Peter Pereira in Seattle

Mark your calendars and grab your umbrellas. Peter reads tomorrow!


PETER PEREIRA
Sunday, March 11, 2007 at 03:00 PM
at OPEN BOOKS, Seattle, WA
Peter Pereira draws on his life as physician, son, partner, gardener, and lover of language to create What's Written on the Body ($15 Copper Canyon Press), a richly textured collection that both moves and delights. At times the poems bubble with wordplay -- "I'm interested in the space between / detonation and denotation.. / How we know / whether to flee / or feel." At other times they unfold with a quiet grace -- "The patient was talking and I was not / hearing a sound. But I was listening and // I was there. I was standing beside and I was / listening with my hands." Though the work does not turn from life's darker moments of illness, death, cruelty, at its core this is a book of praise, pleasure, and love, generous in tone and spirit.

Stories of Chapbooks

Floating Bridge Press, a fabulous small press in Seattle, Washington has a series of essays and stories about the making of a chapbook by previous winners of the Floating Bridge Press Chapbook prize.

They feature poets:
Annette Spaulding-Convy
Michael Bonacci
Tim Kelly
and myself

If you are putting together a chapbook of poems there may be some ideas to help you or you may appreciate the process that these poets took. Also, it's good to know that most of the chapbooks took at least a few years before they were published.

Whenever you submit your work there is the possibility that you will be rejected and feel discouraged. So many times, I think we need to remind ourselves as writers that rejection is part of the process and nothing personal. The poets we will read are the ones who can be rejected, feel discouraged, and yet, continue to do what they are drawn to do--write...and submit.

I told a friend recently my favorite Wayne Gretsky quote: You miss 100% of the shots you never take. Life is uncertain and temporary--don't let a little rejection get you down.