Your humble narrator traveled to Astoria, Oregon to hear the launch of The Last Man in Willapa, the new book of poems from poet/lepidopterist Robert Michael Pyle. There is such a tightly-knit poetry community in Astoria. Maybe it’s because of the annual FisherPoets gathering. Regardless, about 35 people filled Kala to hear their beloved Bob read from his new book on May 24, 2024. You can hear his entire reading here:

But that’s not all! The next day Bob met me at the retro Atomic Motel and we talked for over an hour about his new book, the poems in it, his childhood, bioregionalism, his trip to Cuba, Vladimir Nabokov’s notion via biographer Brian Boyd of “attending to the individuating detail” of one’s life (an upgrade from the same notion I’ve gotten from Blake and Pound) and his general “thing” “close attention to the natural world.” It’s the June 2024 Cascadian Prophets podcast:

Enjoy the poems he read in the interview:

Bigfoot Poem:

Hazels:

In the Botanic Garden:

5. The Children of the Night Try to Puncture the Sky

More Bob? Enjoy Jason Wirth’s December 2022 interview: https://hilo.hawaii.edu/jpact/issues/volume-5-2023/PylebyWirth.php