Chris Olander came over last weekend to sign his Silver King Creek poetry broadside. He was down from the Sierras to read at an event celebrating the first time publication of The Collected Poems of Denise Levertov (New Directions, 2013). That is one great thing about living poets-they can sign stuff. Actually, that is one great thing in many, particularly in Chris's case. He's just lovely and fun and full of stories. We saw Chris a couple years back at the Watershed Poetry Festival when he performed his Coyotes poem with Joy Harjo accompanying him on the sax, but we didn't meet until in line to have some broadsides signed by Gary Snyder last year (which incidentally i got to illustrate and was printed at Poltroon Press!). We asked if we could print some of his work and there you have it. We love his ecstatic animist poetry-makes ya want to tear through brush and yowrl! Serious fun. Also, we connected on the level of working with children, about the life changing, asserting, saving function that arts in the schools can have. He works with California Poets in the Schools. As he was signing, he told the story of how getting up and performing a poem in grade school sent him on a lifetime path as a poet-the class responded and he saw it was a thing he could really do. And he did a ripping woodpecker poem right there---now if we can wrench that one from his hands!
Here is the link to this year's Watershed broadside... http://poetryflash.org/programs/?p=watershed
Letterpress broadside of the poem "Silver King Creek, Upper and Lower Fish Valley" by California poet, Chris Olander. Multi-color woodblock print by Jinny Pearce. Printed in Walbaum and Franklin Gothic Italic type on Stonehenge Paper. 11 x 15 inches. 150 copies printed, limited stock. Signed by the poet.