BOA Blog

[caption id="attachment_354" align="alignleft" width="130" caption="Lucille Clifton. BOA poet. Frost Medal recipient."][/caption] As many people know, Lucille Clifton was born and raised near Buffalo, NY, so it is fitting that The Buffalo News would pay tribute to her with this beautiful article by R.D. Pohl. Lucille Clifton will posthumously receive the Poetry Society of America's Frost Medal tonight at the National Arts Club in New York City. "It will be a bittersweet celebration Thursday night at the National Arts Club on Gramercy Park South in New York City when the Poetry Society of America awards its highest honor -- The Robert...

[caption id="attachment_697" align="alignleft" width="274" caption="Craig Morgan Teicher. Journalist and BOA author. "][/caption] BOA authors aren't just poets and fiction writers. They are also teachers, mentors, journalists, reviewers... and a whole bunch of other things unrelated to literature. Whether it's literary or not, we love authors who are engaged in the larger world. Getting involved with your community - whether it's on a local, national, or international scale - is the best way to effect change. The surprise result is that such engagement also deepens ones writing. Craig Morgan Teicher's new book, a collection of adult fables titled Cradle Book, will...

[caption id="attachment_369" align="alignleft" width="150" caption="Naomi Shihab Nye. BOA Poet."][/caption] "Well, we need to keep extending imaginations, pressing, repeating, invoking, suggesting what other realities might exist, instead of the nightmares of war and hatred and conflict." Naomi Shihab Nye's above response during an interview with Cerise Press is as good a summation of her poetics as I've ever heard. The interview digs into the intersection - and possibilities - of the intersection between art and politics (by which I mean: peace). Read the interview here [Cerise Press Interview with Naomi Shihab Nye]

[caption id="attachment_424" align="alignleft" width="194" caption="Peter Makuck. BOA Poet."][/caption] We always knew that BOA poet Peter Makuck was a major outdoorsman. His forthcoming collection, Long Lens: New & Selected Poems, includes poems about scuba diving, skiing, fishing, jogging... all sorts of good, healthy, outdoorsy activities. But muskrat trapping? That was a new one to us! Read the fascinating interview with Peter Makuck posted at the Sewanee website and find out why Peter's son called him a "psycho" and why Ted Kooser told Peter he was lucky to have grown up when he did. And, of course, get the lowdown on the...

[caption id="attachment_418" align="alignleft" width="199" caption="Christopher Kennedy. BOA poet."][/caption] BOA's own poetry warrior Christopher Kennedy (Encouragement for a Man Falling to His Death) was just featured - and singled out for high praise - in a New Yorker article about Opium magazine's tongue-in-cheek "Literary Death Match." Christopher brought his A-game to a recent Death Match event at the Bowery Poetry Club as Meredith Blake notes in her article: "My personal favorite was the extremely droll Kennedy, who shared from his collection of morbidly witty poems, Encouragement for a Man Falling to his Death. In one, a man coats his head in...