some author activity: Boughn, Schapira, Levy, Ross, Clayton, Barton + The Peter F Yacht Club,

Michael Boughn has a YouTube channel, by the way, in which he's been posting a variety of reading videos, including himself and Victor Coleman, etcetera; Kate Schapira writes about the LA wildfires; John Levy has a poem for Stuart Ross up at International Times; Simon Brown has translated poems by Conyer Clayton into French for Revue Watts; John Barton has a new poem up  at Identity Theory; and a stranger recently sent me a photograph of this Peter F Yacht Club hat he picked up in Montreal, asking if know where the real yacht club might be. I have no idea! I would love to know,

new from above/ground press: Unsovereign, by Kacper Bartczak (trans. Mark Tardi

Unsovereign
Kacper Bartczak
translated from the Polish by Mark Tardi
$5

Hybrid engine triptych


1.

in singing the song all freight

migrates synthesizing a mineral loss

imparts the viscosity of light



2.

biometric sculpture a direct inject

vacuum emission in a unit

a buoyant mouth squishes a piston

spewing a party of grease light



3.

listen on the fora for all sorts of crash

see the algaesphere ionizing

expediting a party of sinking light

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
June 2024
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

cover image: Agnieszka Kowalska-Owczarek
A watercolor from the series Wibracje – Linie z Niekończoności [Vibrations – Infinity Lines]

KACPER BARTCZAK is a Polish poet, scholar, and translator. Recent volumes include Czas Kompost [Time Compost] (2023), Widoki wymazy (2021), Naworadiowa [Radionaves] (2019), Pokarm suweren [Food Sovereign] (2017), and Wiersze organiczne [Organic Poems] (2015), which was nominated for two major awards in Poland. He has translated and published volumes of selected poems by Rae Armantrout, Charles Bernstein, and Peter Gizzi. as well as the work of many other poets into Polish. In English translation, recent poetry of his has appeared in Poetry, ANMLY, Denver Quarterly, Interim, MAYDAY, and Berlin Quarterly. His awards include two Fulbrights––at Stanford and Princeton, respectively––and a fellowship from the Kościuszko Foundation at Florida Atlantic University. He is an associate professor and department chair at the University of Łódź.

MARK TARDI is a writer and translator whose recent awards include a 2023 PEN/Heim Translation Grant and a 2022 National Endowment for the Arts Translation fellowship. He is the author of three books, most recently, The Circus of Trust (Dalkey Archive Press, 2017), and his translations of The Squatters’ Gift by Robert Rybicki (Dalkey Archive Press) and Faith in Strangers by Katarzyna Szaulińska (Toad Press/Veliz Books) were published in 2021. Recent writing and translations have appeared in Poetry, Conjunctions, Guernica, ANMLY, Full-Stop, Interim, Cagibi, Denver Quarterly, and in the anthology The Experiment Will Not Be Bound (Unbound Edition Press, 2023). Viscera: Eight Voices from Poland will appear with Litmus Press in September 2024. He is on faculty at the University of Łódź.

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

new from above/ground press: Poor Rutebeuf, Translated from the French by William Vallières

Poor Rutebeuf
Translated by William Vallières
$5

In the time of leaves falling,
when there are more leaves falling
    than on the bough,
in a poverty that keeps me cowed,
that comes at me from all around
    like sneaky winter
coldly covering my verse,
my reel starts with a laden purse
    of sad stories.
Poor sense and perspicacity
God gave me, the King of glory,
    and poorer means,
and a cold ass when the winds freeze:
the ice of winds rip through me;
    it is often,
too too often that I feel the wind.
My reels promise to make a mint
    and they do:
I get a pound on the sou
for every misery, a fortune
    of penury.
Poverty is again on me:
its door is wide open wide to me;
    I am the guest
kept at its meagre breast.
In rain wet, in heat, all baked red:
     I go naked! ("Winter Reel")

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
March 2023
as part of above/ground press’ thirtieth anniversary
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

William Vallières is a Montreal poet. His work has appeared in The Walrus, Best Canadian Poetry 2019, Grain, periodicities, Event, Plenitude, and other places. His first book of poetry, Versus, is out with Véhicule Press. He’s currently working on a book about the eccentric Québécois inventor—his grandfather—Jean St-Germain.

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

some author activity: Mohammadi, Barbour, MacEachern, Coulton + Robinson,

Khashayar Mohammadi has some new translations of poetry, by Shahin Sadeghzadeh, now up at Asymptote Journal; Edmonton Journal publishes an article on the late Douglas Barbour; Jessi MacEachern is interviewed over at Touch the Donkey; and Valerie Coulton has begun to curate a new series of free pdf poetry chapbooks, palabrosa, which recently posted a new title by Elizabeth Robinson.

new from above/ground press: I am a language you are the sound device, by Sandra Moussempès (translated by Eléna Rivera

I am a language you are the sound device
Sandra Moussempès
translated by Eléna Rivera
$5

What connection are we looking for while watching a film,
while reading a poem?
anticipation or eloquence
using a repetitive metaphor

enjambment                “caesura”

the sequences between sound and sense, the poetry of affect,
the juxtaposition of the poem, time and light, fade(s) to black,
point of view, fragment, the metric, subtraction

what’s the difference between exorcism and the close-up
a way of writing in the dark (the visual narrative)

at first it’s a composition of living matter        barely
resized
our thoughts noted        inside the sculpted house

these fragments in a film-loop

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
April 2021
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Cover photograph by Russell Switzer, 2019

Sandra Moussempès is a poet and vocal artist, born in Paris in 1965, and former resident of the Villa Medici. She has published twelve books of poetry including : Cassandre à bout portant (Poésie/Flammarion, 2021), Cinéma de L’affect (Boucles de voix off pour film fantôme) (L’Attente, 2020), Colloque des Télépathes & CD Post-Gradiva (L’Attente 2017), and Sunny girls (Poésie/Flammarion 2015). As a sound and vocal artist, she has recorded four albums and has performed at the Centre Pompidou, the Louis Vuitton Foundation, and MAMCO in Geneva, among others. above/ground press also published a selection from Sunny girls, translated by Eléna Rivera (2017).

Eléna Rivera was born in Mexico City and raised in Paris. Her most recent book of poetry is Epic Series (Shearsman Books, 2020). Her translation of Bernard Noël’s The Rest of the Voyage (Graywolf, 2011) received the Robert Fagles Translation Prize. She also translated Noël’s The Ink’s Path (Cadastre8zéro, 2018), Isabelle Baladine Howald’s Hantôme (forthcoming Black Square Editions, 2021) and Isabelle Garron’s Body Was (forthcoming, Litmus Press, 2021). She received a National Endowment for the Arts in translation and fellowships from MacDowell (2020) and the Trelex Paris Poetry Residency (2019).

This is their second above/ground press chapbook, after From: Sunny girls (2017).

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

new from above/ground press: THE OCEANDWELLER, by Saeed Tavanaee Marvi (translated by Khashayar Mohammadi

THE OCEANDWELLER
Saeed Tavanaee Marvi translated by Khashayar Mohammadi
$4

the sounds of the Ocean
all sounds crash into cliffs
I recite all my poems to the Ocean 

soft music. we go inside the OceanCruiser. The OceanDweller walks among the white Poplars. We can hear the rustling of leaves. while walking on the dried leaves he speaks of the genesis of Song

a flower has bloomed
dried root       
            lively crown 

            some reprieve. the voice changes its timbre

Asuriq was the first flower on this planet; its pollen carried by the comet Indra to the depths of this planet’s oceans. Long roots and small leaves. Volcanic cycles made the flower surface 130 million years ago. Humanity had not yet come to earth.. It was the time of birds, alone with flowers on the surface. it was then that songs began to take form. the first song was a dialogue between the birds and Asuriq.

            the room. The television speaks in Farsi. No sound of birds.
     the poem is recited with soft music in the background.

I dreamt of you
it was spring
we were walking
you cried
there were no flowers

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
February 2021
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

further of his translations of Marvi's work appeared recently at periodicities: a journal of poetry and poetics

cover image: Babak Tavanaee Marvi

Saeed Tavanaee Marvi is a poet and translator born in the city of Mashhad in 1983. His books include The Woman With Chlorophyllic eyes, Verses of Death: An Anthology of American Poetry and a translation of Richard Brautigan’s Tokyo Montana Express.

Khashayar Mohammadi is a queer, Iranian born, Toronto-based Poet, Writer, Translator and Photographer. He is the author of poetry chapbooks Moe’s Skin by ZED press 2018, Dear Kestrel by knife | fork | book 2019 and Solitude is an Acrobatic Act by above/ground press 2020. His debut poetry collection Me, You, Then Snow is forthcoming with Gordon Hill Press in Spring 2021

This is Mohammadi’s second chapbook with above/ground press, after Solitude is an Acrobatic Act (2020).

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

some author activity: Perry, Pirie, Ross, La Rocque, mclennan, Burdick, Dennis + Hogg,

Paul Perry has a new essay in the "On Writing" series at the ottawa poetry newsletter; Pearl Pirie writes on her writing space for The New Quarterly; Jenya Stashkov asked Stuart Ross to gather poems by fifteen Canadian poets to translate those poems into Russian, and to create a drawing inspired by them, which are now online, including translated poems by Lance La Rocque, rob mclennan, Alice Burdick, Michael Dennis, Robert Hogg and Ross himself; Robert Hogg has two further poems posted as part of the "Robert Kroetsch 2020" up at The Typescript; and Lance La Rocque is being interviewed over at poetry mini interviews.

Alice Burdick and Gary Barwin's above/ground press collaboration translated into French!

Alice Burdick and Gary Barwin's 2018 above/ground press collaboration, PLEASURE BRISTLES, has been translated into French by Canadian translator Simon Brown, and has been published in France! You can order a copy directly from the publisher, Editions Vanloo, and of course, the original English edition is still very much available.

some author activity: Ross, Claxton, Baus, Johnson, Gold + Perry,

some of Stuart Ross' poems have been translated into Russian; Dana Claxton has won the Hnatyshyn Foundation's $25,000.00 prize for outstanding achievement by a Canadian mid-career artist; Eric Baus is interviewed over at Neon Pajamas; Chris Johnson has a short poem, after Artie Gold, with a couple of interview questions, online at Canadian Literature; and Paul Perry has an article in the Irish Times on writing a children's novel.

new from above/ground press: Furigraphic Horizons, by Hawad, trans. Jake Syersak

Furigraphic Horizons
by Hawad
translated from the French by Jake Syersak
$5

The Haulers of the Horizon


I hear the ember
incubating the names
of shooting stars
And I demand from the cricket
once again
that it strip nude the night
any night
that would not deliver a dawn
suspended from the droplet
blood ink bile
tear of my brothers
sweat condensed
in the interstices of my quill
Quill rifle
leveled point-blank
against the temple of oblivion
Quill stinger
frothing and vomiting up rumors
swarms and abrasions
memory
isles and reptiles
insect letters
Tifinagh
crawling with fury
over the deserts and the stars ahead
already laughter and grimaces
lines peopling our faces
as haulers of the horizons

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
October 2019
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Hawad is a visual artist and poet originally from the Aïr region in the central Sahara. He composes his work in his native Tuareg tongue of Tamazight, in Tifinagh script, which is then co-translated into French with his wife, Tuareg scholar Hélène Claudot-Hawad. Hawad’s work is unique for its deployment of what he has coined “Furigraphy” (a therapeutic poetics involving the frenetic repetition of words, gestures, sounds, and images to evoke a vertiginous and obsessional rhythmic trance), a means by which he achieves “Surnomadism” (a nod to both Surrealism and the nomadic heritage of the Tuareg people). Surnomadism, according to Hawad, is a literary transcendence of the self to encompass ubiquity and escape the superficial physical and mental constraints of time and space, to investigate the breach between the inner and outer self, the self and others, and the past, present, and future. Common themes of his poetry include anti-colonial resistance, Anarchism, exile, nomadism, and the prolongation of Tuareg heritage. Hawad is the author of multiple books of poetry, including Furigraphie: Poésies 1985 – 2015, from which the poems in this book are taken.

Jake Syersak is the author of Mantic Compost (Trembling Pillow Press, 2020) and Yield Architecture (Burnside Review Press, 2018). Two of his full-length translations of Mohammed Khaïr-Eddine’s work are forthcoming in the coming year: the poetry collection Proximal Morocco— and the hybrid novel Agadir, co-translated with Pierre Joris. He edits Cloud Rodeo, an online poetry journal, and co-edits the micro-press Radioactive Cloud.

This is Syersak’s second above/ground press chapbook, after These Ghosts / This Compost : An Aubadeclogue (2017).

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

some author activity: mclennan, Syersak, Koss + Schmaltz,

rob mclennan writes of five favourite writers over at The Poetry Question, and has a new poem for Stuart Ross' birthday up at Train : a poetry journal; Jake Syersak has some new translations up at Folder magazine; forthcoming author Zane Koss has new work in the "Tuesday poem" series over at the dusie blog; and Eric Schmaltz has some new work up at Train : a poetry journal.

a selection of Rachel Mindell's rib and instep : honey (2018) translated into French

A selection of poems from Rachel Mindell's above/ground press title, rib and instep : honey (2018) has been translated into French by translator (and current subscriber) Simon Brown and included in #16 of the online WATTS. Thanks so much! You can see Mindell's poems included as part of the issue here.