Kevin Spenst (he/him)
@kevinspenst
Poet, author @AnvilPress, chapbook maker and reviewer @subTerrain, organizer @DeadPoetReading, co-host on Wax Poetic, instructor @TWSSFU
Such a thrill to be read closely and carefully. Thank you, Tom.
KEVIN SPENST A Bouquet Brought Back from Space 2024 @AnvilPress With Bird and GC KB suggest a new freedom is possible in lyric. Romantic idealism is dead, dead. Syllable by syllable the acknowledgment of the lyric other endows the poet’s voice with wild meaning. In love.
Israeli rights groups accuse Israel of genocide in Gaza bbc.in/4lIm7Zs
According to health institutions in Gaza 40,000 Palestinian infants are at risk of death due to starvation and lack of milk in Gaza .
"Working with students, particularly graduate students and Indigenous students, and being involved in some movements around housing and urban rights, generates a future-oriented optimism that I feel a part of" Jeff Derksen bcbooklook.com/from-working-c… @SFU @SFUenglish @sfuenglishgrads
“A poetry of shine”
"If the most sidereal drink is pain, the most soothing clock is music. A poetry of shine could come of this." 'Morning Star' by C. D. Wright - via Academy of American Poets 🤍 #poetry #poetrycommunity #writingcommunity
“I am aware that, every time I have a conversation with a book, I benefit from someone’s decision against silence.” - Yiyun Li
Kumo in Japanese (which sounds like a roundish word to me.) Do you know cloud in any other languages?
BpNichol (1970)
"A creative life cannot be sustained by approval, any more than it can be destroyed by criticism – you learn this as you go on." - Will Self
As a morning writer, I love the distinction being made in the quoted line (in a gorgeous poem about acceptance and openness) and the usual early morning stuff that passes for thought
woke up thinking about this poem by Raymond Carver
Tonight!
Join us on July 23rd for a celebration of the 2024 Fred Cogswell Award. Featuring readings by winner Dominique Bernier-Cormier and first runner-up andrea bennett. I'll also share a poem each from the other eight finalists. Hosted by Alan Hill. I'd love to see you there!
The wonder that can be found on an infant’s face: “twisting their faces / into vast expressions”
ROO BORSON Night Walk: Selected Poems 1994 @oxfordup Canada keeps supplying me with distinguished oeuvres. “Early” RB retains a subdued 50ish realism charged with transcendent pathos. Tuneful gestalts flow towards a comprehensive picture of life at a specific moment. More to come
“the future falls out of place”
The Essential C.D.WRIGHT edd. Gander and Wiegers 2025 @CopperCanyonPrs “Essential” may raise a smirk in our age of suspicion. CDW is that exception. Her cold is hot, erotic. Moon is her self-recognition “without a mirror.” Her difficulty is her adamant ethical coherence.
Troubling indeed @PancouverMedia @TheTyee
Very troubling
"Kingdom of the Clock is packed with vivid imagery and insightful phrasing. Cowper’s word choices and rhythms chime with brilliance throughout (“tonal phrases programmed / into flightpaths”)," writes Joe Enns in the BC Review. thebcreview.ca/2025/07/05/259…
"A climax that is gasp-inducingly beautiful," gushes the reviewer for the Montreal Review of Books. She notes a secondary character could be more complex, which points at how the narrative structure of the poem invites indefinite elaboration. Noted for a 2nd edition someday!
The University of the Fraser Valley is looking for our 2026 Writer in Residence! The deadline is August 15th. To learn more and to apply, visit: ufv.ca/english/writer…
Word of the day is ‘swullocking’, from 19th-century East Anglian dialect: sultry, sweltering, and sudiferous (sweat-inducing).
Over the moon (and a beautiful body of water!) to be reading with these luminaries of language on Galiano Island!
bill bissett is one of the authors performing at the Gulf Island Poetry Festival! Watch this space for more details: galianolit.ca