The Poets in Schools programme is back for 2012.  This is your opportunity to encourage our community’s youth to become involved with reading and writing poetry.

The minimum commitment for the programme is a 1 hour session or workshop, with a possible follow-up session.  At this stage, Poets in Schools is a voluntary programme; but this may be subject to change, depending on funding availability.

In order to participate in first semester, please submit your expression of interest to wapoets@gmail.com before 2/3/2012. You may express your interest to conduct a second semester session at any time. Your expression of interest should include the following:

• Your availability: which days and times you would be available to present your session.
• Your preference of area or schools.
• A paragraph outlining the content of your session(s).
• A brief biography.
• A sample of your poetry (1 poem).

Please keep in mind the students’ age group when preparing your session plans.  You will be put into contact with a teacher at a volunteer school; negotiate with the teacher to ensure that your session content is relevant and appropriate.

To participate in the 2012 Poets in Schools programme, you will require a Working With Children Check card.  Forms may be obtained from post offices, and all relevant information is available from the Working With Children Check website: http://www.checkwwc.wa.gov.au. For volunteer work, the application fee is currently $10; while the application fee for paid positions is $51.50. You do not need to have a Working With Children Check card in order to express your interest in participating, but you’ll need it before delivering your sessions.

Strictly Hypothetical has an exciting new show planned for Fringe World Perth!

Would you like to read your poetry in Midland AND the Margaret River region?

We’re planning a satellite event to the Margaret River Readers and Writers Festival which runs from 29 April to 6 May.

The plan is to have an informal gathering in MJAC for local poets on Sunday April 1^st, with an open mic for anyone willing to read original work. The Margaret River Readers & Writers Festival team have invited us to read at the Special Poetry Dinner on Thursday 3^rd May at the Cowaramup Club… ROAD TRIP!

We are sourcing billets and fuel money to bring poets from the Swan Valley / Eastern Hills region to Margaret River. Negotiations, research and much sweet talking is underway, if you’d like to be involved or have any ideas please get in touch with Sarah Ryan (details below).

http://www.artsmargaretriver.com

Dear Writers,

There is a new literary journal in Melbourne, and we want YOU! We’re pretty sure that there are deep pools of wondrous talent welling within writers’ groups, so we’re coming straight to the source (oh, the imagery!).

VIM Journal is all about counteracting bad news – we want to hear stories of hope, wackiness, enthusiasm, wonder; anything that makes you smile, or think about the world in a fresh way, or sing a bit, or dance a jig.

We have put out a call for submissions for the inaugural edition, and we would love for you to send in your writing. See the attached press release for more information, and visit our website for submission guidelines and other bits and pieces: vimjournal.com. For updates on the journal, as well as whimsical observations of the world and its oddities (we hope), follow us on twitter and like us on facebook (details below). Submissions close 3 March 2012.

We can’t wait to see what you’ve got in store for us, so send it on through.

Good day to you!

Cheers,
The VIM team

On Tuesday 14 February 2012 the Japanese Gardens at the Perth Zoo filled with people and picnics for an evening filled with poetry. Dennis Haskell, Lucy Dougan, Andrew Burke, Kevin Gillam, Vivienne Glance, Amanda Joy, Danny Gunzburg, Jaya Penelope, Scott-Patrick Mitchell, Veronica Lake and Chris Arnold read their poetry by moonlight. MC was ABC Grandstand reporter Karen Tighe.  Perth poets also featured in the dedicated Mulla Mulla Press publication ‘Love Poetry 2012 Fire in my head’, a limited edition only available on the night.

'Waiting for Love' by Beba Hall

The event was supported by The Small Room and Mulla Mulla Press, and co-ordinated by Tineke Van der Eecken for WA Poets Inc.

Do you love reading dotdotdash? Did you listen to that bonus CD in Issue Six: Jukebox on repeat? Do you love listening to performance poetry? Then you should definitely come down to the Fringe Gallery on Friday the 16th of December to help WA Poets Inc celebrate day six of the dotdotdash subscribathon! Held over eight days and nights, each event will be themed after a dotdotdash issue.

WA Poets Inc are very enthusiastic to have collaborated with The dotdotdash Collective to give you an amazing night of symbiotic musico-poetry performances at the Fringe gallery.

What: Day Six of the dotdotdash subscribathon: Jukebox
When: Friday the 16th of December at 7:30pm
Where: The Fringe Gallery, 94 Bawdan Street, Willagee

There will be turntables, so bring along your favourite record, if you’re game enough to share it with the crowd.

MC Naked Blind will introduce our special guests for the evening who will blow your minds away with epic poetry performances. These include:

Liana Christensen
Amanda Joy
Mar Bucknell
Kaitlyn Plyley
Vivienne Glance
Flora Smith

There will be a small coverage charge of $5. We hope to see you there!

Find this event on Facebook

To find out more about the dotdotdash subscribathon check out their website or their subscribathon event page on Facebook

Trivia: A traditional Jamaican Sound System always has a selector, an MC and a DJ. If people bring records, I guess that makes the audience the selector.

Subscribeathon is brought to you by the following fine businesses and writing organisations:
The Department of Culture and the Arts
OOTA writers
Fremantle Press
UWA Publishing
Twelfth Planet Press
Underground Writers
WA Poets Inc
OnWilliam
Love is my velocity
SPUNC
WritingWA
The Fellowship of Australia Writers WA
KSP Writers’ Centre
The Blue Room Theatre

For anyone with a 2011 festival programme, please note that Cottonmouth is now held on the first Tuesday of every month, rather than Thursday. We will update our online programmes to reflect the new date. For all the latest Cottonmouth news, please see the Cottonmouth website.

Giramondo Press invites all interested to the launch of John Mateer’s newest collection, Southern Barbarians, at Crow Books.

For more details see Crow Books

Southern Barbarians

The Portuguese traders who brought Europe to Japan in the sixteenth century were known as ‘southern barbarians’. In his new collection John Mateer offers a contemporary re-charting of the Portuguese Empire, the hemisphere of influence which ties Portugal to Angola, Mozambique, South Africa, Australia, Timor, Malacca, Macau and Japan.

This empire is a fugitive one, notable for its saudade, its awareness of loss, its yearning for a world that appears only intermittently in this one, as an echo, a trace, a memory. At its heart is the figure of the poet, as migrant, tourist, desterrado. His identity is inhabited by other identities, just as the place he is in reminds him of other places.

He is Camões, author of Os Lusíadas, he is Pessoa of the multiple heteronyms. Haunted by doubles and reflections, accompanied by ‘spirit guides’ who pass between this world and the other, he is both ghostly and connected wherever he goes, connected in his ghostliness.