January 4th forum announcement

Dear Poetry Aficionados,

Poetry & Poets in Rags blog

Happy New Year! Let's look back. Let's look forward. And let's gear up.

We begin with a series that the New York Times has published, different critics answering the question "Why criticism matters" with essays. Zeek then gives us a couple of insightful reviews, followed by Financial Times looking at Shakespeare and The Guardian looking at Tennyson. This should get our critical GPS bearings set for the new year.

We then look back at Edwin Morgan and Dennis Brutus. We "celebrate" Liu Xiaobo's birthday, who is still behind bars as China seems to want to remain adamant about old ways of governing. We then continue the solstice series of poetry brought to us by Times Colonist, and end News at Eleven with a Back Page article on the resurgence of Zajal, an old form of Lebanese poetry.

Moving into our Great Regulars section, Jeff Baker's article is on how everything in publishing changed last year. Along these lines, Marianne Combs brings us a poem called "Last Year" and Ted Kooser brings us a poem called "Tomatoe Pies, 25 Cents"--remember pizza back then? And David Ulin writes on making books do what e-books can't.

Luisetta Mudie brings us three articles, one on how the world is losing Manchurian. The Guardian brings us a poem by Ruth Fainlight, which begins with the words, "These days" and Nabina Das says "Goodbye to Ballimaran" in a poem published in The Caravan. Then Powells bring us a review on the book, "Whatever Happened to Modernism."

This is a great New Years edition, because the publications (rags, as it were, newspapers especially) are paying attention and bringing us these and many other stories and poems not alluded to above, in a great way. Things are looking good.



But let's look back to see who to congratulate. The IBPC has announced the Poets of the Decade. Congrats to the top ten!! What an accomplishment!:

Laurie Byro
Laurel K. Dodge
Sarah J. Sloat
Jim Zola
Bernard Henrie
Brenda Levy Tate
Catherine Rogers
Christopher T. George
Jude Goodwin
TE Ballard

There should also be the top ten most supportive poets and readers, the best givers of feedback on the boards. How else do these workshops get so good--how to the poems, even the poets get so good? The IBPC does not have that, but here are the places you'll find them, at the IBPC top ten Boards of the Decade:

The Writers Block
Wild Poetry Forum
Desert Moon Review
Poets.org
Melic Roundtable
About Poetry Forum
criticalpoet.org
Blueline Poetry
MiPo
PenShells

Thanks for clicking in. So glad you made it too.

Yours,
Rus

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