Poetry Postcard Activations
Free Poetry & Community Events in Rainier Beach!
Life as Rehearsal for the Poem and Poetics as Cosmology 2026 Workshops
A five week online (Zoom) workshop best suited for continuing participants and more experienced poets (open to open form) in workshops facilitated by Cascadia Poetics Lab and Poetry Postcard Fest Co-Founder Paul E Nelson. Participate in reading and discussion of foundational essays, interviews, listening and other assignments, as well as spontaneous poetry composition exercises. In Winter 2026, we’ll explore a short history of Cascadian poetry, touching on:
-
- Theodore Roethke
- Fred Wah
- Daphne Marlatt
- George Bowering
- Mary Norbert Kõrte
- John Olson
- Phyllis Webb
- Stephen Collis
- Sharon Thesen
- Barry McKinnon
- Cedar Sigo
- George Stanley
- Robin Blaser
Life as Rehearsal for the Poem (LARFP)
- Sundays 3-5 PM PDT
- March 29, April 5, 12, 19, and 26, 2026
Poetics as Cosmology (PAC)
- Thursdays 3-5 PM PDT
- March 26, April 2, 9, 16, and 23, 2026
Cascadia Poetics LAB Blog
Postcard Fest Open Mic Saturday, Sept 10 9am PDT
Did your card get there? Could anyone read your handwriting? Do you want to try to match a postcard poet's face with their handwriting and poetry?...
2023 Postcard Fest Registration is Open
The 2022 Poetry Postcard Fest is over & ends with the largest participation in 16 years. 17 total groups tie the 2020 expanded pandemic fest....
Michael Daley Interview (Romance with the Unexpected)
I had the good fortune on Sunday, July 17, 2022 to travel to the home of Michael Daley, on Fidalgo Island, to chat with him about his poem Romance...
WAPL Call for Salmon Poems
Rena Priest, Washington State Poet Laureate, was just awarded a fellowship from the Academy of American Poets! As part of the fellowship, she is...
2022 Postcard Fest Stats
The stats are now final for the 2022 Poetry Postcard Fest. Participants: 544 The highest fest participation in 16 years, matching the pandemic year,...
Interview with Claudia Castro Luna
Interview with Claudia Castro Luna, recorded 17-JUNE-2022 via Zoom about her new book Cipota Under the Moon. There’s war raging in Ukraine. A...
2022 Poetry Postcard Fest Launch
(This post has been updated with video of the launch for those who could not attend. See below.) I've been getting some questions as the draft lists...
Postcard Fest Registration Ends July 4
Year 16 of the Poetry Postcard Fest starts on Monday, July 4, 2022 and registration will end on that day. Already there are over 427 registered...
Postcard Fest Orientation
The 16th Poetry Postcard Fest begins July 4, 2022! Have you REGISTERED yet? At the Epic Post-Fest Prompt workshop there were some folks looking for...
Two versions of what will be basically the same workshop to discuss the concept of the daysong, how to accomplish one and what it means to the poet who pulls it off.
Thursday, January 22, 2026 3-5 PM PDT
Monday, January 26, 2026 3-5 PM PDT
Workshop Cost: Free, with optional donation of $20-$100.00 (On Zoom)
Cascadia Poetics LAB Blog
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 time to dedicate to his true calling, that of poet...
Postcards from Mapes Creek June 8
Postcards from Mapes Creek on June 8! Join us on June 8, 2025 from 4-7 PM at Mapes Creek for a community poetry postcard gathering! At the mouth of...
Seattle Author Tessa Hulls Wins Pulitzer Prize
Seattle author, illustrator and adventurer Tessa Hulls has won a Pulitzer Prize for her graphic memoir, Feeding Ghosts! The memoir dives into 3...
The Poetry Postcard Fest is an annual 56-day experiment in spontaneity and community building. This literarary event is a self-guided workshop in spontaneous composition where people sign up to send 31 original poems on postcards to folks on a participation list before the end of August. The fest was initiated in 2007 by poets Paul E. Nelson and Lana Ayers, and has grown to include poets participating worldwide. Registration opens annually on September 1.
Lorna Dee Cervantes Interview (April on Olympia)
Lorna Dee Cervantes Interview on April on Olympia
Podcast (prophets-podcast): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:12:25 — 99.5MB)
Our current media landscape seems hooked on a doom loop, an apocalyptic dream of human self-annihilation from collapsing nation states and anarchy to climate change to AI terminators, to genocidal warmongering. In order to avoid going down with that ship, we, as humans, are going to need to flip the script, to learn to think differently.
Click this link for more information about the workshop Thinkingwith: Writing Strategies for Reconnecting to Earth.
Sundays 3-5:00 PM Pacific Time
February 15, 22, March 1, 8, and 15, 2026
thinkingwith: writing strategies for reconnecting to earth
Our current media landscape seems hooked on a doom loop, an apocalyptic dream of human self-annihilation from collapsing nation states and anarchy to climate change to AI terminators, to genocidal warmongering. In order to avoid going down with that ship, we, as humans, are going to need to flip the script, to learn to think differently.
Click this link for more information about the workshop Thinkingwith: Writing Strategies for Reconnecting to Earth.
Sundays 3-5:00 PM Pacific Time
February 15, 22, March 1, 8, and 15, 2026
!
We recognize that our home office is on the ancestral homeland of the Duwamish, Muckleshoot and other Coastal Salish tribes. Our dedication to bioregionalism is to co-exist on this land in the sacred manner as practiced by the traditional ways of these indigenous people.
Statement on Ahimsa by Board Member Jason Wirth
January 20, 2021
The (Poetry Postcard Fest) and the Cascadia Poetry Festival (are) connected… When you’re writing poetry… part of poetry is the craft… rules (to be understood) in a variety of contexts… (Craft is…) a necessary but not sufficient condition. You’re also… experiencing your mind, at a very deep level. And that mind as you experience it more deeply, is not in a vacuum… It’s now and here… rooted in the socio-economic and ecological conditions that make it possible. And participating in… the spiritual exercise of these postcards, is already entering into… a deep bioregional awakening and conversion. In a way we’re trying for something like a spiritual revolution, and that poetry is not just an interesting thing that you can do, if you like. It’s a fundamental exercise of being here in a less harmful way… it’s a deep ahimsa, a deep practice of non-harming and cultivation. And so, it’s all connected… And… our ambition is… trying to have a mind that would be capable, of being in this place in a better way… We’re going to live or die, by how we come down on these issues going forward.



































