I received my contributor’s copy of the literary journal out of SUNY in Plattsburg, NY, Saranac Review. It  includes two poems of mine, “Firebug!” and “Uprising.” Both refer to racial injustice in this country. “Uprising” is an ekphrastic poem based on Susan List’s painting “Four Arts,” that I saw in a small museum Palm Beach, FL when I was there for a workshop a few years ago. I was happy to see my friend Joseph Bruchac’s two poems in the magazine as well other poets of note, such as Laurie Sewall, Aimee Sands, and Ricardo Pau-Llosa.  I didn’t know Joseph was so prolific; his bio note says he is the author of “over 130 books in many genres.” The rest of us have some catching up to do.

Michael Theune ‘s Structure & Surprise blog picked up on my Poems with a Turn Workshop presented earlier this year at the NM State Poetry Society (NMSPS) annual conference. I’m grateful to him for noticing our similar craft-based interest in the art.

Michael Theune, author of Structure & Surprise, informed me that the renown Catholic journal, Commonweal, posted two of my poems in its online edition. I had not known that “Unraptured” and “Visitant” were online, although I had previously received my contributor’s copies of the print edition.  These poems are both about my late mother, one imaginary, the other, a “real” experience.

I’m very pleased to be invited to read at Onyxswan Gallery on July 14 at 6 and 7 pm (two 15-20 minute readings). The event is an opening for a show by pastel painters Jane Shoenfeld and Katherine Irish called Abstractions in Nature. I will be reading some poems about painting as well as selections from my forthcoming book Previous Lives. The gallery is located at 323 Romero Street NW, Suite 1, in Albuquerque (505-243-1393).

I am happy to announce that Red Mountain Press has accepted Previous Lives for publication in the fall of 2018. The working subtitle is, New and Selected Early Poems. The book will include “best of” selections from my first eight books, as well as recent work,

I was honored to have Breaking Down Familiar selected by Erin Belieu as an Honorable Mention for the 2017 National Federation of State Poetry Societies’ Stevens Award.

Gris-Gris, edited in New Orleans by Jay Udall (brother of the NM Senator), has posted “The Martyr’s Cell,” which I based on a Jorge Borges short story about a prisoner and a tiger.

Matthew Warren of Clackamas Literary Review in Oregon City, OR, notified me of the magazine’s acceptance of “More Than a Howl,” a poem dedicated to the Water Protectors of Standing Rock.  A number of people gave me helpful comments and suggestions on this poem, including Mary Morris, Robyn Hunt, Barbara Rockman, Kim Parko, Anne Haven McDowell, Gary Worth Moody, Wayne Lee, Michael Scofield, and Stephen Bunch.

I was honored to have “The Great Plains in Fog” selected by Elizabeth Tarr to be included in an upcoming issue of The Shining Rock Poetry Review. Her magazine culls poems recently published in other journals, and gets permission to reprint them. Publication in it is by invitation only. Ms. Tarr found my poem in the most recent Valparaiso Review, and picked it along with one by William Wash. It’s an honor to be included in Shining Rock, as the company I’m with in that journal includes such luminaries as Henri Cole, Major Jackson, Eleanor Wilner, Campbell McGrath, Alice Friman, Morri Creech, Tom Hennen, Joseph Bathanti, Natasha Tretheway, Brigit Pegeen Kelly, John Bensko, Jane Hirshfield, Terrance Hayes, Shara McCallum, Clarence Major and William Wright.

Thanks to Molly Wagoner who videoed John Macker and I as we read our poems at Gerald Peters Gallery on October 22, 2017. Four the poems I read can be found on the link page of this website.