logan, Hugh Thomas, Emily Brandt and David Buuck.

And did you hear about our 8th anniversary (subscription) sale, running throughout the month of April (and featuring the above/ground press backlist)?

Interviews with contributors to the first thirty-two issues (more than two hundred interviews to date) remain online, including: Jessi MacEachern, Sue Bracken, Melissa Eleftherion, Valerie Witte, Brandon Brown, Yoyo Comay, Stephen Brockwell, Jack Jung, Amanda Auerbach, IAN MARTIN, Paige Carabello, Emma Tilley, Dana Teen Lomax, Cat Tyc, Michael Turner, Sarah Alcaide-Escue, Colby Clair Stolson, Tom Prime, Bill Carty, Christina Vega-Westhoff, Robert Hogg, Simina Banu, MLA Chernoff, Geoffrey Olsen, Douglas Barbour, Hamish Ballantyne, JoAnna Novak, Allyson Paty, Lisa Fishman, Kate Feld, Isabel Sobral Campos, Jay MillAr, Lisa Samuels, Prathna Lor, George Bowering, natalie hanna, Jill Magi, Amelia Does, Orchid Tierney, katie o’brien, Lily Brown, Tessa Bolsover, émilie kneifel, Hasan Namir, Khashayar Mohammadi, Naomi Cohn, Tom Snarsky, Guy Birchard, Mark Cunningham, Lydia Unsworth, Zane Koss, Nicole Raziya Fong, Ben Robinson, Asher Ghaffar, Clara Daneri, Ava Hofmann, Robert R. Thurman, Alyse Knorr, Denise Newman, Shelly Harder, Franco Cortese, Dale Tracy, Biswamit Dwibedy, Emily Izsak, Aja Couchois Duncan, José Felipe Alvergue, Conyer Clayton, Roxanna Bennett, Julia Drescher, Michael Cavuto, Michael Sikkema, Bronwen Tate, Emilia Nielsen, Hailey Higdon, Trish Salah, Adam Strauss, Katy Lederer, Taryn Hubbard, Michael Boughn, David Dowker, Marie Larson, Lauren Haldeman, Kate Siklosi, robert majzels, Michael Robins, Rae Armantrout, Stephanie Strickland, Ken Hunt, Rob Manery, Ryan Eckes, Stephen Cain, Dani Spinosa, Samuel Ace, Howie Good, Rusty Morrison, Allison Cardon, Jon Boisvert, Laura Theobald, Suzanne Wise, Sean Braune, Dale Smith, Valerie Coulton, Phil Hall, Sarah MacDonell, Janet Kaplan, Kyle Flemmer, Julia Polyck-O’Neill, A.M. O’Malley, Catriona Strang, Anthony Etherin, Claire Lacey ,Sacha Archer, Michael e. Casteels, Harold Abramowitz, Cindy Savett, Tessy Ward, Christine Stewart, David James Miller, Jonathan Ball, Cody-Rose Clevidence, mwpm, Andrew McEwan, Brynne Rebele-Henry, Joseph Mosconi, Douglas Barbour and Sheila Murphy, Oliver Cusimano, Sue Landers, Marthe Reed, Colin Smith, Nathaniel G. Moore, David Buuck, Kate Greenstreet, Kate Hargreaves, Shazia Hafiz Ramji, Erín Moure, Sarah Swan, Buck Downs, Kemeny Babineau, Ryan Murphy, Norma Cole, Lea Graham, kevin mcpherson eckhoff, Oana Avasilichioaei, Meredith Quartermain, Amanda Earl, Luke Kennard, Shane Rhodes, Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Sarah Cook, François Turcot, Gregory Betts, Eric Schmaltz, Paul Zits, Laura Sims, Stephen Collis, Mary Kasimor, Billy Mavreas, damian lopes, Pete Smith, Sonnet L’Abbé, Katie L. Price, a rawlings, Suzanne Zelazo, Helen Hajnoczky, Kathryn MacLeod, Shannon Maguire, Sarah Mangold, Amish Trivedi, Lola Lemire Tostevin, Aaron Tucker, Kayla Czaga, Jason Christie, Jennifer Kronovet, Jordan Abel, Deborah Poe, Edward Smallfield, ryan fitzpatrick, Elizabeth Robinson, nathan dueck, Paige Taggart, Christine McNair, Stan Rogal, Jessica Smith, Nikki Sheppy, Kirsten Kaschock, Lise Downe, Lisa Jarnot, Chris Turnbull, Gary Barwin, Susan Briante, derek beaulieu, Megan Kaminski, Roland Prevost, Emily Ursuliak, j/j hastain, Catherine Wagner, Susanne Dyckman, Susan Holbrook, Julie Carr, David Peter Clark, Pearl Pirie, Eric Baus, Pattie McCarthy, Camille Martin and Gil McElroy.

The forthcoming thirty-third issue features new writing by: Howie Good, Jérôme Melançon, Genevieve Kaplan, Cecilia Stuart, ryan fitzpatrick, Benjamin Niespodziany, Maw Shein Win, Margo LaPierre, Sarah Pinder and Michael Boughn.

And of course, copies of the first thirty-two issues are still very much available. Why not subscribe? Included, as well, as part of the above/ground press 2022 subscriptions! We even have our own Facebook group. It’s remarkably easy.

Etcetera : some commentary, and a few new(ish) poems,

Thanks to Katie Naughton's Etcetera, I did some short write-ups on particular works by Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Susan Howe, Joshua Beckman, the anthology on grief co-edited by George Bowering and Jean Baird, and the infamous 1960s Canadian poetry anthology by Eli Mandel (through which I discuss Bowering and John Newlove), all of which you can read here (alongside two new poems, as well). Also, Nate Logan was good enough to post a poem of mine (originally composed for Scientific American, but I couldn't figure out how to submit to them) up at his buffalopluseight. So many things!

12 or 20 (small press) questions with Nate Logan on Spooky Girlfriend Press

Spooky Girlfriend Press has published mostly poetry with solid Midwestern values since 2008. Visit them online: www.spookygirlfriendpress.tumblr.com

Nate Logan was born and raised in Indianapolis, Indiana. He is the author of four chapbooks, including Post-Reel (Locofo Chaps, 2017). His work has appeared in a variety of journals including BOAAT, Forklift, Ohio, and Ninth Letter.

1 – When did Spooky Girlfriend Press first start? How have your original goals as a publisher shifted since you started, if at all? And what have you learned through the process?
Spooky Girlfriend Press started in the winter of 2008 in my basement apartment in Moorhead, Minnesota. My initial goal was to publish work by female-identified poets from the Midwest (minus our first title), but in short order that expanded to include female-identifying poets from across the United States. I've learned it takes sheer will to persist--the world at large is antithetical to small press publishing and probably poetry more than the other creative writing genres. It certainly is a labor of love.

2 – What first brought you to publishing?
The excuse to start the press stemmed from a long poem (50+ pages) I had written that I knew would never be published in a magazine. Even then I knew this was shady, but really I only did it to get the press off the ground because I did not have any chapbooks lined up out of the gate. In my defense, I only think I ever sold one copy of my chapbook and quickly was able to really start on the goal I had set out for the press.

3 – What do you consider the role and responsibilities, if any, of small publishing?
I think small presses have the responsibility of being advocates for the marginalized voices in society. Small presses are where the weirdos hangout (and I mean weirdos in the best way). Since last year's election results, small presses, maybe now more than ever, help serve as the artistic resistance against the administration. While we haven't done any explicit political chapbook, we did start a journal, Killjoy, as a means to resist.

4 – What do you see your press doing that no one else is?
This is a hard question to answer. I think there are a lot of presses who certainly do more than we do. We're a pretty small fry. I guess I would have to say making a pizza poem anthology was something no one else has done? And there's a new series we've started that publishes two poem chapbooks? We're also hoping our next single author chapbook has some kind of audio element to it.

5 – What do you see as the most effective way to get new chapbooks out into the world?
While we have a fondness for the physical book in hand, e-publication is definitely more effective and immediate. We only have limited experience with this, but our new series is going to be exclusively published online, so we'll get more practice.

6 – How involved an editor are you? Do you dig deep into line edits, or do you prefer more of a light touch?
I have been very fortunate in that the poets who've trusted their work with the press have all been easy to work with and wonderful writers. I engage the light touch while editing, usually only commenting on things to make a manuscript more uniform (the Virgo in me). I only usually go in for deeper edits if the poet has a particular concern.

7 – How do your books get distributed? What are your usual print runs?
Besides Getting Lucky and Stone Boats, all of our titles have been print-on-demand. Usually a pre-order will go up and once the book is ready, I'll have a bulk number shipped to Spooky Girlfriend HQ, package them up, then mail them.

8 – How many other people are involved with editing or production? Do you work with other editors, and if so, how effective do you find it? What are the benefits, drawbacks?
For most of the press's existence, it's just been me. The amazing poet Laura Theobald was kind enough to be an assistant editor for a few years and it was so nice to have someone to bounce ideas off of and someone who was talented at doing book design. She is so great.

9– How has being an editor/publisher changed the way you think about your own writing?
This is an interesting question. I'm not sure it has changed how I think about my own writing. If anything, it has just given me a richer awareness of the breadth of poetry as it exists now.

10– How do you approach the idea of publishing your own writing? Some, such as Gary Geddes when he still ran Cormorant, refused such, yet various Coach House Press’ editors had titles during their tenures as editors for the press, including Victor Coleman and bpNichol. What do you think of the arguments for or against, or do you see the whole question as irrelevant?
Like I alluded to in the first question, I did use my own work as the spark to start the press, just so I'd have something to start with. In general though, I find this practice to be on the shady side. I mean, to give oneself editorial power is already an unbelievable act of ego and having writers trust you with their work, to believe in what you're doing, that's enough for me. I think Reb Livingston said something about if you don't believe in your own work, how can you expect anyone else to, and I understand that argument, too. And I think this argument is stronger if you are LGBTQ, a woman, from a traditionally marginalized population. For me though, a white, cis male, there have always been venues for me, so I would not do this now.

11– How do you see Spooky Girlfriend Press evolving?
Though poetry chapbooks remain at our core, I feel like we've been evolving steadily. We published an anthology chapbook, a chapbook of non-fiction, we've started a new two-poem chapbook series, etc. Being able to publish more would be a nice evolution to go through.

12– What, as a publisher, are you most proud of accomplishing? What do you think people have overlooked about your publications? What is your biggest frustration?
I'm extremely proud to have published Nicole Steinberg's first full-length collection. As for overlooked things, I think some of our titles have gone under the radar for whatever reason (see: IS TO : AS : IS TO by Cecily Iddings / READ IT) which can be a bit disheartening. My biggest frustration is not being able to properly compensate our authors and the lack of funds to attend book fairs where we can get more exposure.

13– Who were your early publishing models when starting out?
Bloof Books was and continues to be a huge inspiration for us. dancing girl press was also an inspiration for us as we basically borrowed our mission statement from them.

14– How does Spooky Girlfriend Press work to engage with your immediate literary community, and community at large? What journals or presses do you see Spooky Girlfriend Press in dialogue with? How important do you see those dialogues, those conversations?
We mostly do this engagement through our Internet presence, most often through our Facebook and Twitter pages. We try to promote our authors the best we can, sharing their readings or work that's recently been published. Unfortunately, we're located in a pretty quiet place, literarily (?) speaking, so there aren't too many opportunities to promote ourselves locally, but we try. As far as dialogue goes, I think we are in conversation with presses who pride themselves on being feminist in nature. They are important insofar as that their, and our existence, highlights just how underrepresented women continue to be in the small publishing world.

15– Do you hold regular or occasional readings or launches? How important do you see public readings and other events?
Oh, no. But I wish we did. Naptown is not a hotspot destination for such things. Most of our authors live on the east coast, anyway. We've been fortunate to participate in some readings at AWP; those are probably the largest profile readings we've done so far. We'd love to go to some smaller book fairs and run a table / host a reading. I think they are really important and are usually a fun time.

16– How do you utilize the internet, if at all, to further your goals?
The Internet is everything for the press. If it wasn't for the Internet, there'd be no way the press would be where it is today. There are so many presses, big and small, vying for attention on the Internet, we're just glad we have the corner of a corner of a corner of a room to promote our authors and titles.

17– Do you take submissions? If so, what aren’t you looking for?
Nope! We solicit all our titles (minus our 7" Single Series, which has its own particular rules).

18– Tell me about three of your most recent titles, and why they’re special.
“ghazal with the city sparking” by Emily Corwin b/w “The Seven of Cups is a Dialogue Between Yourself and Images” by Jennifer MacBain-Stephens /// Our most recent title, the first in our 7" Single Series (an online, two-poem chapbook, highlighting the work of two poets). This is special because it's the first one in this series and I've been a fan of Emily's and Jenny's work for a long time and was so happy when I saw they submitted something for the open call. I think these are just two really great poems that compliment each other well.

What Urge Will Save Us by Alina Pleskova /// I like to think that SG is open to all kinds of work, that the press isn't narrowed down to one kind or type of poetry. Alina's chapbook is one that I had never read before--I mean that in the way that the vividness of the language and the story that these poems tell had me engaged from page one. Yes, there have been poems written before about intimacy and finding oneself in the midst of it, but Alina's work made those ideas new for me. Emily Dickinson's line about reading something and feeling as if "the top of your head were taken off," this chapbook is what that means.

Libido by Cathy de la Cruz /// Cathy is a triple-threat talent wise and I'm so glad she trusted us with her work for her first chapbook and our first e-chapbook. This is another chapbook that discusses intimacy, but in a very different way from Alina's. Cathy's work is just as effective though and hard-hitting in the feelings it evokes. "Something, Anything" will stop you in your tracks.

12 or 20 (small press) questions;