I got a new chapbook manuscript

…anyone wanna publish it?

Seriously, I dig chapbook. I love that the unit is very manageable and undaunting for me, in terms of thinking up a project, and writing it through to some end without the same exhaustion that I’ve experienced writing full length book projects. As well, I love that production timelines on chapbooks bring almost immediate results. It’s also easing me back nicely into the prospect of writing a book. I’m happy to say I see 4th book manuscript solidifying, as we wait to hear back on 3rd book manuscript. This waiting, of course, is interminable, so it’s good to fill my waiting time up with some satisfying amounts of productivity.

That said, the poems in this chapbook manuscript, entitled We, Spoken Here, are as follows:

• Upland Dance
• We, Spoken Here
• Worry
• Pakikisama
• We, Spoken Here
• No, I am Not Yours
• We, Spoken Here
• West Oakland Invocation
• West Oakland Litany
• West Oakland Sutra for the AK-47 Shooter at 3:00 AM
• My California
• West Oakland Serenade
• (t)here
• 14th & Broadway Lullaby, Oakland

So there’s that.

Chapbook: Cherry is Here

Whew! I have survived yesterday evening’s read and dash to the next reading. I’m a little tired, so I will get to writing about yesterday evening’s two events soon. In the meantime…

Cherry is here!

[covers come in red and black...]

Announcing Cherry

by Barbara Jane Reyes

Published by Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs

To order a copy of the chapbook please visit the Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs website or email Brenda Iijima: Brenda@yoyolabs.com

$6 + $1 shipping

send checks to

Brenda Iijima

596 Bergen Street, #1

Brooklyn, NY 11238

http://yoyolabs.com/reyes.html

Shameless Hussy Poetics: Buy your Easter Sunday Chapbook!

Thanks again to Carrie Hunter of Ypolita Press for these lovely Easter Sunday chapbooks, which are now available for purchase online:

She had previously posted jpgs, and these are scans of the actual covers, so I think these are more true to life. I will be receiving my copies soon, so that’ll be great.

I ran into Pegasus Books’ intrepid Clayton Banes at the recent SPDBooks Open House, and he mentioned that he’d be getting them into the store as well.

Cherry: Chapbook Coming Soon

Many thanks to Brenda Iijima of Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs, for Cherry is coming soon! Here is info on an upcoming book party (from the Cuneiform Press blog here):

United Artists, Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs,
Granary, Roof, Cuneiform, Bootstrap, The Figures & Ugly Duckling
INVITE YOU TO A SMALL PRESS PARTY
May 15, 2008
Max Protetch Gallery
511 W. 22nd, NYC
6-8 PM

Come celebrate the publication of the following books:

Phyllis Wat, The Influence of Paintings Hung in Bedrooms
Barbara Henning, My Autobiography
Gloria Frym, Solution Simulacra
Reed Bye, Join the Planets
Barbara Jane Reyes, Cherry
Sueyeun Juliette Lee, Mental Commitment Robots
Julie Patton, Notes for Some (Nominally) Awake

Jennifer Firestone, Waves
Geoffrey Young, The Riot Act & Pockets of Wheat
Catullus, The Complete Poems (trans. Ryan Gallagher)
John Wieners, A Book of Prophecies
Tom Morgan, On Going
Jen Bervin, The Desert
Lewis Warsh, Inseparable : Poems 1995-2005

Francesco Clemente & Vincent Katz, Alcuni Telefonini
Clark Coolidge, Space & The Book of During
Bill Berkson, Sudden Address
Ted Greenwald, Two Wrongs
Dan Featherston, The Clock Maker’s Memoir
Mimeo Mimeo, edited by Jed Birmingham & Kyle Schlesinger
Nada Gordon, Folly

The Consequence of Innovation: 21st. C. Poetics, ed. Craig Dworkin
Marc Nasdor, Sonnetailia
Gary Sullivan, PPL in a Depot
Christine Hume, Lullaby
Sam Truitt, Vertical Elegies
Jack Micheline, One of a Kind
Aleksandr Skidan, Red Shifting

Chapbook: Easter Sunday

Easter Sunday is almost here! You can go to the Ypolita Press blog for more info. In the meantime, here are two covers, designed by Carrie Hunter, with art by Juan Carlos Quintana and Michelle Muennig:

You may remember Juan Carlos as the cover artist for OCHO #16.

Poet : Work : Updates

I’ve just finished proofing the pdf’s of chapbook #1, Easter Sunday. Carrie Hunter of Ypolita Press and I have gone over some really awesome cover art, so just you wait.

I’ve just updated my acknowledgments page for chapbook #2, Cherry, and submitted this to Brenda Iijima of Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs, so just you wait (again).

I have three poems — “Accessories,” “Corpse Eater,” and “Worry” — forthcoming in Eleven Eleven.

I am reading/speaking at two different places next week: Los Medanos College on Wednesday afternoon, and Manilatown on Saturday.

Bits of Poetry News

(1) OCHO #16: MiPOesias Magazine Print Companion is now available at Amazon. Have a look see here.

(2) Many thanks to Brenda Iijima of Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs who will be publishing my chapbook, Cherry. More info forthcoming.

(3) Many interesting folk have been visiting this here blog; this weekend has seen both Bill Knott and Juan Felipe Herrera commenting on recent posts. So interesting.

(4) Tomorrow evening is Literary Death Match! Will be sure to get all diva’ed fantastic for the affair.

(5) We saw Dagoberto Gilb this evening at Modern Times Books in the Mission. Alejandro Murguía was there with Raza Studies and/or Creative Writing classes from SFSU. More on all this later. Now, sleep.

Poet-Work-Stuff

(1) Good morning. After receiving a positive response to a query, I have just submitted my chapbook, entitled Cherry, to an awesome indie publisher, so wish me luck. I decided it was time to let go the war and porn poem project, and to start working on other projects.

(2) That said, I have also just sent out a couple of queries re: Diwata to a couple of awesome indie publishers. It’s time to stop tinkering with this manuscript, and to find this baby a home.

(3) Exciting plans for 2008, and I wish I could talk about it all publicly, but I will use my better judgment and keep quiet for now while we continue planning and doing our work over here.

And that’s it right there. I enjoy poetry work; I enjoy finding spaces, seeing these spaces open up for my work in the world.

I am grateful when I am recognized and rewarded for my work. Last year, I was surprised and grateful to find poets I admire, Linh Dinh, Nathaniel Mackey, and Anne Waldman, interested in my work, recognizing me for my work.

For this, I enjoy being in the poetry world. I enjoy being excited by poets’ work, and I thrive in spaces of poet generosity.

Some thoughts, including poetry stuff on the horizon

(1) Yesterday evening’s road trip and the Sacramento Poetry Center reading was lovely. A couple of pictures are at the blog of Sacramento poet and editor of Munyori Poetry Journal Emmanuel Sigauke. More on the reading soon.

(2) I have just been invited to be a feature poet in the Visiting Writers Series of the Creative Writing Department of UC Santa Cruz, where I am now told Nathaniel Mackey has recently taught Poeta en San Francisco. My reading will be in April, and will be also be slated as a part of the Critical Filipino Studies Research Cluster’s upcoming conference titled “Filipina/o American Studies at the Crossroads: Art, Activism and Scholarship in Response to Philippine State Violence.” Details forthcoming.

(3) Thanks to Ypolita Press and Carrie Hunter, who will be publishing my chapbook, Easter Sunday. Exciting! This is going to be fun. Details forthcoming.