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1. Letter from the Editors

Dear Readers,

On Tuesday we continue our series of prose features with "The Future of Irish Poetry?" by Richard Tillinghast, from Poetry Ireland Review, Issue 89, reviewing The Wake Forest Series of Irish Poetry, Volume One, selected and with a preface by Jefferson Holdridge (Wake Forest University Press):

"One thing W B Yeats, Louis MacNiece, Patrick Kavanagh and Seamus Heaney - to pick four poets from the generations preceding the current one - had in common was their preoccupation with their native country both as a nation and as a place... When we come to the poets included in the Wake Forest anthology, that old sense of Ireland seems to have gone up in smoke. It would seem that now, as a prosperous member of the European Union, host to waves of emigration from Eastern Europe and elsewhere, Ireland is just like everywhere else."

Look for it on Tuesday on our news page.

We hope you enjoy this week's poems!

Warmest regards,

Don Selby & Diane Boller
Editors

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2. Sponsor Messages

Riggio Writing Fellows Program at The New School
Announcing the Riggio Writing Fellows program at The New School. With a partial scholarship for each semester in residence, this innovative curriculum of undergraduate writing workshops and close-reading seminars is open to gifted adults who wish to complete the bachelor's degree as a writer in New York City. For more information about The New School Bachelor's Program and the Riggio Fellows, click here.

Four Way Books Open Reading Season -- Poetry and Short Fiction
Manuscripts submitted between June 1-June 30. Please visit us for guidelines: http://www.fourwaybooks.com

Crab Orchard Series in Poetry First Book Award: $2500 & Publication
A first book of poems will be selected from an open competition. The winner receives publication with Southern Illinois University Press and a $1000 prize. The winner also receives $1500 as an honorarium for a reading at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. $25 entry fee. Postmark deadline: July 1, 2007.
Mail to:
Crab Orchard First Book Award
Faner 2380 - Mail Code 4503
Southern Illinois University Carbondale
1000 Faner Drive
Carbondale, IL 62901

Joiner Center Writers' Workshop
William Joiner Center's 20th Annual Writers' Workshop, June 18-29, at UMass Boston, situated on Boston Harbor. Taught by a distinguished and caring faculty.

Instruction in poetry, fiction, non-fiction and translation. Also, special one-week poetry workshops by Danielle Legros-Georges. Faculty includes: Bruce Weigl, Larry Heinemann, Demetria Martínez, Macdara Woods, Grace Paley, Sam Hamill and others. Workshop classes, seminars, consultations and reading series.

Letter of interest and writing sample required. Tuition: $400 two weeks; $220 one week; deposit, $25. Phone: 617-287-5850. E-mail: michael.sullivan@umb.edu

Greek Island Poetry - The Muses Workshop
Greek Island Poetry: The Muses Workshop. Write and study poetry and myth with A.E. Stallings on the island of Spetses. Rachel Hadas, Richard Cecil and Maura Stanton will be among this year's speakers. Past speakers
include Katerina Anghelaki-Rooke, Christopher Bakken, Aliki Barnstone, David Mason and Edmund Keeley.

June 24th-July 14th (shorter stays available) Additional information... E-mail...

The Catskill Poetry Workshop
Join Stephen Dunn, Lynn Emanuel, Carol Frost, Jay Hopler, Tom Sleigh, Chase Twichell, and Michael Waters July 9-14 at the 2007 Catskill Poetry Workshop. The six-day workshop offers classes on craft, evening readings by staff and guest writers, and individual manuscript conferences.

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3. Poetry News Links

News and reviews from around the web, updated daily:

• Robert Pinsky introduces a poem by Carl Dennis. (The Washington Post)
• Ted Kooser introduces a poem by Elizabeth Hobbs. (American Life in Poetry)
• Baseball Haiku, edited by Cor van den Heuvel and Nanae Tamura, briefly reviewed by Marjorie Kehe. (Christian Science Monitor).
• A diarist recounts a presentation of grief poems by Dannie Abse and Alan Jenkins at the T.S. Eliot Memorial Lecture. (Guardian Unlimited)
• The Parthian Stations, by John Ash, reviewed by William Wootten. (Guardian Unlimited)
• Peter Stanford, author of C Day-Lewis: A Life, discusses the poet's rocky relationship with God. (Guardian Unlimited)

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4. Selected New Arrivals

These and other new arrivals are available for purchase via Poetry Daily/Amazon.com.

• The Matter of the Casket, Thom Ward
• A Thief of Strings, Donald Revell
• Riding Westward, Carl Phillips
• The Late Show, David Trinidad
• Earthquake, Susan Barnes
• High 5ive: An Anthology of Fiction from Ten Years of Five Points, ed. Megan Sexton
• Wideawake Field, Eliza Griswold
• Quiver of Arrows: Selected Poems, 1986-2006, Carl Phillips
• Rift, Forrest Hamer
• Hams Beneath the Firmament, Terri Ford

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5. This Week’s Featured Poets

Monday - David Baker
Tuesday - Kathleen Jamie
Wednesday - Rachel Rose
Thursday - Regan Good
Friday - John Hennessy
Saturday - C. Dale Young
Sunday - Sarah Sawyer

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6. Featured Poets May 14 - May 20, 2007

These and other past featured poets may be found in our archive:

Monday - Bob Hicok
Tuesday - Stuart Dybek
Wednesday - Cathrine Grøndahl / tr. Roger Greenwald
Thursday - John Gallaher
Friday - David Lehman
Saturday - Reginald Shepherd
Sunday - Eric Pankey

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7. Last Year’s Featured Poets

These poems will be retired from our archive during the coming week.

Henry Taylor — "A Crosstown Breeze"
Eamon Grennan — "A Thrush by Utamaro"
Robert Pinsky — "Pliers"
J. Allyn Rosser — "Gym Dance with the Doors Wide Open" and "The Smell of Rat Rubs Off"
Campbell McGrath — "Philadelphia" and "Two Poems for Frank O'Hara"
Yves Bonnefoy / tr. Hoyt Rogers — "Let This World Endure"
Rachel Hadas — "The Nosebleed"

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8. Poem From Last Year

The Smell of Rat Rubs Off

Once again you've fallen for the lure
of his deferral, his quick eyes' brightness
slinking from the pantry of the righteous.
Nothing half so sleek as self-licked fur.
Not that he forgot your boots, or left
A single high-aimed compliment unturned.
He'll double back, affect to be concerned
when he's the secret reason you're bereft,
embracing you with his Houdini hold,
repeating chewed-off bits of what you say
so he seems loyal, you the turncoat jay.
You'd think by now you'd learn to be consoled
to know the soul he sold's not yours but his,
though where yours was a hollow feeling is.

J. Allyn Rosser
Poetry
May 2006

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Copyright © 2006 by The Poetry Foundation. All rights reserved. Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission.