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Professor’s Corner Invites Members to Summer-Fall 2023 Session
Professor’s Corner has invited all NFSPS members to join in a literary discussion group that meets 4th Mondays for four months at 7pm Central time. Summer and Fall 2023 sessions will be devoted to ecopoetry, defined as poems about our relationship to nature and the environment. Participants will explore selected poetry from The Ecopoetry Anthology (Trinity University Press, 2020), which consists of American poems from the mid-19th century to the present. Learn more.
About the Meetings
This series will meet July 24, August 28, September 25, and October 23.
POEMS FOR JULY 24 (with anthology page reference):
- Wallace Stevens, “Anecdote of the Jar” / p. 31
- Wallace Stevens, “The Snow Man” / p. 31
- Sterling A. Brown, “Riverbank Blues” / p. 70
- Langston Hughes, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” / p. 72
- Langston Hughes, “Daybreak in Alabama” / p. 72
- Kenneth Rexroth, “Toward an Organic Philosophy” / p. 78
- Kenneth Rexroth, “Lute Music” / p. 81
- Kenneth Rexroth, “Lyell’s Hypothesis Again” / p. 82
- Kenneth Rexroth, “Andree Rexroth” / p. 84
- Theodore Roethke, “Meditation at Oyster River” / p. 85
How to Access Reading Materials
You can find the relatively inexpensive 2020 edition of the anthology at amazon here; it is also available elsewhere. The Denton Public Library has copies at each of its three branches. The earlier (2013) edition of the anthology may also be used.
The page numbers provided above are valid for either the 2020 or 2013 edition of the anthology (purchase here). Some of the poems are also available online; links included above.
How to Join the Group
You must sign up for the PROFESSOR’S CORNER MAILING LIST to join. To get on the Denton Public Library’s Professor’s Corner mailing list, please e-mail ProfessorsCornerDPL@gmail.com and ask to be added to the mailing list. (If you already get e-mails from Fred.Kamman@CityOfDenton.com, it means you’re already on the Professor’s Corner mailing list.)
More Information
- This program is made possible in part by a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
- Professor’s Corner is sponsored by the South Branch Library in Denton, which has supported the program enthusiastically since 1999.
- The Denton Record Chronicle provided generous support for our first series; Lone Star Literary LIfe is providing support for our second series.
- The TWU Library is providing research support.
PLEASE NOTE: 1) Programs funded by Humanities Texas, like this one, cannot participate in “political action” or “planning for direct political actions.” 2) And per Humanities Texas: “Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed [through this program] do not necessarily represent those of Humanities Texas or the National Endowment for the Humanities.” The same disclaimer can be made with respect to all other individuals and entities involved in the series sponsored by the Denton South Branch Library and with regard to the poetry chosen for discussion. 3) Some of the material encountered through this program may not be appropriate for all audiences. 4) Links provided in our communications with you (such as the Zoom invite) may not work if you have your VPN (Virtual Private Network) activated.
For further information contact the Professor’s Corner producer and discussion leader, Dr. Stephen Souris (Professor of English [Ret.], Texas Woman’s Univ.), at SSouris2002@yahoo.com.
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Poetry Society of Tennessee Turns 70
In June 1953, charter members gathered to sign a charter for a poetry society dedicated to poets and poetry. During the meeting, they elected officers and enacted a charter whose purpose stands fast today. Learn more.
Virtual Celebration Held
On the evening of June 15, 2023, society members from across the state and beyond gathered virtually to celebrate the occasion.
In the Beginning
President Lisa Kamolnick opened the event with a reading of Linda Pastan’s “A New Poet,” reflecting on the ways that Poetry Society of Tennessee (PST) creates the kind of experience described in the poem for untold numbers of people through their many programs. She stepped through the founding history and spoke about the ways that PST continues to fulfill the charter’s original purpose today, such as member contests, educational programs, critique groups and sessions, student contests, poetry shares, annual festival, and anthology. Longtime member JoAn Howerton, who knew some of the founding members, added color and detail to the presentation. Lisa also expressed gratitude for the founders and the hundreds who came after to keep the society alive.
Long-time member JoAn Howerton shares memories of founding members. Our Past in Poetry
Board Director and Member Contest Chair Russell Strauss, a longtime member, prepared a thoughtful and, at times, amusing collection of poems by past (and passed) members, with thanks to member and longtime contest chair Ann Carolyn Cates for assisting with the earliest poetry sources. He and other members provided a touching memorial reading of their poems:
- “Harps in a Strange Land” by Raymond McCarty—read byRussell Strauss
- “Dear Mr. Sears and Mr. Roebuck” by Michael R. Denington—read by Lisa Kamolnick
- “Modern Times, Sometimes a Poem” by Isabel J. Glaser—read by Rose Klix
- “Early Spring at Reelfoot Lake” by Patricia W. Smith—read by Rose Klix
- “Joy” by Rosemary Stephens—read by Fred Tudiver
- “Nothing” by Sam Sax—read by Fred Tudiver
- Untitled pyramid poem by Kenneth Beaudoin—read by Calvin Ross
- “From Stone to Stars” by Frieda Dorris—read by Calvin Ross
- “Starlight” by Jeanine Mah—read by Cynthia Storrs
- “God’s Grandmother” by Malra R. Treece—read by Howard Carman
- “Like Milkweed Puff” by Eve Braden Hatchett—read by Russell Strauss
Director, contest chair and longtime member Russell Strauss, who selected poems and presided over the “Poets in the Past” memorial reading, shares memories of poets before their poems are read. In Our Own Words
Treasurer and Membership Chair Howard Carman presided over a powerful poetry share, opening with two poems that inspired him to take up poetry seriously: “Acrophobia,” by Janice Hornburg (a former PST member, PST Best of Fest Winner, and Northeast Chapter leader) and “Pruning Rose,” by Rose Klix (Northeast Chapter founder and longtime chapter leader). PST members shared a collage of poetry:
- Jerry Buchanan, “Song of the Stones”
- Howard Carman, “Too Slow”
- Janice Hornburg, “Acrophobia”
- Lisa Kamolnick, “Breaking Silence” and (penned by Bard, Google’s AI Experiment) “70 Years of Poetry”
- Rose Klix, “Gift of the Eagle’s Feather” and “Pruning Rose”
- Lisa Riley, “Reflection”
- Calvin Ross, “The Close-in Crowd”
- Cynthia Storrs, “To the Non-Existent Parent Licensing Bureau” and “Ode to My Brother Who, Like My Father, Knows Everything”
- Russell Strauss, “Emergency Call”
- Fred Tudiver, “Chicken in a Shoe Box”
Treasurer/Membership Director and Anthology Chair Howard Carman tells of his first encounter with Poetry Society of Tennessee, and the profound impact members’ poetry had on him. Preserving Our Memories
The evening concluded with a time capsule ceremony. Lisa Kamolnick presented and accepted various documents and artifacts and placed them in the PST time capsule, a heavy duty black case with dual combination locks. By unanimous decision in the only official business of the evening, the society heard a motion and approved that the time capsule hold said items, remain open through June 18, 2023, for any as-yet provided poetry from the poetry share, be sealed on June 19, 2023, not to be opened again until June 2028. The items placed in the physical time capsule have been digitized and placed in a digital time capsule as well.
As additional historical information is gathered and created over the coming years, the society will collect it for potential placement in future time capsules. Importantly, a central storage repository for history with a chain-of-command has been established to preserve PST history.
While accepting items for the time capsule, President Lisa Kamolnick recognized former President Bill Hill for contributing artwork for several Tennessee Voices editions. Wondering about that meat tenderizer? It represents the “gavel” used in Memphis-based meetings for many years.
The evening concluded with thanks and merriment and a wish for Poetry Society to thrive for many years to come.
Bonus Material
Miss the meeting? Check out the replay.
PST member, PST-Northeast founder and former PST Poet Laureate Rose Klix sent a heartfelt note in response to the evening.
The time capsule has been sealed, not to be reopened until our 75th Anniversary. -
Arch Cowan Jones Announces Into the Now Launch Celebration
Poetry Society of Tennessee member Arch Cowan Jones recently announced the release and launch of his poetry collection Into the Now. The event will be held at the Mary B. Martin Center for the Arts on East Tennessee State University’s Campus.
About Into the Now
Into the Now by Arch Cowan Jones is a fully illustrated collection of hard hitting spoken word philosophical alchemy that dances through mysticism, religion, and consciousness punctuated by a new hope for humanity.
Into the Now is available for purchase. Learn more about Into the Now.
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KB Ballentine’s Spirit of Wild Now Available
Poetry Society of Tennessee member KB Ballentine recently launched her 8th poetry collection, Spirit of Wild, May 10, 2023, at the Soddy Daisy Community Library.
About Spirit of Wild
Wild weaves through each of us, but the spirit of wild doesn’t always rage. Sometimes it is the gentle, quiet moments alone in our souls that show us who and what we are. The spirit of strength, the spirit of wonder, the spirit of curiosity, the spirit of fury, the spirit of peace are all part of us. But we bottle or ignore them, questioning our anxiety and depression.
These poems speak to that spark in each of us that we might remember even through our sorrows, tragedies, joys, and silent seasons that the spirit of wild doesn’t call us – it is us. Don’t ignore it. Don’t let it go. Hold it tight as you dream, when you wake, and as you live your day. Yes, live. Live and embrace wild.
Praise for Spirit of Wild
As KB Ballentine delves without fear from windowed rooms into a wilderness of forest and ocean, it soon becomes clear that even the darkness in her collection Spirit of Wild is one that teems with life, wing, and song. Ballentine shows us that there is “a shelter for the sacred in each of us.” Spirit of Wild is a balm, and I didn’t know how much I needed it.
-Chera Hammons, author of Maps of Injury
Spirit of Wild confirms that “each day waits with sudden mysteries, / offerings, / like dreams half-remembered / from the night.” In lyrical, precise language that throbs and pulses with the rhythms of the natural world, Ballentine celebrates the spirit of all manner of life’s organic wonders, from the fox and wren to the bee and seahorse, to lavender fog and “stones cloaked in mossy silence.” I can’t think of a better time for this exuberant collection to come to light, nor a better time to heed Ballentine’s call to “cast off the rooms where we’ve boxed ourselves tight / step into the den of the forest’s deep heart.”
— Hayley Mitchell Haugen, Sheila-Na-Gig Editions
Spirit of Wild and other collections are available for purchase. Explore her website, contact her or follow her on social platforms.
About the Author
KB Ballentine resides in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and teaches creative writing, theatre arts, and literature to high school and college students. She has an M.A. in Writing and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing, Poetry.
Her work has appeared in numerous journals and publications, including Atlanta Review, North Dakota Quarterly, Linnet’s Wings, Crab Orchard Review, Alehouse, Tidal Basin Review, Haight–Ashbury Literary Journal, The Sigh Press, and MO: Writings from the River.
Ballentine’s seventh collection Edge of the Echo was published by Iris Press in May 2021. The Light Tears Loose appeared the summer of 2019 from Blue Light Press. 2017 showcased Ballentine’s fifth poetry collection Almost Everything, Almost Nothing, published by Middle Creek Publishing and Audio. In 2016, The Perfume of Leaving received the Blue Light Press Book Award.
Her work also appears in several anthologies: White Stag: Spirit Anthology (2023), LOVE Anthology (2023), Women Speak: Volume 8 (2022), Appalachia (Un)Masked (2022), I Thought I Heard a Cardinal Sing (2022), The Strategic Poet (2021), Women Speak: Vol 7 (2021), Pandemic Puzzle Poems (2021), The Mountain (2021), Pandemic Evolution (2021), In Plein Air (2017), Carrying the Branch: Poets in Search of Peace (2017), In God’s Hands (2017), River of Earth and Sky: Poems for the Twenty-first Century (2015), Southern Poetry Anthology, Volume VI: Tennessee (2013) and Southern Light: Twelve Contemporary Southern Poets (2011).
She was selected as a finalist for the Southern Alliance of Literature Outstanding Writer for 2021; she was awarded the Libba Moore Gray Poetry Prize in 2016, in 2014 she was a finalist in the Ron Rash Poetry Awards, and in 2006 a finalist for the Joy Harjo Poetry Award. She was a recipient of the Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Prize in 2006 and in 2007.
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Abby N. Lewis’ Palm up, Fingers Curled Now Available
Plan B Press recently announced the publication of Palm Up, Fingers Curled, a chapbook of poems by Poetry Society of Tennessee member Abby N. Lewis.
About Palm Up, Fingers Curled
Palm Up, Fingers Curled explores the tenuous–and dangerous–transition from innocent young girl to sexualized teenager. Many of the poems discuss the horrors women have been subjected to at the hands of men and the fates they have suffered. The title poem, “Palm Up, Fingers Curled,” which the cover is based on, describes the young female narrator sitting down at a table with her father and grandfather on her grandfather’s back porch, unknowingly entering a conversation about the kidnapping of a young woman who was recently in the news. Another poem, the first in the collection, describes an event in which the narrator comes close to becoming a missing person herself, one of the invisible women who haunt billboards, their ghosts staring out of faded, wrinkled fliers.
The chapbook contains lighter poems as well, such as “The Flood,” which depicts three sisters enjoying a mild flood that only reaches to the edges of the lake houses in their neighborhood. It is a tame flood that does not represent a disaster but a Ponyo-style wedding of water and land. “0.6 inches” explores the responsibility in owning pets, and the ways in which owners must make critical, difficult decisions for the well-being of their domesticated friends.
Palm Up, Fingers Curled is available through Plan B. Contact Abby by email at lewisan1@etsu.edu, or visit her website at https://freeairforfish.com/.
About the Author
Abby N. Lewis is a poet from Dandridge, Tennessee. She earned dual master’s degrees from ETSU in 2021, one in English and one in Communication & Storytelling Studies. Reticent, her first full-length poetry collection, was published by Grateful Steps in 2016. Her first chapbook was published by Finishing Line Press in 2018. Her poetry and fiction have appeared in Timber, The Mockingbird, Red Mud Review, and Sanctuary, among others. Her very first publication was in Gallery, the literary journal of Walters State, and she is eternally grateful. Her book reviews can frequently be found on Chapter 16’s website, as well as in Up the Staircase Quarterly, Black Moon Magazine, and The Keeping Room through Minerva Rising Press.
Of her first chapbook, Jesse Graves, East Tennessee State University’s Poet in Residence, whose awards include 2015 James Still Award for Writing about the Appalachian South from the Fellowship of Southern Writers and a 2015 induction into the East Tennessee Writers Hall of Fame, has said, “Abby N. Lewis is a young poet with an old soul, already aware of the losses of time, the pressures put upon us by growing older, and by the uncertainties of the future. She writes with rich imagery and real feeling for her subjects. . . . This Fluid Journey begins a quest, a poet’s true course, and readers will surely discover many treasures along the way.” Michael Amos Cody, her former mentor at East Tennessee State University and author of the novel Gabriel’s Songbook, has also praised her first chapbook: “The child in This Fluid Journey is as familiar as memory. She lives and plays, wanders and wonders, and readers remember days and nights and former lives lost but not wasted. But this young poet understands when to cling to and when to put away childish things, and when the latter is called for, she invests more mature settings and experiences with the same charm and mystery that nature holds for the child.”
About the Publisher
Plan B Press is a poetry publisher based in Alexandria, Virginia. Learn more.
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Poetry Society of Tennessee Celebrates 70 Years on June 15
SEVENTY REFLECTIONS: A CELEBRATION
On June 15, 2023, the Poetry Society of Tennessee (PST) will hold a virtual celebration from 7:30-9:30 pm Eastern / 6:30-8:30 Central in honor of its 70th anniversary.
MEETING INFORMATION
Members and friends of PST who are subscribed to our mailing list will receive an invitation no later than May 30, 2023. If you have not received an invitation and would like to attend, please email poetrytennessee@gmail.com with subject line 70th GUEST REQUEST.
ABOUT POETRY SOCIETY OF TENNESSEE
PST is a non-profit organization founded by poets for poets in 1953, recognized by the National Federation of State Poetry Societies. The society welcomes poets and poetry lovers from across Tennessee and beyond. In addition to regular membership, a student membership is available for high school students.
PST offers members an inclusive, supportive community with plenty of hands-on opportunities to learn, grow, and appreciate the art and craft of poetry. Activities include but are not limited to educational programming, poetry readings, critique groups and sessions, poetry contests (including a student contest), poetry publications, and a poetry festival. PST also has a Poet Laureate program for members. Learn more.
PST News
Poetry Society of Tennessee 