FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE July 14, 2023
Contact: Paul E. Nelson, pen@cascadiapoeticslab.org

REGISTER FOR 7TH ANNUAL CASCADIA POETRY FESTIVAL

By Veronica Martinez, Administrative Assistant, Cascadia Poetics Lab

Celebrate the poetry of the bioregion at the Cascadia Poetics Lab’s 7th annual Cascadia Poetry Festival! From October 6-8, 2023 at Spring Street Center in Seattle, WA, writing workshops, panel discussions and readings will resume for the first time since before the pandemic. Surround yourself with a community of open minded and engaged writers!

A key theme in the work of the Cascadia Poetry Festival is that it is vital to focus on the place in which we live in order to chart a way forward past current political and environmental challenges. This year, the festival celebrates the launch of Cascadia Zen Volume I: Bioregional Writings on Cascadia Here and Now, edited by Tetsuzen Jason Wirth, Paul E. Nelson, Adelia MacWilliam with Theresa Whitehill. The anthology brings together nonfiction, poetry and translations that explore expressions of Zen and the reflective life within the Cascadia bioregion.

This year’s Cascadia Poetry Festival will feature poets Andrew Schelling, Brenda Hillman, Tim McNulty, Theresa Whitehill, Holly J. Hughes, Michael Daley, Dr. Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs, Tess Gallagher, Jan Zwicky, Robert Bringhurst, Gary Copeland Lilley, Cedar Sigo and Sarah Marie Ortiz and others. On Friday, October 6 at 7 p.m. there will be a keynote reading by Gary Copeland Lilly, Jan Zwicky, Tim McNulty and Robert Bringhurst. Saturday, October 7 at 9 a.m. starts a full day of panels and workshops, celebrating Empty Bowl Press, “The Poetics of de-Colonial Cascadia,” workshops by Dr. Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs and Tess Gallagher, as well as talks on Bioregional Typography and Eco-Poetic. The night will conclude with a main stage reading and the After Party reading. The festival will conclude on Sunday with a tour and reading at Kubota Garden, a viewing of the film On Heavy Lifting by poet Theresa Whitehill and artist Felicia Rice, and a closing reading honoring poets with Cascadian connections who have died.

The Cascadia Poetry Festival is absolutely unique, offering both attention to local conditions (both social and geographical/ecological), and to general matters of aesthetics (what poetry is up to right now–what matters to poets, and how they are responding to what matters),” says Canadian poet Stephen Collis, “I know of few communities like this in the world…open, focused, exploratory, welcoming, democratic and engaged to its very core. The Cascadia Poetry Festival is a vital necessity.

Sponsors of the Festival include: La Sala, 4 Culture, WESTAF, Humanities Washington, Seattle Escribe, Subud Greater Seattle, National Endowment of the Arts, Kubota Garden, Spring Street Center, Empty Bowl Press, Seattle Office of Arts and Culture and the Washington State Arts Commission.

Registration for an early bird gold pass is available now for $60, and registration for individual workshops is available for $75. Register now via the festival website: https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/cascadia-poetry-festival-7/ and find more in depth information regarding the festival and its featured poets and events.

Cascadia Poetics Lab, a Seattle-based nonprofit, was founded in Auburn, Washington, on December 14, 1993. Founding Director Paul E. Nelson is available for interviews. (206) 422.5002 or pen@cascadiapoeticslab.org