As National Poetry Month comes to a close, our local independent bookseller’s coalition, United Booksellers of San Francisco, has managed to publish our third chapbook in one calendar year with the cooperation of San Francisco Poet Laureate Kim Shuck. In what she calls our chapthology series, we bring you volume three of The City Is Already Speaking, featuring Cathy Arellano, Jorge Argueta, Kitty Costello, JoAnn DeLuna, Lourdes Figueroa, Sandra Garcia Rivera, Charlie Getter, Lauren Emiko Ito, David Kubrin, César Love, Naomi Quiñonez, Tiny (Lisa Gray-Garcia) and Katie Tomzynski. So far, we have published new and previously published work by San Francisco Bay Area poets Josiah Luis Alderete, Dee Allen, Simon Crafts, Tongo Eisen-Martin, Flavia Elisa, E.K. Keith, Thea Matthews, Alejandro Murguía, Linda Noel, Raul Ruiz, Kim Shuck, Ricardo Tavarez, Avotcja, Charles Curtis Blackwell, bloodflower, Paul Corman-Roberts, norm mattox, Gail Mitchell, Leroy F. Moore, Jr., Richard Sanderell, Norma Smith, Maurisa Thompson, and René Vaz, Featured visual artists have included Michael Roman, Kate Razo, Veronica Solis and Anna Lisa Escobedo. As one of three co-editors and a contributor to the project, I can tell you the effort is truly gratifying when we see the faces of the contributors as well as our readers upon publication. This is a labor of love by our local community of poets and the bookstores who support their work. I’d like to thank everyone, especially the readers who make the continued publication of this series possible. Because we are a grassroots, non-proift/break-even project, we’ve gone into the red on this edition, but you can help us by placing your order at United Booksellers or stopping by one of our participating stores (Alley Cat, Adobe Books, Green Arcade, Bird & Beckett) and purchasing your copy. You can also attend a reading (a live reading of this work will take place on May 12 at 4 PM at Adobe Bookshop in San Francisco). With appreciation for all you do to support the literary arts in the Bay Area and in your area, we thank you for
Filed under: Arts and Culture, Poetry, San Francisco News, Tales of the Gentrification City, books, chapbooks
Denise Sullivan 