This just in from WalesOnline:

‘Blasphemous’ poetry given AMs’ go-ahead
WalesOnline - United Kingdom
THE Assembly Government weighed into the row over the cancellation of a “blasphemous” poetry reading last night, vowing the reading will go ahead. …
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Elsewhere in WalesOnline:
The right to free speech belongs to everyone
AS WE report today, poet Patrick Jones has won the right to a public reading …
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And this:
Caernarfon reading

Wales, the heartland of British coal, has much in common with West Virginia. Check it out sometime.

Today, from Wales, we see this unsettling story bubbling up:
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Kenny Chesney — AP photo

Music Video of the Year: “Waitin’ on a Woman,” Brad Paisley featuring Andy Griffith.  Male Vocalist of the Year: Brad Paisley 

By John Gerome
AP Entertainment Writer

NASHVILLE, Tennessee (AP) — Kenny Chesney won his fourth entertainer of the year award and George Strait became the most-honored artist in the history of the Country Music Association Awards at Wednesday’s ceremony.

The show was highlighted by a lavish performance by Taylor Swift, a surprise appearance by rapper Lil Wayne, and the return of one of country’s biggest stars, Shania Twain.
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CHARLESTON, W.Va. – The Mountain State will be showcased briefly before an international audience when Brad Paisley co-hosts the CMA Awards show Wednesday at 8 p.m. on ABC, according to Pam Haynes at the W.Va. Film Office. The show will include tourism footage.

“The West Virginia Film Office received a request from the CMA Awards show to share tourism footage to be incorporated into a special segment with Brad Paisley during the show,” Haynes said.

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Photo illustration by Vic Burkhammer

Read about the 2008 Kentucky Book Fair, coming up next weekend. That would certainly be worth a trip to Frankfort, Kentucky.

Download the full catalog (pdf). 

Poets on the schedule: Constance Alexander. Garry Barker. Thomas Rain Crowe. Normandi Ellis. Jane Gentry — Kentucky’s poet laureate for 2007-08. Richard Taylor. Joe Survant. Jonathan Greene. Necia Desiree Harkless. Erin Keane. Leatha Kendrick. George Ella Lyon. Jude C. McPherson. Danny Miller on Jesse Stuart. Michael Moran. Erik Reece. Taylor Reese. Polly A. Ritchie. Kathy Skaggs. Noel Smith. Frederick Smock. Joe Survant. Richard Taylor. Mary Ann Taylor-Hall. Last but certainly not least (this list is alphabetized from the catalog)  — Frank X. Walker, an extraordinary poet.  I apologize to any poets I might have overlooked. What an array of poets in Kentucky!  These are just the poets. Many other outstanding writers — novelists, biographers and such — will be there reading, speaking and signing books.   Look up, for example, Fontaine Banks Jr. , son of a coal miner, Berea graduate, Marine in Korea, with his Memories of a Political Legend.

And Rick Bragg will be there. What wonderful books! He’s the guy who wrote I Am A Soldier Too: The Jessica Lynch Story, a biography West Virginia’s own Jessica Lynch. The catalog says of him:

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Back in 1970, at the bookstore of the Parkersburg branch of WVU, before the branch became a community college, I saw a poster of a haiku machine by Shel Silverstein (I think). The large contraption was carnivalesque in the truest sense of Shel Silverstein anyway. Anyone out there have that poster? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve just wanted to see that thing again. At the time, I didn’t have enough money for even a candy bar, so I left it there, in the store… the haiku machine.

Ever read “Weird-Bird” or “Hug O’ War”? They obviously aren’t haiku, but short poems that demonstrate Silverstein’s knack for laughing poetry.

Weird-Bird

Birds are flyin’ south for winter.
Here’s the Weird-Bird headin’ north,
Wings a-flappin’, beak a-chatterin’,
Cold head bobbin’ back ‘n’ forth.
He says, “It’s not that I like ice
Or freezin’ winds and snowy ground.
It’s just sometimes it’s kind of nice
To be the only bird in town.”

– Shel Silverstein (1930–1999)

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Hug O’ War

I will not play at tug o’ war.
I’d rather play at hug o’ war,
Where everyone hugs
Instead of tugs,
Where everyone giggles
And rolls on the rug,
Where everyone kisses,
And everyone grins,
And everyone cuddles,
And everyone wins.

– Shel Silverstein  (1930–1999)

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Click here for Shel Silverstein books

The New York Times on Friday published a great story and large photo of 85-year-old Jean Ritchie, treasured folk artist. Click it here.

Her work is just saturated with poetry.

As never before, poets everywhere now have access to other poets’ work from every corner and thoroughfare of the past and present.

Amid the tidal wave of poetry, certain mainstay poets keep speaking to me, through the years.

Apropos of that, here’s a well-honed passage from “Instead of a Forward,” the introductory essay to a book titled “Passing Through: The Later Poems, New and Selected” by Stanley Kunitz:

“It disturbs me that twentieth century American poets seem largely reconciled to being relegated to the classroom — practically the only habitat in which most of us are conditioned to feel secure. It would be healthier if we could locate ourselves in the thick of life, at every intersection where values and meanings cross, caught in the dangerous traffic between self and universe.
“Poets are always ready to talk about the difficulties of their art. I want to say something about its rewards and joys. The poem comes in the form of a blessing — “like rapture breaking on the mind,” as I tried to phrase it in my youth. Through the years I have found this gift of poetry to be life-sustaining, life-enhancing, and absolutely unpredictable. Does one live, therefore, for the sake of poetry? No, the reverse is true: poetry is for the sake of life.”

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So you’ve heard of the Page 69 test now for longer books, where you try that page to see if you’d like to buy the book.

Poetry sometimes has a tougher standard. I read the following jewel on a poetic line workshop description by Dick Allen — a notion I’ve heard throughout most of my adult life, and I do and don’t believe it more now than ever, so my ambivalence endures:

“Dirty little secret:  for most editors, the poem’s first line determines whether or not they toss the poem or read on.”

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Poet and translator Peg Boyers will read from her two poetry collections, “Hard Bread” and “Honey with Tobacco,” on Nov. 12, 2008, at the International Poetry Forum in Pittsburgh, Pa. For more information and to buy tickets, visit the Poetry Forum online.