Poetry Postcard Fest co-founder Paul Nelson interviews Mark Johnson on his experience with the august POetry POstcard festival.
This year the Poetry Postcard Fest celebrates its 20th anniversary. From the fest many a creative project has spawned, and one recent example of that is Julie Master’s book: No Headlines Here: Postcard Poems.
Notes on the last Poetry Postcard Activation for 2026 at Pritchard Beach in Seattle.
Postcarding and DaySonging (A Workshop). In this session it will be a presentation of how the postcard fest developed, how the daysong developed, how I prepare for the fest and how participants attending prepare for the fest, as well as how to prepare for a successful daysong. The similarities of the daysong to serial poetry could be discussed, as well as the effort to put one’s self into the open, which has benefits in one’s own life.
Awesome interview. I took away a lot of ideas … Mark’s discussing the
epistolary poem, // a verse letter // letter poem being a poem in the form of an epistle or letter.
( thank you google )
was the part that I forgot that was suggested sometime when I started PoPo.
.
I would often forget to put the salutation on the postcard … or not leave room for it when I started.
The first year, I realize now …thanks to Mark and Paul’s conversation, is that I was worried about
using an informal first name.
Foolish me, I got myself tied up in calling people by their first names. Of course, that was meant back
when I was young, the proper way to address an older person or a title they had earned.
My takeaway besides the epistolary style … I have to admit that I am probably a lot older than most of
the people that are on the list. I AM that older person that I thought I was writing to.
.
My only negative-ish comment to Mark is about the “not being hand written means not spontaneous”…
for me, anyway, what I type is more spontaneous than hand written …
and the fact that hand writing for many people may be illegible or painful.
Thanks for a delightful interview. 🙂 <3