Swan Scythe Press

10/30/2024

The winner of the 2024 Swan Scythe Press Chapbook Contest is Aida Zilelian for her manuscript Dissonance!

09/21/2024

The brilliant poet and humanist Sandra McPherson has passed (1943-2024). She was a favorite student of Elizabeth Bishop and went on to become an excellent professor, inspiring generations of poets and scientists during her tenure at the Iowa Writers' Workshop and at the University of California at Davis.
Her interests were wide ranging and included jazz, blues, quilts, Japanese aesthetics and the miracles of life that take place all around us. Sandra and her husband poet Walter Pavlich founded Swan Scythe Press in 2000. Here we share her poem “Timing” which won the 2019 Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Prize judged by Marilyn Chin.

Sandy you are missed!

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/sandra-mcpherson

05/02/2024

Now available, Gail Wronsky's chapbook Some Disenfranchised Evening, winner of the 2023 Swan Scythe Press Chapbook Contest!

Praise for Gail Wronsky's poetry:
“A master of the lyric, a visionary never far from the complicated wondrous relations between world and imagination, body and mind, Gail Wronsky is one of our most indispensable poets.”
— Gillian Conoley, author of Notes from the Passenger

“The stakes are high, each poem walking the edge of a decision to live and love another day…Here, the lyric form is revivified.”
— Diane Seuss, author of Modern Poetry and winner of the 2022 Pulitzer Prize

https://www.swanscythepress.com/books/some_disenfranchised_evening.html

03/19/2024

Swan Scythe Press 2024 Poetry Chapbook Contest is open for submissions!
Entry fee: $18. Deadline is June 15 (postmark). Winner receives $200 and 25 perfect-bound chapbooks.
For full guidelines, visit www.swanscythepress.com and swanscythepress.submittable.com/submit.
The 2023 winner is Gail Wronsky for Some Disenfranchised Evening.

10/31/2023

The winner of the 2023 Swan Scythe Press Chapbook Contest is Gail Wronsky for her manuscript Some Disenfranchised Evening.

09/22/2023

On this week's SPD Recommends list: Arthur Solway's book Siddhartha On Fire.

SPD Recommends

08/22/2023

Siddhartha On Fire by Arthur Solway, winner of the 2022 chapbook prize! Out now!

Arthur Solway’s poetry is full of knowledge of the world, New Delhi and Kabul, Istanbul and Athens are all here. Here too are the patron saints of our literature—Emily Dickinson and Vasko Popa, John Keats and Beckett. Syntax that is as interested in metaphysics as it is in music is the instrument Solway uses to bring it all together, in lines where breath becomes a searing musical notation. I marvel at how in the book so full of the world it is somehow the most lonely poems that won’t let me go: open the book on pieces like “A Matter of Faith” or “What Is Not” and you will find yourself right in the 21st Century devotional moment, a space where negative theology is the spiritual seeker’s best friend. In those moments, perhaps his most desolate, Solway delivers the music that’s truest, I feel. The result is worth it, because he knows that “there is no ordinary suffering” and that “the world is the end of the world” and yet goes on, undeterred, “again, repaired by a stranger’s kiss.” This is a very beautiful book.

—Ilya Kaminsky, author of Dancing in Odessa and Deaf Republic

https://www.swanscythepress.com/books/siddhartha_on_fire.html

08/22/2023

Thank you to Annie Fay Meitchik for reviewing Little Hour and to Livia Meneghin, reads editor at Sundress Publications!

Rae Gouirand’s chapbook, Little Hour (Swan Scythe Press, 2022), uses poetry as a medium to explore themes of place, space, duality of self, as well as the relationship between nature versus human influence and design. The collection of 20 poems opens with “Some Place” which encapsulates the sp...

08/22/2023

Thank you again to Verse Daily for sharing Sandra McPherson's poem "Simple Science" on August 12, 2023!

Verse Daily, a quality online web anthology of poetry. A poem a day, along with our complete archives, and poem selections from the web.

08/22/2023

Thank you to Verse Daily for sharing Rae Gouirand's poem "Little Hour" on August 10, 2023!

Verse Daily, a quality online web anthology of poetry. A poem a day, along with our complete archives, and poem selections from the web.

05/03/2023

Swan Scythe Press author Kyle Liang (How to Build a House) to feature at the first annual Brooklyn Poets Poetry Festival! May 25 to 27 at 144 Montague Street or via Zoom, for workshops, craft talks, panels and readings!

Join us for the first annual Brooklyn Poets Poetry Festival from May 25 to 27 for workshops, craft talks, panels and readings!

04/26/2023

The Poetry Invitational is back! Join us for an evening of poetry inspired by the works on view at the Museum, hosted by , the 2022–23 . Happening Thursday, April 27 at 7pm, free admission for everyone. Presented by SJMA and .

Participating Poets:

Arlene Biala 

Tshaka Campbell 

Lorenzo Mazon Dumuk 

Minerva Kamra 

Keana Aguila Labra 

Joseph Jason Santiago LaCour 

Chris Locsin 

Tongo Eisen-Martin 

Tureeda Mikell 

Robert S. Pesich 

Sophia Rose Rodriquez

Jen Siraganian 

Asha Sudra 

04/22/2023

The SJSU Annual Legacy of Poetry Festival continues its longstanding tradition of presenting readings and panels exploring various aspects of poetry and poetics every April. The festival features nationally prominent poets along with poets from SJSU and South Bay communities. Presented by the Poets and Writers Coalition.

Welcome to the first day of SJSU’s Legacy of Poetry Festival:
Sharing Our Food and Culture(s)
April 28th
Student Union Theater, 4:00 – 7:00 p.m.
Enjoy an evening of readings in the Student Union Theater or on Zoom from SJSU Legacy of Poetry by faculty, staff, alumni, and student poets. Plus special readings from university officials. Featuring a special appearance by poet and memoirist; Marcelo Hernandez Castillo and Prof. J. Michael Martinez reading from his forthcoming poetry book, Tarta Americana, to be published by Penguin Poets.

Welcome to the second day of SJSU’s Legacy of Poetry Poetry Festival:
Feeding Our Hunger
April 29th
Student Union Theater, 4:00 – 7:00 p.m.
Meet us back at the Student Union Theater or on Zoom for an evening full of festivities and knowledge. Playing a screening of Gerald Stern’s Still Burning, we honor the poet and his work throughout time. Following the tribute, enjoy a Keynote poetry performance by the 2023 Frost Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Poetry recipient, Juan Felipe Herrera, (U.S. Poet Laureate 2015 - 17), and Lee Herrick, current California Poet Laureate. Also featured will be Sally Ashton, poet, writer, Editor-in-Chief of the DMQ Review and an SJSU Lecturer emerita (Santa Clara County Poet Laureate, from 2011-2013) and Arlene Biala, a Filipina American poet and performance artist born in San Francisco (Santa Clara County Poetry Laureate 2015 – 17). Special guest appearance by Tshaka Campbell, current Santa Clara County Poet Laureate, host of the program Beautiful Black Books and author of Tarman, Muted Whispers, Tunnel Vision and most recently, Stuff | I will write more.

Welcome to the third day of SJSU’s Legacy of Poetry Poetry Festival:
Ghost of Cesar Chavez
April 30th
Student Union Theater, 4:00 – 7:00 p.m.
Join us back at the Student Union Theater or on Zoom at 2:30 pm to watch Poetry Performance Videos screened on YouTube, sponsored by DPWC. Following that, we pay tribute to Cesar Chavez on the thirtieth anniversary of his death through student readings and performances with author J. Michael Martinez.
We will end the evening, and the festival, with a Feeding San José/Ghost of Cesar Chavez Keynote performance by playwright/essayist/poet Luis Valdez, featuring David Dominguez, Xochiquetzal Candelaria and special guest Yosimar Reyes, a LAMBDA Literary Fellow and author of For Colored Boys Who Speak Softly.

The Legacy of Poetry Festival is supported by the College of Humanities & the Arts Artistic Excellence Programming Grant, the MOSAIC Cross-Cultural Center and Poetry Center San José. This event is supported in part by Poets & Writers.
For more program information visit: https://bit.ly/3KbrU8g

https://www.facebook.com/events/770661968055741

This page is dedicated to the Legacy of Poetry Festival 2023, with the theme "Feeding Our Hunger"

04/14/2023

Rebecca Foust, author of The Unexploded Ordnance Bin, in Literary Hub!

Write only what you absolutely do not know, not what you’re merely not sure of. –Stephen Dunn   Null. All. What’s after death or before. Where my old dog is now, my mother, my father—not the a…

04/10/2023

Well-RED celebrates National Poetry Month with Open Mic Night!

Tuesday, April 11th, 7 p.m.

Co-sponsored by Works/San José art and performance center.

This will be a hybrid event! Come visit and celebrate the new gallery space for Works/San José! 38 S 2nd St., San José.
Appetizers will be served including cheeses, breads and fruits. Wine and soda also available.

Register for your ticket to attend in-person at Eventbrite. Link:
https://bit.ly/3M80qD7
If you are unable to attend in person, we welcome you to join via Zoom!

Register in advance for this event via Zoom.
Link: https://bit.ly/3JVr27I

https://www.facebook.com/events/746107666969675

Well-RED celebrates National Poetry Month with Open Mic Night!

03/26/2023

Swan Scythe Press 2023 Poetry Chapbook Contest is open for submissions!
Entry fee: $18. Deadline is June 15 (postmark). Winner receives $200 and 25 perfect-bound chapbooks.

For full guidelines, visit www.swanscythepress.com and swanscythepress.submittable.com/submit.
The 2022 winner is Arthur Solway for Siddhartha On Fire.

12/08/2022

The winner of the 2022 Swan Scythe Press Chapbook Contest is Arthur Solway for his manuscript Siddhartha On Fire.

08/31/2022

We’ve got five days of poetry events that will inspire, challenge, and feed your creative soul! There’s a pass for that. Get your San José Poetry Festival 2022 pass and join us September 7–11 for events featuring Tongo Eisen-Martin, Anna Sanchez, Brennan DeFrisco, David Perez, Anna Yang, Tshaka Menelik Imhotep Campbell, Danny Thien Le, SevanKelee Boult, Chris Lok and many more: bit.ly/sjpf2022pass