I’ve got a new chapbook coming along in October from Baseline Press. Consider Each Possibility is a set of fairly short poems. The manuscript goes back about two years. Re-reading it now, it seems clear that these poems were a step towards a properly minimalist manuscript I’ve got in the works now. I’m excited about the book, and am looking forward to reading from it. Karen Schindler at Baseline does such beautiful work, and I’m truly thrilled to have my name on the Baseline list.

I also recently picked up a small rubber-stamp rotary press, a “Superior Cub Rotary Printing Press.”

The internet thinks it is from the 40s, 50s, or 60s. The included literature tells me that I can use it to print greeting cards, recipe cards, invitations, as well as “tally cards for [my] mother’s bridge club, programs, for garden or reading clubs, and raffle tickets for fund-raising groups.” I plan to use it to print weird little poems.

I’ve run one small poem off as a test, not using the rotary press but simply pressing the lines of type into paper by hand. Work to be done to get things to come out clean, but I’m happy with it!

I’ve had three tiny poems make appearances online in the last couple weeks. “Chronology”, a plundered thing, is up over at Flat Singles Press (thanks Joe Labine) and I’ve got two (two!) up in the July 2015 issue of The Steel Chisel (thanks David Emery) beside new work from Justin Million and Dave Currie.

To quote Jeff Blackman, “Otherwise / nothing new just work.”

Alan Neal and All in a Day were kind enough to speak to Bill and to me last week about The Collected Poems. You can listen to audio of Bill reading a few poems and Alan interviewing Bill here. Photos and the Chaudiere report from the launch here.

Thanks to all that were able to make it out, and to all who sent regrets along in advance.

I am giving a paper as part of ACCUTE at Congress this coming weekend: “‘Ottawa, / you know nothing / of poems’: William Hawkins and the Small Press in Ottawa.” The paper grew out of editing The Collected Poems of William Hawkins. It looks a bit more broadly at how Hawkins’s life and work make clear some of the contrasts that the small press inhabited in Ottawa in the 1960s, arguing that his poems and their material production as well as his critical reception in the intervening decades are informed by his residence in the capital. The panel is called “Ottawa in Literature / Literature in Ottawa” and will also have papers by Alana Fletcher (Queens) and Zachary Abram (University of Ottawa). Sunday May 31, 1:45-3:15pm. Should be fun!

There is also a reading on Sunday night as an unofficial part of ACCUTE. “A Night of Too Many Poets” runs 7pm at the Carleton Tavern, taking advantage of the sudden influx of poets into the city thanks to Congress. I’ll be reading beside some excellent people, too many to list here. We’re at 13 last I checked. Hopefully it won’t be quite so humid. Come on out!

After far too many years of work, a paper that began its life during my M.A. research will finally see publication.“‘poet and audience actually exist’: The Contact Poetry Reading Series (1957-1962) and the Study of Literary Readings in Canada” is forthcoming in the Spring issue of the Journal of Canadian Studies. I owe a great debt of thanks to a great number of people for helping the paper forward over the years. You will be thanked in person.

You will also find a nice article about Collett Tracey, In/Words, and what some of its past editors are up to now in the latest issue of FASSinate. I am always up for singing the praises of the magazine and its influence on me, and was happy to have the chance to do so once again.

Now available from Apt. 9 Press: the blue, blue there by Marilyn Irwin and The Lake Contains an Emergency Room by Lillian Nećakov!

Look what you can purchase online now, via All Lit Up (the online bookstore run by the Literary Press Group).

The Collected Poems of William Hawkins has arrived!

It is a thing of beauty. The art by Chris Wells on the cover, the design and typesetting by Christine McNair, the production values from Chaudiere, the blurbs from Bruce Cockburn, Roy MacSkimming, and Nelson Ball, and of course, most importantly, Bill’s poems! It is overwhelming. Too many thank-you’s to list here (they’re in the book anyway).

Five (plus) years of work, and here it is, a 354 page book that feels great in hand. I feel very lucky and grateful. I hope that some new readers will discover Bill’s poems, and I hope that some longtime readers will re-discover them.

Reminders that you can read an interview with me about editing the book here, and you can read the introduction to the book here.

Launch details (currently in-progress)  to follow. You can buy it in person from me, or from rob and Christine at Chaudiere (rob@chaudierebooks.com), immediately. Available online for purchase here shortly.

AB Series details here.

I recently had a paper published in Amodern Issue 4: The Poetry Series. I am very proud to be in the journal alongside such intelligent people (Marjorie Perloff, Dean Irvine, Gregory Betts, and on and on). My paper, “Setting Widespread Precedent: The Canada Council for the Arts and the Funding of Poetry Readings in Canada (1957-1977)” is an historical look at how the model for funding poetry readings developed at the Council during its first two decades.

The Collected Poems of William Hawkins, forthcoming from Chaudiere Books, is now at the printer. It should be in our hands by the end of the month.

Apt. 613 was kind enough to run a five-part review of Apt. 9’s Five last week during their “Poetry Week” festivities. Read the individual parts: Jeff Blackman, jesslyn delia smith, Justin Million, Rachael Simpson, Cameron Anstee.

On a related now, the recent “Accord” reading in Kingston is now available to listen to online thanks to Bruce Kauffman and his “Finding a Voice” show on CFRC Kingston: Part 1, Part 2.

Finally, I am excited and nervous to be reading in the AB Series at the end of April alongside Steven Artelle. Full details and a poster will be available shortly, but the reading will be on April 30. I will post more once I have it. I’m working through a manuscript of minimalist work (some of which you can hear on “Finding a Voice” above) that I hope to read from at that event.

Design by Christine McNair, cover painting by Christopher Wells (whose artwork has illustrated Hawkins’s books going back to 1964; Wells also collaborated on the poster poems in 1962).

Introduction: “Living now in Ottawa: William Hawkins at the Margins”

Chaudiere Books Interview about the editing of the book.