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.

The Fall 2008 issue of the Virginia Quarterly Review, on Iraq War veterans, includes a conversation with poet Brian Turner. For the Web exclusive, click here.

Two Frank X. Walker election poems rolled in through Appalnet somehow. Turns out, they’re from Jeff Biggers’ blog on The Huffington Post. Biggers is the award-winning author of The United States of Appalachia, among other books. For more information on his work, visit: www.jeffbiggers.com.  I don’t think Frank would mind my posting these poems here, since this IS election day. This is fine work from the Lannan Award-winning poet and editor of the Affrilachian (African American Appalachian) magazine Pluck:
OBAMA SHUFFLE

by Frank X. Walker

To the seasoned black women in line behind me when I went to early vote

we move as if chained together, we move like we are
pacing out the complex steps to the new line dance

thank you for taking off work today, for standing
outside in the cold on sore feet for so long
bundled in winter scarves, long skirts, leather coats,
faux fur, bandanas, fatigues, sweats and jeans
clutching designer purses, book bags and paper sacks

to the right, to the right, to the right, to the right
thank you for clearing your throat
when anybody forgot to move the line

thank you for leaning on your canes
for looking over your reading glasses

to the left, to the left, to the left, to the left
for casting a watchful eye at the poll workers
and at me and at everybody within squinting distance

for wearing my mother’s nose on your faces, for wearing
her shoes, for standing with your hands on your hips too

now kick, now kick, now kick, now kick
now move as if chained together, now move like we are
pacing out the complex steps to the new line dance

now walk it by yourself, now walk it by yourself

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 Last year I received a poem flawlessly presented on paper by a friend, Joan Wyrick Ellison.  She has written more than one or two books, including “Lyrics of Love: An Introspection” (2005). The poem “Is Anybody Home?” seems somehow both restrained and unrestrained in view of her husband’s serious illness at the time. He is the Rev. A.D. Ellison, and has since largely recovered.

IS ANYBODY HOME?

I leave my door half-open
for you may pass this way,
I listen for your footstep
and hope to hear you say,
    “Is anybody home?”

I leave my door half-open,
sit quietly and muse,
hoping your pleasant voice
will call out,
    “What’s the news?”

I push my mind wide open
for truth may pass this way,
I listen for its inklings
in every word you say
    because

The time we spend together
highlights my lonely day.
I’m glad my door is open
so I can hear you say,
    “Is anybody home?”

— Joan Wyrick Ellison