Pure Poetry!

Pure Poetry is my poetry advocacy group that I started about two years ago. When I went to the SC Book Festival in 2005, poetry was an ignored genre! Not good for me, because I was trying to sell my first book, The World: Poetic Connections. The next year, I got a group of poets together, I bought booth space at the SC Book Festival and we read our poems from the booth. Success! And we were given a space on the program to read in one of the conference rooms! At the 2007 festival, we were on the program, sold lots of books, and had a great time.

The next event for Pure Poetry is at the Beaufort County Library on June 15th from 12:00 p.m. until 2:00 p.m. Tickets are $20.00 and that price includes a gourmet lunch. Tickets may be purchased by calling Bay Street Trading at 843-524-2000. Advance tickets are available, but no tickets will be sold at the door. Reading for Pure Poetry will be Marjory Wentworth, the South Carolina Poet Laureate, Susan Meyers, Linda Annas Ferguson, Dennis Stiles, Karen M. Peluso, Patricia Bee, and of course, yours truly!

If you are in the Beaufort, South Carolina area, please make plans to attend this fun summer event!

And so this is Christmas....

And so this is Christmas....and what have you done?

Those wonderful words of John and Yoko always echo long past the Christmas season, giving me resolve to be able to answer that question every December with a sense of accomplishment.

Have I accomplished anything this year? Well, if anything, I have realized that I love writing, and I love the writers who have encouraged and inspired me this year. Kay Day (author of Killing Earl, and A Poetry Break), Marjory Heath Wentworth (Poet Laureate of South Carolina, and author of Noticing Eden), and Cassandra King (author of The Same Sweet Girls) have written blurbs for the back cover of my new book, Gravity, due from Coastal Villages Press on February 1, 2006. My sisters in letters, thanks a million for your friendship, for your wit and humor, for being there for me!

These same wonderful writers will join me at the South Carolina Book Festival in February, 2006 in Columbia, South Carolina at our Pure Poetry booth. Along with Patricia Gray and Dorothy Fletcher, we will each read our poetry, round-robin style, in an easy, fun atmosphere that will hopefully attract a crowd. Each poet has something new and different to offer, so there will be something at this event for every reader!

Merry Christmas to all, and I am sending all my positive energy your way, in hopes that you and I will both be proud of our accomplishments in the coming year!

EVENT IN SAVANNAH 7/30

I will read poetry and make a presentation at Barnes and Noble in Savannah, Georgia on Saturday, July 30th at 1:00 p.m.

This event is sponsored by Southernscribe.com, an internet-based writing forum moderated by the lovely Joyce Dixon. Appearing with me will be the award winning poet Kay Day, whose book, A Poetry Break, was nominated for the SEBA Book of the Year. Her most recent tome, Killing Earl, will be featured in her presentation.

I have to tell all of you, I read Killing Earl in one sitting. The prose is so seamless, so riveting, that I could not tear myself away from it. It is a true story of a young girl, Kay Day's own daughter, and her odyssey of dealing with a mystery illness. In her book, Day gives helpful information to families dealing with real health problems, and insight into the medical implications that can cripple the strongest of wills.

Ken Bell will also appear, promoting his books, respectively, From the Heart, and From the Heart II. Though Ken did not write any of the essays in the book, he is wholly responsible for compiling these stories of love and inspiration for all to enjoy. The fabulous Joyce Dixon will be signing with Ken; not only is she the queen of cyberspace at Southernscribe.com, but she is also a contributer to From the Heart II.

Please join us as we speak and read. Each of us will give a talk about publishing, and aspiring writers are welcomed!

Events!

Darling Lovers of Poetry,

It has been eventful lately! I was a featured guest at Barnes and Noble's "Poetry Extravaganza" on April 28th. Leading the event was Kay Day, author of "A Poetry Break" and "Killing Earl", and other books. Kay is a leader in the Jacksonville community, drawing poets together in what I can only describe as a very literate sharefest. The audience was kind, and Whitney, the CRM at B&N made us all feel welcome!

I will be signing books at the Bluffton Festival on Calhoun Street on May 7th, along with Kendall Bell, author of "From the Heart" and "From the Heart 2". Bluffton is located just outside Hilton Head, South Carolina, so stop by if you are in the 'hood!

I am looking forward to the Coastal Carolina Writers' Retreat on May 20-22 at Palm Key, an enchanting nature retreat just outside Hilton Head. Writers, publicists, agents, and guests can choose from 24 different workshops on a variety of subjects all about the creative aspects of writing as well as many talks about the business side of writing.

And speaking of the business side of writing, it is a necessary evil. Writing is the fun part. I found out on April 21 that my publisher, Coastal Villages Press, is closing its doors. I have now signed with Low Tide Press, and plan to re-release The World: Poetic Connections in July, with a brand new cover, and quotes from various authors on the rear cover. Gravity is finished and in editing now, with a September release, or possibly a March, 2006 release.

Say a prayer for this poet! With all the change going on in my world, I am still writing.

As the Monty Python crowd would say, "I'm not dead yet!"

Book Signing!

Greetings poetry lovers!

I will be signing copies of The World: Poetic Connections today, March 18th, in Sumter, South Carolina, at Waldenbooks in Sumter Mall. Tomorrow, I will be signing at Happy Bookseller in Columbia, South Carolina, along with Kendall Bell, the author of From The Heart and From The Heart 2.

As a new poet, I realize that many readers out there have just put poetry down and refused to read it. People tell me that they are just not interested in remote and obscure references that take forever to decipher, and for that reason, poetry is just not an enjoyable read for the average reader.

I beg to differ! There is a new trend brewing, folks. Rhyming poetry is making a comeback, and simpler, more accessible poetry, while never really dead, was only sleeping!

Come see me today, but if you can't, take a look at the poems in my last post. The book is available at all online booksellers, or through my website, http://www.janetcarrhull.com.

RHYME IS SUBLIME!

GRAVITY

Here are a few selections from my book, Gravity, which will be released by Coastal Villages Press in Spring, 2006:



MY SISTER



My sister, oh, my sister,
where did you go?
Your garden that bore fruit
with weeding and blister
is now needing water
and spring’s new suit.
The friend’s balm of aloe
won’t salve the shoot
of seeds that won’t grow.

Spreading deeply trenched
‘side the soil forever brown,
I am left to gather
seeds left unquenched.
I’m the crying left daughter,
trying in ceaseless blather
to calm the gossiped town;
they’d all, if they’d rather,
send you straight on down.




PLEASURE


You tell me to ignore the nights
of our sweet soft fog,
whispered touch of skin on skin
that faintly pressed upon my mind
templates of everlasting nexus.

Wistful tenets of done love
blandish my eyes to see
the sweet soft fog in my dreams
that blankets me in night’s purlieu.
Daylight damns my pleasure.



SCHOOL DAY


I pull a squirmy boy
into an unforgiving jacket
on a quiet winter morning
that is dark as my heart;

his belly full of oatmeal
and heart full of wonder,
I nudge him off to school
to smile upon his day.

He doesn’t know that I am
being dragged into a vortex,
a cubicle to sit in
while he learns how to count.

The world pulls me into
an unforgiving morning,
my eyelashes wet,
he kisses ‘bye and says, “Love!”

He will count forever.

The World: Poetic Connections

Here are a few selections from my book, The World: Poetic Connections (Coastal Villages Press/July, 2004):

FOSSIL HUNTER

Lost like a forgotton fossil buried in the earth
Bossed around adulthood, all the way from birth
I hike the quilted mountain, containing all my bone
And strike a look to distance, struck that I'm alone

As I push away the rocks that strew my tearless way
I still believe that high upon the mountain lies my day
My day to wake, my history unleashed from my mind
I'd stay inside the valley if amnesia left me blind

But though I thought I had forgot the flesh and bone I was
I now seek absolution from the past's winged out buzz
That made my skin become too thin and caused my will to shrink
That bade goodbye to life's perfume that made me smell and think

I reach the summit like a spaceman fresh to plant a flag
I find the smiling bones in camouflage of the crag
I look below and bid the valley of the past goodbye
And look straight up and tally clarities of my new sky



KEY WEST VACATION

Server snaps his tray holder open
and sits his heavy load down.
We're hapy and starving - who got the flounder?
I gaze at marina sundown.

Hundreds of boat lights shine tiny sunsets
and line the floated tie;
I glance in awe at son's lit face
and plan how not to die.



BLUSH

Do I recall that
Dreams I witnessed
Gleamed this color?

Or it the charmed
Flush of conscious
Thought, waken to see

Pink! All about
In sunrise, on lips
of old and young

The fake kind
Glowing upon the cheek
Bright up the eyes!

I rather the real
Of the palest skin
Grown hot and quick

The colored blush
Diluted blood
And deep draw of air

Once the mirror tells
You have thought
A shocking thought


The World: Poetic Connections is available at all online booksellers, and through my website, http://www.janetcarrhull.com