Not about poetry--but about poets

http://chronicle.com/forums/careers/read.php?f=19&i=1876&t=1720

Send books here, too--

This is in my old neighborhood, Mid-City/City Park/Faubourg St. John. Their elevation is lower and their and population of working writers is greater. In other words, they need the help.

Becky Rolland/NWU
Gulf Coast Writers' Relief
c/o Fairgrinds Coffee
3133 Ponce de Leon
New Orleans, LA
70119

For more info, contact Gulf Coast Writer’s Relief Project, P. O. Box 2067, Mandeville, LA 70470 or call 1-888-842-2493.

URGENT: 501(c)(3) book giveaway

This from First Book--you MUST be a 501(c)(3) in oder to participate. Please forward widely:
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First Book is excited to announce a First Book - Book Relief distribution in Mobile, Alabama the week of February 6, 2006. Due to technical problems with our initial announcement, this email is being sent to all groups registered with the First Book National Book Bank. However, please note:

THE MOBILE DISTRIBUTION IS FOR BOOK RELIEF ONLY. APPLICANTS MUST BE FROM ONE OF THE FIVE GULF COAST STATES AND LOCATED IN COUNTIES AND PARISHES DIRECTLY AFFECTED BY THE 2005 HURRICANES.

First Book's Book Relief initiative is our response to the recent Gulf region hurricanes. If your program was impacted by the hurricanes, you are eligible to apply for Book Relief distributions. During the application process, you will be asked to explain the extent to which your program was impacted by the hurricanes.

If your program was NOT impacted by the hurricanes, you will not be eligible for Book Relief distributions. Please watch future announcements for upcoming First Book National Book Bank distributions.

The distribution in Mobile, Alabama will occur on Thursday, February 9th and Friday, February 10th. Books are available to be picked up or shipped to organizations regionally. Thanks to the support of our corporate partners, shipping for this distribution is free!

Book Relief is a cooperative effort. This distribution is possible thanks to the generosity of Townsend Press. Please note that all books available at this distribution are most appropriate for children 12 and older.

The Mobile, Alabama Book Relief 2006 application is available online NOW. Please apply for books as soon as possible, since the distribution is next week and the application period will end very soon.

- Gulf region programs rebuilding following the hurricanes are eligible to apply for books from Book Relief distributions.
- Book Relief distributions are not subject to the National Book Bank limitation of one distribution per calendar year. Please treat Book Relief distributions as "special distributions."
- IT IS INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT that you include specific information about how your program was impacted by the hurricanes in the Mission Statement section of the application. If this information is not provided, your application CANNOT be accepted.

There will be more distributions throughout the Gulf Coast. The next Book Relief distribution will be held in Louisiana in early March. More information about upcoming Book Relief distributions will be available soon. Please help us get books into the hands of children who need them by reaching out, on our behalf, to other programs in your community.

How to apply for books:
Applications for all First Book - Book Relief distributions can be found on our Web site, www.NationalBookBank.org.

Please note: Completing an application does not guarantee that you will receive books for your program. If your application is accepted, you will receive the warehouse address, exact pick-up time (if applicable), and other information closer to the date of the distribution. Due to the nature of the Book Relief distributions, this information may be provided very close to the date of the distribution.

To successfully complete an application, follow the instructions listed below:

1. Go to www.NationalBookBank.org

2. Scroll to the bottom of the home page, enter your username and password in the "Apply for Books" box, and click the "Log-In" button. (You created your username and password when you first registered with the First Book National Book Bank.)

3. If you have not updated your contact information recently, click on the "My Organization" and "My Profile" links to make sure it is accurate. It is VERY IMPORTANT that your e-mail address is correct!

4. Click the "Apply" link to the right of the Mobile distribution. This will bring you to the online application.

5. Read the Eligibility Requirements for First Book - Book Relief distributions, and click "I Agree".

6. Select your organization from the drop-down menu and click the "Apply" button.

7. Fill out the application carefully, making sure that you answer EVERY question on all five Web pages.

8. Click the "Submit" button on the final page of the application. This will send your application to First Book!

If you have questions, have trouble with the application, or would like more information, contact the First Book - Book Relief team at BookRelief@FirstBook.org or at 866-393-1222.

Thank you from TW/NO Litfest Staff

To all of you who read, wrote checks, or put a dollar in the basket at Outwrite and Joe's Coffee, these words of thanks from the Tennessee William/New Orleans Literary Festival:

"Thank you so much for your donations to the K.A.R.E.S. fund. It was so kind of you to remember us, We hope to see you at the Festival; please check out our website at www.tennesseewilliams.net. New Orleans will come back! --Thank you, The Tennessee Williams Festival Staff."

THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! And please--support this year's festival on its 20th anniversary by attending March 30-April 2. Spend a weekend in the lovely French Quarter and talk about the future of New Orleans literature.

Reading Feb. 12, Maple Leaf; need reader(s) in ATL

I'll be reading February 12 at the Maple Leaf, splitting the bill with Melanie Leavitt. If you're in the neighborhood, please drop by and say hi. I'm also looking for a couple of people who are able to travel to Atlanta to read at the end of February (small payment--might pay for your gas--but a chance to get away from it for a few days). E-mail for details.

Win you some money

It costs a little more than a lottery ticket, but the odds are better...

2006 GROLIER POETRY PRIZE
ELLEN LA FORGE MEMORIAL POETRY FOUNDATION, INC.

6 Plympton St., Cambridge MA 02138. (617) 547-4648. E-mail:
grolierpoetry@cs.com; website: www.grolierpoetrybookshop.com.

The Grolier Poetry Prize, established in 1974, is open to all poets who have not published either a vanity, small press, trade, or chapbook of poetry. One poet receives an honorarium of $1,000. Up to six poems by the winner and four by each of three runners-up are chosen for publication in the Grolier Poetry Prize Annual.

Submissions must be unpublished and may not be submitted elsewhere. Submit up to 6 poems, not more than 12 double-spaced pages. Submit one ms in duplicate, without name of poet. On a separate sheet give name, address, phone number, and titles of poems. Only one submission/contestant; mss are not returned. For updated guidelines, send SASE to Ellen La Forge Memorial Poetry Foundation or check e-mail before submitting ms. Entry fee: $10, includes copy of Annual. Make checks payable to the Ellen La Forge Memorial Poetry Foundation, Inc. Enclose self-addressed stamped postcard for acknowledgment of receipt.

Opens Feb. 1. Deadline: June 30. Winner and runners-up will be selected and informed in early September. Copies of the Annual available from the Grolier Poetry Book Shop at the above address.

Another book drive for New Orleans writers!

Saw a public relations release today that a writer/paralegal in New Orleans, Becky Rolland, is also now collecting books, via NWU. Can't have too many books for New Orleans writers!

Wanted to give you a heads-up that Kalamu, Dave, Kysha and I are in the final stages of editing the New Orleans poets' Katrina anthology. The book should be out in the next few weeks and the profit from every purchase goes DIRECTLY into the pockets of displaced poets. No middleman, no cut off the top. It's a self-help model. We'll send out a more formal heads-up closer to time.

Some of you outside New Orleans are wondering why you haven't heard back from your poet-partner. Please be patient. These folks are under enormous stress, and even mailing a letter or getting to e-mail remains next to impossible for many. And some indeed resent feeling as if they are suddenly "charity cases." Send another friendly note with an interesting article you read, a book of poetry, or a blank journal. Give them time. Life in New Orleans remains extraordinarily difficult at this time, despite Dubya's posing for the cameras just in time for Carnival season.

To give you an idea, here's a note from co-editor and poet/publisher Kysha Brown-Robinson:

"...there is a pre-Katrina level of productivity that I cannot deliver in the post-Katrina world. Everything now takes more energy and more time. In the last week, I have gone to three post offices and former UPS drop-off sites trying to send two boxes. Between the inability to process credit or debit cards (because the phone lines are out), long lines, more long lines, more long lines, and the cancellation of pick-up services, I am still transporting those boxes in my trunk."

Finally, I wanted you all to know that Beverly Rainbolt has been tirelessly serving in the Common Ground community health clinic, despite having been displaced herself. It is this sort of generosity in the face of disaster that makes me proud to call New Orleans home.

Thanks for helping,
Robin

UPS reminder

If your UPS package was returned as undeliverable to the Gold Mine Saloon, it is your responsibility to contact UPS, explain (nicely) that the address was good, that you are sending relief supplies, and that you are requesting redelivery at no charge to the following address:

Dave Brinks/17 Poets!
c/o French Quarter Wine Cellar
700 Dauphine Street
New Orleans, LA
70116

You will need your tracking number(s).

You can contact UPS at

http://ups.com/content/us/en/index.jsx

UPS should, but an individual operator may not, be aware of the problem. Please thank them for helping to get the books there.