a series of video recordings of contemporary poets reading from their work, originally prompted by the Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent cancellations, shut-downs and isolations; a reading series you can enjoy in the safety of your own protected space,
Michael Fraser : “Frances Jane Scroggins Brown”
Michael Fraser is published in various national and international journals and anthologies. He is published in Best Canadian Poetry in English 2013 and 2018. He has won numerous awards, including Freefall Magazine’s 2014 and 2015 poetry contests, the 2016 CBC Poetry Prize, and the 2018 Gwendolyn MacEwen Poetry Competition. The Day-Breakers is his third book of poems.
Alexandra Oliver : “Young Politician at a Rotary Club Tea,” “How to Stop,” and “Triptych: American Wives”
Alexandra Oliver was born in Vancouver, BC. She is the author of Meeting the Tormentors in Safeway (Biblioasis 2013, winner of the 2014 Pat Lowther Memorial Award), Let the Empire Down (Biblioasis 2016), and the chapbook On the Oven Sits a Maiden (Frog Hollow Press 2018). She is the co-editor (with Annie Finch) of Measure for Measure: An Anthology of Poetic Meters (Penguin Random House/Everyman’s Library 2015). A PhD candidate in the Department of English and Cultural Studies at McMaster University, she lives in Burlington, Ontario with her husband and son.
Alice Burdick : “Brush fire,” “Lightning in October,” and “Inquiry”
Alice Burdick (she/her) lives in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia, and is the author of four full-length poetry collections, Simple Master, Flutter, Holler, and Book of Short Sentences, and one selected: Deportment: The Poetry of Alice Burdick (which came out through Wilfrid Laurier University Press). She has also authored two cookbooks, and her essays and poetry have appeared in many print and online chapbooks, broadsides, folios, magazines, journals, and anthologies since the early 1990s. She has been a judge for various awards, including the bpNichol Chapbook Award. She also visits elementary and high school English classes as a “Poet In Your Class” through Poetry in Voice/les Voix de la Poésie, and leads workshops through the Writers Federation of Nova Scotia.
Adrian Lürssen : “TEETH [A Methodology],” “TRAIN” and “WAR”
Born and raised in apartheid-era South Africa and then Washington, DC, Adrian Lürssen now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. His book HUMAN IS TO WANDER was selected by Gillian Conoley for the Colorado Prize for Poetry and will be published by the Center for Literary Publishing in November, 2022. He is also the author of the chapbook NEOWISE, from Trainwreck Press (Canada).
Leigh Chadwick : “XIII.” and “Frankie Cosmos Is a Good Band Name” from Your Favorite Poet (Malarkey Books, 2022)
Leigh Chadwick is the author of the poetry collection Your Favorite Poet (Malarkey Books, 2022) and the collaborative poetry collection Too Much Tongue (Autofocus, 2022), co-written with Adrienne Marie Barrios. Her poetry has appeared in Salamander, Passages North, The Indianapolis Review, and Hobart, among others. She is the executive editor of Redacted Books and is a regular contributor at Olney Magazine, where she conducts the “Mediocre Conversations” interview series. Find her online and www.leighchadwick.com and on Twitter at @LeighChadwick5.