
Sam O’Hana on How to Support Working Class Poets
When I said that what’s good for general society is also good for poets, I’m talking about a series of cultural opportunities where a much wider stretch of people are allowed to take the opportunity to become writers. I came back from a conference last week where I presented some research on the demographic aspects of the New American poets. The poets that were born and came to maturity in the early to mid-20th century were beneficiaries of broad national scale longevity gains. This [includes] things like pushbacks against tuberculosis, against polio, against poor nutrition and infant mortality. These are gains that were made by the medical and scientific institutions, but also by general prosperity, by making more food available to more people and making that food shelf stable for longer. So, when you talk about what might make it possible for poor people to do more creative work, you could start by saying well we should just give people more money, but the fact of the matter is that plenty of people already have the wealth they need, they just don’t actually have any time.
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Rhea Miller on Cloudhand, Clenched Fist
To go back 30 years in one’s writing is an exercise fraught with the possibility that the material is very dated, but this book, Cloudhand, Clenched Fist, by Rhea Miller, is a large exception.
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Interview with Paul Nelson on the Poetry Postcard Fest
Sam Hamill said “Over the past decade or so, no one has done more for poetry in the Pacific Northwest than has Paul Nelson.” With the Poetry Postcard Fest, now in its 19th year, that influence is spreading well beyond the Cascadia bioregion and all over the world.
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Anne Tardos on Cascadian Prophets
I am grateful today to bring you an interview with Anne Tardos on Cascadian Prophets, reading from and speaking about her newest book: The Always Already Absent Present.
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An interview with Jewell James
An interview with Jewell James, Master Carver and Director of the Sovereignty and Treaty Protection Office with the Lummi Nation
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Andrew Schelling on Forests, Temples, Glacial Rivers
Sanskrit translations, a deep bioregional sense of place and homages to dead (mostly) poet friends makes Andrew Schelling’s new book a compelling distillation of subjects he’s been tracking for over 40 years. Author of “Tracks Along The Left Coast: Jaime D’Angulo & Pacific Coast Culture” and “From the Arapaho Songbook” and many other titles, he lives in the mountains outside of Boulder, Colorado, and teaches poetry and Sanskrit at Naropa University. The new book is Forests, Temples and Glacial Rivers, published by Empty Bowl.
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Sam O’Hana on How to Support Working Class Poets
Allen Ginsberg earned $701 dollars in 1956 from Pacific Greyhound Lines and yet he had plenty of...
Rhea Miller on Cloudhand, Clenched Fist
To go back 30 years in one's writing is an exercise fraught with the possibility that the material...
Interview with Paul Nelson on the Poetry Postcard Fest
If you were to visit cascadiapoeticslab.org and click to the Poetry Postcard Fest page, you’d find...

Cascadian Prophets: Interviews 1999-2023
is the second collection of transcribed interviews taken from the 30 year history of the Cascadia Poetics Lab and conducted by Paul E Nelson, CPL Founder. Interviewees include 7 USAmericans and 7 Canadians, 7 women and 7 men and 7 people who have died and 7 that at the time of publication (February 2, 2024) are still alive. Interviewees:
Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs – Mary Norbert Körte – Robert Bringhurst – Barry McKinnon – Colleen J. McElroy – Brenda Hillman – Daphne Marlatt – Diane di Prima – Miriam Nichols – Stephen Collis- Charles Potts – Robin Blaser – Peter Culley – Sam Hamill
The book is $30 plus shipping and is available online here.

Cascadian Prophets: Interviews 1999-2023
is the second collection of transcribed interviews taken from the 30 year history of the Cascadia Poetics Lab and conducted by Paul E Nelson, CPL Founder. Interviewees include 7 USAmericans and 7 Canadians, 7 women and 7 men and 7 people who have died and 7 that at the time of publication (February 2, 2024) are still alive. Interviewees:
Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs – Mary Norbert Körte – Robert Bringhurst – Barry McKinnon – Colleen J. McElroy – Brenda Hillman – Daphne Marlatt – Diane di Prima – Miriam Nichols – Stephen Collis- Charles Potts – Robin Blaser – Peter Culley – Sam Hamill
The book is $30 plus shipping and is available online here.
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Harry and Cleo Davenport Elser, wedding photo
Diana Elser
“Donation in memory of Harry Elser and Cleo Davenport Elser, two Montana ranch kids. Harry was a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. We learned to enjoy each place we lived – the Missouri River in Great Falls, Montana, the Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas – the Great Salt Lake Basin, and always – Montana.”

Glen and Jessie Dodge
Sally Hedges-Blanquez
“For the memory of Glenn and Jessie Dodge, a World War One Vet and his wife, world-class grandparents and farmers in the town of Gate, Washington.”

Glen Dodge



