Hello my friends!

An exciting evening yesterday. Our small but vibrant poetry community here in Cobourg persuaded the Mayor and his counselors that I would be an ideal candidate for the town's second Poet Laureate, and last night the town pronounced it so!!! Many thanks to our first Poet Laureate, Eric Winter, who held the post for 12 years and paved the way for this to happen. As I said in my acceptance speech, it is an enlightened city or town that has a poet laureate - ones that recognize that poetry is important to our culture. So, here I go - Ms. Poet Laureate !!!

If you haven't already got your tickets for Opera to Go, you need to rush off and buy them because TOMORROW is the day!! And I'll be on hand to introduce mine and Andrew Staniland's piece Ashlike on the Cradle of the Wind. I'll be the one with the purple hair! Opera to Go runs through Friday, so if you like it on Wednesday, you'll love it by then. 

On Friday I'll be in Kingston, Ontario, on the grounds on Queen's University hosting the Grad Club Slam. Ah....the world of Slam! Bring your 3 minute poem, your performing chops and five bucks and pit your poetry luck against 11 other performers in the competition to end all competitions! Fun, mayhem, and hopefully some pretty good poems. Our featured readers are the Sharp Tongues, three slamming chicks who'll bring the house down. Remember - "The points are not the point, the poetry is the point!" - that'll be our mantra for the night and I'll be your slam mistress for the evening.

Nothing like a Sunday evening in small town Ontario!! 

Probably a good time to let you all know what's coming up on the readings front so you'll have a chance to sample the poetry! And don't forget - this week: Opera To Go!!!

Thursday April 15th, 8:00 pm

Hot Sauced Words

Black Swan Tavern

154 Danforth Avenue, Toronto

Saturday April 17th

PerformaPoem (workshop) with Jill

POW Festival

Cobourg, Ontario

Sunday May 2nd, 7:30 pm

Lit Live

Hamilton, Ontario

Sunday May 16th, 6:00 pm

Plasticine Reading Series

The Central

603 Markham Street, Toronto

This evening I am sitting down to go through the final draft of the Dark Star Requiem manuscript - my new book coming out in June with Folded&Gathered Press. Thanks to super editor Allan Briesmaster for the great copyediting job which will make me sound even better than I already do!

The book is the first for F&G and it's going to be magnificent!! Anstey Book Binding is making the books, so you know they are going to be brilliant. ansteybookbinding.com A trade edition with a great design and some beautiful touches, and 50 editions of a special art book which will contain a limited edition Micah Lexier print and many more goodies. Collectable and groovy. All thanks to Aurelie and Neil!!!

Great news arrived in my email box today! I've been invited by OSEA to speak at their Arts for Social and Environmental Justice Symposium on May 15th! I'll be presenting a paper : Dark Star Requiem: Sliding AIDS education into popular culture - based on the creation/production of Dark Star Requiem which will premiere at the Luminato Festival of Arts + Creativity in June. Who said poetry is just in books??

hello dear reader...

...and welcome to my blog! I woke up this morning thinking I should have a blog! and so - here it is! 

Next week Tapestry New Opera will celebrate 30 years with a special anniversary performance of five of their favourite operas. And guess what?! I'm in it!!! Ashlike on the Cradle of the Wind is a collaboration between the composer Andrew Staniland and myself (on words). Ticket details (because I know you're all dying to get there) are on line:

tapestrynewopera.com/current-season/opera-to-go/

We made this piece for Opera to Go about three years ago and it's a really nice segment into our new collaboration Dark Star Requiem, which will premiere as part of this year's Luminato festival - but more about that later.