The Pre-Poem Moment

I'm very pleased to be included in a new Frog Hollow Press anthology. My contribution is an essay on my poem "Achromatope," previously published as a Frog Hollow broadside.

Here's the bumpf:

APPROACHES TO POETRY: the pre-poem moment

edited by SHANE NEILSON

The origin of poetry is presumed to be
song; but what is the origin of the poem?
This anthology attempts to explain the
origins of original poems by asking 27
poets to create a dialogue with a favourite
poem (their own) in the form of an essay.
The poets were given free reign in
answering; some were short and sharp,
others ranged further, thinking of the
essay as an opportunity to discover the
means of poetry, how biography and
image and the right words render them-
selves unto the poem.

The results are sometimes essayistic
and sometimes indivisible from their
poetic origins. Poets can be as various as
reaching back to Robert Browning, side-
ways to a heteronym, or forward to the
process of revision. Each of the poets
surprised themselves as they trawled
their consciousness, discovering not just
the elements of their poems, but their
process.

essays & poems by:

mark abley
brian bartlett
john barton
stephanie bolster
tim bowling
ron charach
evie christie
wayne clifford
geoffrey cook
jason dewinetz
crispin elsted
ben hart
jessica hiemstra-
van der horst
amanda jernigan
jim johnstone
monica kidd
m. travis lane
nyla matuk
alison pick
harold rhenisch
claire sharpe
goran simic
sue sinclair
david solway
carmine starnino
sara tilley
zachariah wells