Irises Made of Moth Wings (by Christian O'Keeffe) - CC#56 - OUT OF PRINT

cover foto by Steven B Smith

Free poetry you need to read!

Crisis Chronicles Press presents an inspired 26-page chapbook by the late Christian O'Keeffe (1991-2012).

The first time I met and heard Christian, at the Jawbone poetry festival, I found myself greatly moved and told him I’d love to publish a book of his work. He said he’d be honored and would work on sending me some poems. A year later, he gave me these cut and pasted, photocopied and (when he had revisions) pasted again galleys, a sort of handmade chapbook called Irises Made of Moth Wings, saying this is what he had in mind. I loved the poems. But before we made time to work together on the book, he was gone.  

I had mixed feelings about how to proceed. It was hard. I couldn’t consult Christian, so I set it aside. It took nearly 2 years before I knew what to do. I would photocopy his hand-created galleys, leaving them totally as is, come up with an appropriate cover to bind them, and disseminate his poems freely, as he did.

Irises Made of Moth Wings is offered at no charge in a saddle stapled edition, 8.5" x 5.5", with white cover stock, crimson endpapers and white photocopied pages.  1st edition of 99 copies published 14 September 2014.  ISBN 978-1-940996-09-7.  The book was free, but alas, we are out of copies out as of 30 November 2017.

 
Christian O’Keeffe lived in Kent, Ohio. His influences included the river, Jim Carroll, Maj Ragain, Jack Micheline, Bob Kaufman, moths, deer, blue heron, Kurt Cobain, Arthur Rimbaud, and that ecstatic act of walking.

Find more of his work online at https://soundcloud.com/christian-okeeffe.

Christian O'Keeffe at Jawbone, 6 May 2011 - photo by JB

Oct Tongue -1 (by Mary Weems, John Swain, Steven Smith, Lady K Smith, Shelley Chernin, John Burroughs and Steve Brightman) - CC#55

cover foto by Smith

Like seven 31-page chapbooks in one!

Published August 27th by Crisis Chronicles Press, Oct Tongue -1 is a collaborative book by Mary Weems, John Swain, Steven Smith, Lady [Kathy] Smith, Shelley Chernin, John Burroughs and Steve Brightman.  This book is our biggest yet, 300+ pages, featuring 217 poems (31 by each author), all written in response to the editor's October 2013 poem-a-day challenge.  [He borrowed the idea from a poem-a-day book called February 03 by Todd Colby, Alex Gildzen, Thurston Moore and Matthew Wascovich (published in 2003 by Slow Toe in Cleveland).]  Oct Tongue -1 is  a 6x9" paperback, ISBN 978-1-940996-08-0, available for $15 (now only $10) from Crisis Chronicles Press, 535 Parkside Boulevard, Cleveland, Ohio 44143 USA.  See October through the eyes of seven fine and quite different poets!

Please join us at these special launch events!

8/27/2014: Official Oct Tongue -1 Book Release at Mac's Backs in Cleveland Heights, Ohio
9/1/2014: Monday at Mahall's featuring Ray McNiece and Mary Weems in Lakewood, Ohio
...and perhaps more to be announced soon

About the authors:

Dr. Mary Weems is a poet, playwright, imagination-intellect theorist, social/cultural foundations scholar and former Poet Laureate of Cleveland Heights. Weems is the author and/or editor of twelve books and five chapbooks, most notably white (Wick Poetry Chapbook Series) and Tampon Class (Pavement Saw Press). Two of her books were full collections of poetry: An Unmistakable Shade of Red and the Obama Chronicles (Bottom Dog Press, 2008) and For(e)closure (Main Street Rag Press, 2012), both finalists for Ohioana Book awards.

John Swain of Louisville, Kentucky, is the author of several acclaimed books including Rain and Gravestones (2013, Crisis Chronicles), White Vases (2012, Crisis Chronicles) and Prominences (2011, Flutter Press). His latest, Ring the Sycamore Sky, is forthcoming in the summer of 2014 from Red Paint Hill Publishing.

Steven B. Smith was born, is living, will die. He's been a poet 50 years, artist 49 years, the publisher of ArtCrimes, editor of AgentOfChaos.com, he blogs on WalkingThinIce.com, and sings at ReverbNation.com/MutantSmith. Smith & Lady published his bio Stations of the Lost & Found, a True Tale of Armed Robbery, Stolen Cars, Outsider Art, Mutant Poetry, Underground Publishing, Robbing the Cradle, and Leaving the Country in 2012 via The City Poetry Press.

Lady, a.k.a. Kathy Ireland Smith, is a poet, publisher, artist and surreal photographer from northeast Ohio. She and her husband Smith spent 31 months of traveling in 10 countries on 3 continents from 2006-9, and you can follow their ongoing adventures at WalkingThinIce.com. Kathy is also founder and editor of The City Poetry (thecitypoetry.com), a cutting edge art and poetry zine based in Cleveland.

Shelley Chernin is a freelance researcher, writer and editor of legal reference books and a ukulele enthusiast. Her poems have appeared in places like Great Lakes Review, Scrivener Creative Review, Rhapsoidia, Durable Goods, Big Bridge, and the Heights Observer. She was awarded 2nd Place in the 2011 Hessler Street Fair Poetry Contest.  Her chapbook, The Vigil, was published in 2012 by Crisis Chronicles.

Steve Brightman lives in Kent, Ohio. He firmly believes in two seasons: winter and baseball. His most recent chapbooks include 13 Ways of Looking at Lou Reed (2013, Crisis Chronicles Press), In Brilliant Explosions Alone (2013, NightBallet Press); Like Michelangelo Sorta Said (2013, The Poet’s Haven), Absent The (2013, Writing Knights Press) and Sometimes, Illinois (2011, NightBallet).

John Burroughs is the founding editor of Crisis Chronicles Press and hosts the Monday at Mahall’s Poetry and Prose Series in Lakewood, Ohio.  He is the author of It Takes More Than Chance to Make Change (2013, The Poet’s Haven), The Eater of the Absurd (2012, NightBallet Press), Barry Merry Baloney (2012, Spare Change Press), Water Works (2012, recycled karma press), Electric Company (2011, Writing Knights) and more.

The Night Market - by D.R. Wagner (CC#60)

Art by ReBecca Gozion

Crisis Chronicles Press is thrilled to announce the imminent publication of the legendary D.R. Wagner's new book, The Night Market.  I love everything we've ever published, but if anything can be called the jewel in the Crisis Chronicles crown, this book is it.  Perfect bound, 140 pages, with D.R.'s poetry accompanied by ReBecca Gozion's cover and interior art. In my opinion this is the book of the year.

“I would guess I’ve been reading the poetry of D.R. Wagner for about 15 years now and one of the things that has always struck me is his seemingly effortless ability to blend both classical and modern literary styles and come out on the other side with something completely his own. The pieces in The Night Market offer a glimpse into the ever-changing landscape of his dreams, his heart placed bare on a snow covered rock at dusk, stealing its revolutions back from the sun, bathing in an ethereal river of emotion that will surely leave you breathless, I promise you.”  -John Dorsey, Author of Tombstone Factory.

D.R. Wagner's The Night Market is only $14.99 from Crisis Chronicles Press, 535 Parkside Boulevard, Cleveland, Ohio 44143 USA.

We also made the first 26 copies of THE NIGHT MARKET available in a special lettered edition signed by D.R. Wagner and ReBecca Gozion. The special edition is sold out.

Photo of D.R. Wagner by Glenda Drew

ISBN: 978-1-940996-05-9

Click here to rate The Night Market at Goodreads.

For more details about the official release party for D.R. Wagner's The Night Market on August 16th 2014 at the Moon Cafe in Locke, California, please see the poster below.

Thank you for supporting the independent literary arts!

D.R. Wagner is the author of over twenty books and chapbooks of poetry and letters. He founded press : today : niagara in Niagara Falls, New York, in 1965 and later Runcible Spoon (press) in the late 1960’s and produced over fifty magazines and chapbooks. He co-wrote The Egyptian Stroboscope with d.a. levy in the late 1960’s. He read with Jim Morrison of the Doors in a legendary reading with Morrison and Michael McClure. and has read with Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Al Winans, Viola Weinberg, d.a. levy, E.R. Baxter III, Ed Sanders, Anne Waldman and many, many other poets over the past 40 years. 

His work is much published and has appeared in numerous translations. He has exhibited visual poetry with the likes of William Burroughs, Byron Gysin, Ian Hamilton Finlay, bpNichol, bill bissett, J.F. Bory and John Furnival in venues ranging from The Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, at the Louvre to the Smithsonian in Washington, DC. 

He is also a visual artist, producing miniature needle-made tapestries that have been exhibited internationally and are included in numerous publications and museum collections. He is, further, a professional musician, working as a singer-songwriter and playing guitar and keyboards. 

Teaching Design at the University of California at Davis since 1988, he also teaches in the Honors program at the University conducting classes in Poetry by Design. He continues to design interior carpeting and tapestry as well as write, perform and publish poetry regularly.

He currently lives in Locke, California.

Songs in the Key of Cleveland: An Anthology of the 2013 Best Cleveland Poem Competition (CC#54)

cover photo by Michael Spear

Crisis Chronicles Press is thrilled to announce the long-awaited publication of Songs in the Key of Cleveland: An Anthology of the 2013 Best Cleveland Poem Competition on 28 February 2014. 

The first annual Best Cleveland Poem Competition was held on Sunday, May 5, 2013 at the Willoughby Brewing Company.  Songs in the Key of Cleveland features the best poems shared that day, including work by area lit stars Catherine Criswell, Katie Daley, T.M. Göttl, Dianne Borsenik, Geoffrey Landis, Joshua Gage, Terry Provost, Jack McGuane, Ruth J. Coffey, Martin Snyder, Jeffrey Bowen, Mary A. Turzillo and competition emcee Ray McNiece.

The book is around 40 pages, perfect bound, 6x9" and a steal at only $10 from Crisis Chronicles Press, 535 Partkside Boulevard, Cleveland, Ohio 44143 USA.

Dr. Claire McMahon says "This is a great collection...!"

Available now by mail and online — and soon from particular local independent bookstores across the country!  Please join us for the official Songs in the Key of Cleveland release party on March 3rd during Mondays at Mahall's Poetry & Prose series, hosted by Catherine Criswell at Mahall's 20 Lanes, 13200 Madison Avenue in Lakewood, Ohio.  Meet and hear many of the contributors there. PLUS... the evening will feature a reading by Cleveland lit superhero Brad Ricca, author of Super Boys.  Talk about a dynamic duo!

Project editor for Songs in the Cleveland: Dianne Borsenik 
Executive editor: John Burroughs
ISBN: 978-1-940996-07-3

Update: Now its second printing.  250 copies in print so far.

For more information about the annual Best Cleveland Poetry Competition sponsored by attorney Tim Misny, please click here.

Cut Me Free - by Ben Heins (CC#53) - OUT OF PRINT

Cover photo by Steven B. Smith

Crisis Chronicles Press is thrilled to cut loose this fine new chapbook by Ben Heins on 23 February 2014. Cut Me Free is a brave and rich, lovingly handmade eighteen-page chapbook, a tasty word stew seasoned with astute erasure, pregnant margin variation and other deftly applied spices/devices. 

Highlights include "Letter of Disaffiliation to Freedmans Lutheran Church," "Delivering the Eviction Notice, Christmas Eve," "Reconsidering the Single Father," "I've Got This Grin You'll See from Space When You Come Down" and "Songs from the Ruptured Amniotic Sac." Cut Me Free is in 8.5x11" format and sidestaple bound using high quality cream and burnt orange card stock and faux ivory parchment paper.

Get yours while supplies last. Limited edition of 100 copies. A steal for only $4 from Crisis Chronicles Press, 3431 George Avenue, Parma, Ohio 44134 USA. This chapbook is currently out of print.

 

"Ben Heins' vivid, disturbing poems are full of passion, empathy, and rage. In Cut Me Free, the poems cry out for freedom in the voices of collapsed, 'soul-sucked' balloons, an eviction server on a slippery front step on Christmas Eve, and a single father estranged from his own father. The book begins with a 'Letter of Disaffiliation to Freedmans Lutheran Church,' but the church and the idea of God can't be so easily escaped. From first to last, the poems take on big issues: a 'collapsing country' where a man is freezing while the speaker in the poem locks his doors, a person who is dying despite pills and an IV drip, and a church greeter who can't forget a murderous mental patient who collapsed in front of a congregation 'screaming for God.' Heins writes skillfully in forms ranging from a terzanelle ('I've Got This Grin You'll See from Space When You Come Down') to poems such as 'Songs from the Ruptured Amniotic Sac' that are split open on the page by the intensity of the feelings they express."
— Barbara Daniels, author of Rose Fever: Poems, Black Sails, and Quinn and Marie 

"Very powerful stuff here. Excellent work....  Ben Heins does not mess around when he writes. These poems are very powerful and use language extremely well. It is some of the best new work I've read in quite awhile. Crisis Chronicles has published this book and I would like to encourage anyone who really cares about poetry and the written power of the word to order themselves a copy before they go away. This is what you've been wanting to read even if you didn't know it."

— D.R. Wagner, author of Breaking and Entering and Continuing Lecturer in Design at UC Davis.

"I like the look of [Cut Me Free], the size of it, and the layout of it.... Yes, it's unconventional—but it's arty and I think it fits the material well. The colors are great, and it's obvious the cardstock and paper are of high quality. I think the poems benefit from being isolated on one side of the page, and I also think it helps give the book physical heft."

— Dianne Borsenik, author of Fortune Cookie and publisher for NightBallet Press. 

"Yesterday's mail brought copies of Songs in the Key of Cleveland and Ben Heins' Cut Me Free. Heins was a good read, now onto Cleveland Keys."

— Steven B. Smith,  author of Zen Over Zero and publisher of ArtCrimes.

"Amazing work here!"
— Krysia Jopek, author of Maps and Shadows.

Click here to read selections from Cut Me Free in the Crisis Chronicles cyber litmag.
Click here to view ratings of Cut Me Free at Goodreads.

Ben Heins is the author of Greatest Hits & B-Sides (Vagabondage Press, 2012). He graduated from Rosemont College in 2012 with an M.F.A. in poetry and from Kutztown University of Pennsylvania in 2008 with a B.A. in professional writing and a minor in English literature. He currently teaches at Rowan University and the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey.  Find him at www.benheins.com.

ISBN: 978-1-940996-06-6

In Bold Blackness: Selections - by Jami Tillis (CC#52)

Front Cover

This chapbook, a selection of 14 poems from Jami Tillis' In Bold Blackness series, is 18 pages, 8.5 x 5.5", lovingly handbound with top quality off-cream card stock, black endpapers and white paper.  The cover art is a detail of an Edward McKnight Kauffer illustration in the Borzoi Poe, as photographed by Steven Smith.  Poems include "Couldn't Sleep," "This Is Gonna Hurt Me," "Cancer," I Should've Known Better," "Where's That Dress?," "If These Walls Could Talk," "Hotels," "Ode to Hip Hop" and more.  Laser printed.  ISBN: 978-1-940996-04-2.  Approximately 60 copies in print. Published 31 January 2014.

In Bold Blackness: Selections by Jami Tillis is available for $5 from Crisis Chronicles Press, 535 Parkside Boulevard, Cleveland, Ohio 44143 USA.
 

 

Click here to see ratings of In Bold Blackness: Selections at Goodreads.

Jami Tillis

About the author:
My name is Jami Tillis. I am 24 years old. I graduated from Northeastern Illinois University in May 2012. My field of study is Secondary Education with a concentration in English and history. In college, I belonged to a variety of groups—Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority Inc., Sigma Tau Delta English Honors Society, and Pi Alpha Theta History Honors Society.

I have a 6 year old daughter named Chayse who is my current inspiration for writing. All of my poetry and other written works are derived from real life experiences that I have witnessed and survived before and after she came along.

I am currently living in Chicago and working as a 5th and 6th grade Reading and Writing teacher in Chicago Public Schools.