The reading is at Flintridge Books, 1010 Foothill Blvd., La Canada. Come early to sign up for the open reading.

LeVine is a writer, poet, philosopher, storyteller and author of two books of poetry – Forgiveness for Forgotten Dreams and Myths & Artists, both published by The Center Press. His latest book, Insights of an Ordinary Man, a collection of autobiographical vignettes, inspired essays and poems, was officially launched in December 2011 by Spirit Wind Books, becoming an Amazon.com Best Seller and securing a top-20 spot within the top-100 in the nation.

Alynn is a poet, essayist and fine art photographer. Originally from Portland, Oregon, she has lived many places, including New York City, Okinawa and San Diego, before returning to her beloved Northwest, making Seattle her home. She earned an MFA in Creative Writing/Poetry from Antioch Los Angeles and moved to Anacortes, Washington, where she currently lives with her husband and two cats. Alynn is the author of two collections of poems: Necessity of Flight (Cherry Grove, 2011) and a chapbook, Threads & Dust (Finishing Line Press, 2005).

May 18, 2012  :  Posted by Alice Pero

This is an updated version of a book first published in 2006 and features lyrics and poems from across his career. It also features some black and white images of Ubaldini to give the book a visual aspect. His website is www.rocknrollpoet.com so that nails his colours to the mast. How well do lyrics work without music is a point that is often raised about lyric books. They serve two purposes, one to allow listeners to read lyrics and secondly for the words themselves.

To continue reading, click here.

May 12, 2012  :  Posted by Michael Miller

Anyway, National Poetry Month is over, and, of course, that means nothing to us. More exciting news to come in May through March!

May 1, 2012  :  Posted by Michael Miller

John F. Buckley

Having spent close to the last twenty years in California, John F. Buckley looks forward to returning to his native Midwest as an MFA candidate at the University of Michigan this fall. Since his return to writing in 2009, Buckley has published over 180 of his poems in such journals as Agenda, Confrontation, Evergreen Review, Gargoyle, Poetry New Zealand and Zyzzyva, Like everyone else and his dentist, he is a Pushcart nominee. His first chapbook, Breach Birth, appeared on Propaganda Press in 2011, while his full-length collaboration with Martin Ott, Poets' Guide to America, is forthcoming on Brooklyn Arts Press in summer 2012. The selections below hail from his as-yet-unpublished solo collection, Sky Sandwiches.

Progress

When I was a little boy, all poems rhymed.
Not anymore. As I grew older,
poems spent many hours with
a battery of cruel but effective speech therapists.

Nowadays, poems are more neurotic,
because of the prolonged psychological abuse,
but they can do almost anything. Some poems
are doctors or lawyers. Some poems
have become firefighters or police officers. Some poems
don't like money very much, so they have
entered the field of teaching. Bruce Kardashian is
a dyslexic poem who won an Olympic gold medal in 1976.

I saw a duck who was a poem buying
crystal meth in downtown Irvine, but he
drove away before I could get his autograph.

The only time I have had any trouble with a poem
was in college at a loud party. I went there with my girlfriend
and this poem wouldn't stop hitting on her.
I got mad and started making fun of his accent.
I changed the ends of his lines to disgusting words
like shit-tonsil and Bachmannescence. We ended up
wrestling in the mud on the lawn until the police came.
I was fined two hundred dollars, but the poem
walked away scot-free because his father was a prominent ghazal.
Fucking diplomatic immunity.

Despite this, I support poems' rights to vote, to marry,
and to attend good schools, even with the white children.
Outer space, poems' rights, and the ocean depths
are the three final frontiers.

A Man and a Woman and a Bird

Thirty days have passed
since buying the robotic pigeon
I hoped would bring us closer together.

You had sighed admiringly at
the lifelike model from Japan,
rife with real synthetic feathers
and able to conduct aerial tea ceremonies.
We could not afford it,
so I bought a slick South Korean version
with painted slate-blue plumage.

It cannot fly, I understand your
disappointment over this,
but nevertheless, it bobs
its head, coos, has an internal
atomic alarm clock,
and ferments in its abdomen
certain types of kimchi in half the time.
If a person ever wanted certain types of kimchi
in two weeks instead of four weeks,
this was unquestionably the model to get.

I forgot you don't like kimchi.

Having been the one to lose the receipt,
I am more than willing to help you pack,
I am more than happy to wish you luck
as you search for a man who can offer you
more than second-rate birds and breadcrumbs.

If you stay, nothing will change.
We will continue to take
our South Korean robotic pigeon to bed with us,
propping it between our pillows,
an avian chaperon,
allowing it to peck us awake
in the morning at the proper time,
waiting for its battery to fail,
for its springs to lose elasticity,
for our warranty to expire.

It's on Poets Cafe on KPFK 90.7 FM at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 25. Listen in if you can!

Jeremy Radin is an actor and poet based out of Los Angeles, California. He's spent the last seven years studying at the Beverly Hills Playhouse and has been featured on several TV shows (It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Criminal Minds, Zoey 101). As a poet, he's performed with the likes of Derrick Brown, Mindy Nettifee, Mike McGee, Brendan Constantine and Jon Sands. He is the co-host of the wildly popular LightBulb Mouth, a Literary Adventure in Long Beach. His first book, Slow Dance with Sasquatch, is due out from Write Bloody this year, after which he will embark on a tour of the States. He currently runs poetry workshops for teens with eating disorders.

April 24, 2012  :  Posted by Jaimes Palacio

Iannaci is a widely published and anthologized Los Angeles-based poet. She earned an MFA in Poetry from Vermont College of Fine Arts and was a finalist for the 2009 New Letters Literary Award. She served for five years as co-director of the Valley Contemporary Poets and co-editor of their yearly anthology and has appeared at countless readings in the US and around the world. She has one son and prefers paisley to polka dots. You would like her.

Lieber's collection, Chemical Tendencies, published by Tebot Bach, was a finalist in the MSR poetry contest. He also received an honorable mention in the Allen Ginsberg Contest. Paul produces and hosts “Why Poetry” on KPFK radio in L.A. and Santa Barbara. His poems have appeared in the Patterson Review, Askew, Alimentum, New York Quarterly, Solo and many other journals. He lives in Venice CA with his wife and son.

Maloutas is the 2008 Sawtooth Poetry Prize winner for the whole Marie (Ahsahta Press). Her previous book and chapbooks are In a Combination of Practices (New Issues Press), Coffee Hazilly (Beard of Bees) and Practices (New Michigan Press/Diagram). In 2010, Les Figues Press published online, Her Not Blessed, a response to Harold Abramowitz’s Not Blessed.

For more info on LMU Extension poetry and writing classes, visit us on-line at www.lmu.edu/academics/extension.htm.

April 22, 2012  :  Posted by David Slavin

April 18, 2012  :  Posted by Peggy Dobreer

Susan's first book, I Was Building Up to Something, came out from Moon Tide Press in November last year. She has also won the Drury and Rebecca Lard awards and had her poem "Farm Days" installed on transit-station windscreens in Texas. Poetry Quarterly critic Glenn Lyvers called her collection "one of the best books I have read in years."

April 16, 2012  :  Posted by Michael Miller

The new, revamped Lost American Nights will launch this Wednesday at Two Idiots Peddling Poetry at the Ugly Mug, located around the block from Chapman University in Orange. The show starts at 8 p.m. and admission is $3. We hope to see you there! And if you'd like to order a copy of the book in advance, click here.

April 14, 2012  :  Posted by Michael Miller

Joan E. Bauer is the author of The Almost Sound of Drowning (Main Street Rag, 2008) and has worked as an English teacher, poetry editor, educational counselor and nonprofit fundraiser. She divides her time between Venice, California and Pittsburgh, where she curates the Hemingway Summer Poetry Series with Jimmy Cvetic.

Billy Burgos is a native of Belize and makes his home in the Leimert Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, where he is an active member of the Anansi Writers Workshop and serves as a poetry facilitator for Beyond Baroque.

Jessica Ceballos has been writing for over twenty years and been published in Centre Review and Hinchas de Poesia.

Cassandra Love is a 2008 PEN USA Emerging Voices Fellow. Swagger is a Woman is her first book of poetry and is available through Mouthfeel Press.

Bryan Sanders is a member of the Hollywood Institute of Poetics and the former host of the Black and Tan poetry reading series at Stories bookstore in Echo Park.

April 13, 2012  :  Posted by Joan E. Bauer