The Art of Raining

Poets and artists are supporting the Rain with a little body art!

Spring 2011 Edition of Poetry Quarterly is now available both in print and FREE on their website. I’m honored that includes one of my poems.

CLICK HERE to give it a read!

The Knives Forks and Spoons Press interviewed me about process, tropes, and all assorted goodies pertaining to my new chapbook they just released, The Art of Raining.

Just posted it to their blog. Click HERE to give it a read!

My newest chapbook, The Art of Raining, is now available for purchase through The Knives Forks and Spoons Press. Click on the link to order. It’s on their home page.

The book is going to print within the week, so hopefully the hard copies will be in my hands soon. It’s 5 pounds (it’s a UK press) or around $8.

I’d be honored if you’ll give it a read!

Object Stories

Portland Art Museum- 1219 SW Park Ave, Portland, OR 97205

Friday, May 27
6:00 P – 7:00 P

Throughout the Portland Museum galleries, listen to local wordsmiths from the community as they share their stories, poetry, and short fiction in front of art objects that inspired these writings. Participants may include members of Write Around Portland, Literary Arts’ Writers in the Schools, and the Portland State University writing program.

I’ll be reading my poem “Sleepless Harbor”.

More info: CLICK HERE

I’m honored to join the Oregon Poetic Voices community…

Here’s the link to my page.

My experiment with longer poems, Autobiography of Fever, has been accepted for late summer 2011 publication by Bedouin Books as part of their annual poetry series.

I’m particularly honored as Bedouin only releases one chapbook each year.

Bedouin is putting together a launch party, perhaps in September. Details to follow…

I’m honored to find one of my new poems in this issue of Barnwood International, a journal I’ve enjoyed for years. The poem is part of my nearly-completed book, Controlled Hallucinations.

Click HERE to give it a read!

By Paul Merchant- poet, translator, professor, William Stafford archivist

Donald Rumsfeld was frustrated by the “old Europe,” where history is made gradually rather than in haste. By contrast, John Sibley Williams has gathered in The Longest Compass a sequence of poems celebrating those mature cultures. Moving from Vienna and Prague to Turkey and Greece, these subtle, perceptive poems enact a journey into a hard-won appreciation. They move from the bewilderment of “flowers without names” and “the wilderness below the surface” to gracious acceptance in the final poem, “Foreigner”: “Comfort me, ignorance. / All these tongues / detach, reunite, / roll me in their mouth.”

The early poems in this collection are illuminated by love for the poet’s companion, and by the end we see the same love expressed in particulars: “Imagine mastering a landscape, even a single stairway.” This poet has a tender heart, and can turn a memorable phrase. “Why fret the vastness of the world?” he says in the prefatory poem, in which “the world / fits snugly an eye socket, / is the size of the last dime / in your pocket / you’ve been saving / to quench your thirst.” These poems have traveled a long way, and come to us loaded with experience. The Longest Compass is full of fresh and novel poems that unpack old secrets.

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The Longest Compass is due out later in 2011 by Finishing Line Press.