Posts tagged: Mad Poets Review

AT LONG LAST: Mad Poets Book Party

October 20, 2010, by 6 comments

It’s been a while… thanks to budget cuts and general financial yuck, it’s been a lot longer than any of us would have liked. But this weekend, we are thrilled to finally release Volume 23 of the Mad Poets Review!!!! We’ll be celebrating on Saturday, starting at 11am, at the Delaware County Institute of Science.

Mad Poets Review, Vol 23

Mad Poets Review, Vol 23

Volume 23 is definitely worth the wait! Bigger than your average MPR, this is an extra-stuffed, stunning issue — 272 pages, perfect bound, and filled with incredible poetry from local favorites, like Joe Roarty and Dan Maguire, as well as nationally renowned poets, like Therese Halscheid and Paul Martin. Sneak a peek at the Table of Contest below the jump.

For those who haven’t been to a book party before, it’s a read-till-you-drop extravaganza, where we go through the issue cover to cover and any published poet who’s there gets to read his/her work. Come for all or part. Come for great poetry. (I also have it on good authority that there will be some scrumptious munchies!) The party starts at 11am at the Delaware County Institute of Science.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Read more →

TONIGHT: Genre-bending continues at Milkboy

June 10, 2010, by No comments yet

By the late notice of this post, you might not think I’m as excited as I am about tonight’s reading at Milkboy. But I am indeed psyched. We’ve got three great readers & a genre-bending good time. We’ve got three poets: Tree Reisener is an old friend on the Mad Poet scene who will be reading her dynamic short fiction tonight! Dave Worrell will be reading his jazz-infused poems with musical accompaniment. And Connie Beresin will be representin’ old school-style with a straight up poetry reading. This looks to be one of the most eclectic readings thus far in our mixed-genre series. And I can’t wait.  Oh, and let’s not forget the awesomeness that has been our open mic contest! Seriously folks — this thing has been a total rollercoaster, and I’m diggin’ the ride.

Here’s some more about our readers:

Dave Worrell’s poems have appeared in Mad Poets Review, U.S. 1 Worksheets, Wild River Review and Fox Chase Review.  He has performed his jazz-accompanied poems at Chris’ Jazz Cafe in Philadelphia and Cornelia Street Cafe in New York City.
Connie Beresin has been an artist, journaling devotee, secretary, case worker, community organizer/planner, social services administrator, fund raiser, public policy advocate, wife, mother, grandmother and caregiver. Retiring in 2006 after 30 years in non-profit social services, she is focusing on poetry and watercolor. Her poems have appeared in MARGIE, Mad Poets Review, Moonstone Art Center’s Poetry Ink, Voices de la Luna, CC&D and Kotopress Loss Journal. In 2009 one of her poems was selected for a reading at the D & R Greenway Land Trust’s poetry and art event celebrating waterways in New Jersey. Connie particularly enjoys encouraging poetry reading and writing among her 13 grandchildren, produced by her daughter and three sons and their spouses. She lives with her husband, Carl, at The Quadrangle in Haverford, PA.
Tree Riesener has published poetry and short fiction in numerous literary magazines.  Her work has been translated into Russian and Turkish.  Achievements include three first prizes for the Short-Short Story and the Literary Short Story at the Philadelphia Writers Conference, Finalist for Black Lawrence Press’s Hudson Prize, Finalist in PANK magazine’s Fiction Chapbook Contest, Best of Wigleaf 2009 , Semi-Finalist in the Pablo Neruda Competition, three short stories staged in the Writing Aloud productions of InterAct Theatre, Philadelphia, a Hawthornden International Writing Fellowship, two Pushcart nominations, and the William Van Wert Fiction Award. She is the author of three poetry collections, Inscapes, Angel Poison and Liminalog. EK, a full-length collection of ekphrastic poetry, is forthcoming in 2012 from Cervena Barva Press.  Her website is http://www.treeriesener.com and she blogs at http://www.treeriesener.blogspot.com.

Dave Worrell‘s poems have appeared in Mad Poets Review, U.S. 1 Worksheets, Wild River Review and Fox Chase Review.  He has performed his jazz-accompanied poems at Chris’ Jazz Cafe in Philadelphia and Cornelia Street Cafe in New York City.

Connie Beresin, poet

Connie Beresin, poet

Connie Beresin has been an artist, journaling devotee, secretary, case worker, community organizer/planner, social services administrator, fund raiser, public policy advocate, wife, mother, grandmother and caregiver. Retiring in 2006 after 30 years in non-profit social services, she is focusing on poetry and watercolor. Her poems have appeared in MARGIE, Mad Poets Review, Moonstone Art Center’s Poetry Ink, Voices de la Luna, CC&D and Kotopress Loss Journal. In 2009 one of her poems was selected for a reading at the D & R Greenway Land Trust’s poetry and art event celebrating waterways in New Jersey. Connie particularly enjoys encouraging poetry reading and writing among her 13 grandchildren, produced by her daughter and three sons and their spouses. She lives with her husband, Carl, at The Quadrangle in Haverford, PA.

Tree Reisener, poet and short fiction writer

Tree Reisener, poet and short fiction writer

Tree Riesener has published poetry and short fiction in numerous literary magazines.  Her work has been translated into Russian and Turkish.  Achievements include three first prizes for the Short-Short Story and the Literary Short Story at the Philadelphia Writers Conference, Finalist for Black Lawrence Press’s Hudson Prize, Finalist in PANK magazine’s Fiction Chapbook Contest, Best of Wigleaf 2009 , Semi-Finalist in the Pablo Neruda Competition, three short stories staged in the Writing Aloud productions of InterAct Theatre, Philadelphia, a Hawthornden International Writing Fellowship, two Pushcart nominations, and the William Van Wert Fiction Award. She is the author of three poetry collections, Inscapes, Angel Poison and Liminalog. EK, a full-length collection of ekphrastic poetry, is forthcoming in 2012 from Cervena Barva Press.  Her website is http://www.treeriesener.com and she blogs at http://www.treeriesener.blogspot.com.

Friday Random 2

February 5, 2010, by No comments yet

So, way back in the day when I first started blogging, before I started my current (ongoing) personal blog, and well before I took on the duties of the Mad Poets bloggette, there was thing that went around the blogosphere called The Friday Random 10… folks would put their music players on random & then post to their blog the first 10 songs that came up. It was always fun to see what connections came up.

Inspired by that tradition (does anyone still do it), I’m initiating the Friday Random 2 here on the Mad Poets blog. Every Friday I’ll select 2 random (or not so random, as the case may be) poems from the Mad Poets Review, the Internet, the Norton Anthology, or where ever I feel like. If you’ve got a blog, maybe you can point us in the direction of a few of your favorite poems (let’s keep copyright in mind, so link to external sites, get permission from your friends & be generally conscience of not just posting someone else’s stuff without their say so).

I thought it only fitting that we start off with a poem by the Queen of the Mad Poets, Eileen D’Angelo. This poem appeared in the Mad Poets Review, Volume 20, which was released in 2007.

South Wind
~Eileen M. D’Angelo

It’s one a.m. –
and nothing feels right:
My legs are too long for this small bed,
my feet dangle off the end, into cool air.
The stars outside hang just below the tree line,
and this cabin is not big enough for me
and this country brown spider.

It’s one a.m. –
and I want to pick up the phone,
hear your voice, tell you how cold the sheets are
here in the mountains, where four months
of rainless skies deluged into one day
of drizzle and downpours. The other night,
under cover of overcast sky, I slipped
into the dark cold waters, my nipples
hard as buttons, my eyes skyward
as smoky clouds moved across the moon.

Tomorrow I will walk around the lake,
rain or no rain. I will take what I can
for the journey home: This south wind
blowing off the lake, the damp pines
turning in sunlight. Fallen apples
circled by bees.

The second poem comes from one of my newer favorite web mags, Literary Mama. I read this poem a few months ago & it just rang so true of the pressures (read: neuroticisms of motherhood). Here are the first few lines, please link over for the full poem, it’s well worth it!

Junk food poem
~Rachel Levy

Start stressing about Halloween festivities at the kiddies’ school. Read flyer about Room 9 Halloween party. Experience disbelief that each family is to send in some kind of Halloween junk. Calculate that junk total for each child would equal twenty-five pieces. Wonder how so much junk will fit into little goodie bags that kids are supposed to decorate. Experience some level of disgust with emphasis on materialism given the recent economic downturn. Experience desire to not spend money on little plastic witches with little parachutes that will get destroyed after one day of use and go into a landfill. Realize that before landfill junk will come into home. Experience strong desire to keep junk out of home. Consider possibility of homeschooling kids…. READ THE REST OF THIS POEM.