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April is coming. So are the poems.

The NaPoWriMo graphic for this year is a black and white photo of a rock wall with a rainbow eye painted on it. It says NaPoWriMo at the top in black type, and at the bottom in white says (20 years of looking out for poetry).

What is #NaPoWriMo, you wonder? It’s an unofficial, unaffiliated poetry game played annually by poets all over the world (#GloPoWriMo). It grew, sort of accidentally, out of a personal challenge Maureen Thorson set for herself one April, many moons ago in the poetry-blog days of yore. I joined her the following year, and others did too, and soon it became an annual, organic free-for-all, a lively everybody-is-invited event. 

Maureen’s idea has proven so popular, people have assumed it’s hosted by some Official Org or Institution, but nope. It’s entirely noncommercial and unsponsored. She’s created a site—napowrimo.net—and accompanying Twitter account to share daily prompts and featured participants every day in April, which is really nice of her. 

Bloof always hosts a handful of our authors on our blog, and this April will be no exception. Wanna play? You can join in on your own site or social media account. See napowrimo.net for the details.

PS: This is the 20th year!

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AWP 2023: Where to find Bloof poets

Bloof, the press, will not be at AWP. But Bloof, the poets, will be! And you can still grab some bookfair deals online.

VIRTUAL BOOKFAIR at bloofbooks.com
March 7–13. All paperbacks in bundle deals: 2 for $25, 3 or more for $10 each.
+ Free shipping on all orders over $25 (US only).
This virtual bookfair is for everyone, whether or not you’re attending the conference.

Thursday, March 9

DANIELLE PAFUNDA
Family Trees in the Enchanted Forest: Fairy Tales & Intergenerational Trauma
12:10 p.m. Room 427

KATIE JEAN SHINKLE
Two or More Become One: Writing in Collaboration Across Genre
3:20 p.m. Room 337

KATIE JEAN SHINKLE
6:00 p.m. Slip In Beltown Gallery
2301 1st Street
Orchestrate Your Whole Fucking Life! reading

IRENE VÁZQUEZ
Muzzle Magazine reading
7:00 p.m. Loving Room
1400 20th Ave

Friday, March 10

IRENE VÁZQUEZ
10:00 a.m. Bookfair signing
Take Me to the Water chapbooks + broadsides of Glory from Above
Riot in Your Throat table (T1522)

KATIE JEAN SHINKLE
2:00 p.m. Museum of Museums
900 Boylston Ave
University of Louisiana Lafayette and Sam Houston University Graduate Student Reading

DANIELLE PAFUNDA, KATIE JEAN SHINKLE
7:30 p.m. Alley Mic
1922 Post Alley
Apogee, Diagram, March Fadness, Texas Review, TRP reading

Saturday, March 11

A pastel radial gradient background with white and lavender text giving reading details and readers’ names:

Extravaganza, an offsite reading.

Saturday, March 11, 3:30–5:00 p.m. at the Crescent Lounge, 1413 E. Olive Way, Seattle.

READERS
Ginger Ko
Irene Vázquez
Katie Jean Shinkle
Natalie Eilbert
Danielle Pafunda
Min Kang
Jessica Rae Bergamino
Jackson Bliss
Abby Hagler
Megan Kaminski
Nilufar Karimi
Sarah Minor
Olivia Muenz
JD Pluecker
Claire Marie Stancek
Dennis James Sweeney
+ karaoke to follow!
Event graphic for Essay Press, Noemi Press + Bloof Books Extravaganza

KATIE JEAN SHINKLE, GINGER KO
1:45 p.m. Room 437
#FeelsBad: Writing Discomfort and Pessimism in Genre

GINGER KO, IRENE VÁZQUEZ, DANIELLE PAFUNDA, KATIE JEAN SHINKLE, NATALIE EILBERT
Essay Press, Noemi Press & Bloof Books Extravaganza reading
(see graphic above for the full list of readers!)
3:30 p.m. Crescent Lounge
1413 E. Olive Way

NATALIE EILBERT
6:00 p.m. Elliot Bay Book Company
1521 10th Ave.
Copper Canyon 50th Anniversary Celebration

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ON DREAMS by Maureen Thorson: Now available for preorder

22% off through March!

After being diagnosed, or misdiagnosed, with a rare, “invisible” eye condition that causes blind spots, Maureen Thorson set out to write a self-portrait in a broken mirror: a “mirror of my suffering,” wry and poignant, fragmented and necessarily incomplete. On Dreams is allusive, searching, and self-arguing, a lyric meditation on reality, truth, illusion—the warped reality of the mirror image and everything we “see”—and the illusion, “the dream,” of control. 

—Elisa Gabbert

After a pandemic delay and the intervening release of another book by Maureen last year (from our friends at Veliz), we’re finally ready to spring this fascinating book on you, dear readers!

On Dreams is as much a personal exploration on reality and illness as it is a richly documented commonplace book—the notes on the text are integral to the way the essays move, crisscrossed with rabbit holes and byways, with citations ranging from Aristotle to tweets. As Kwoya Fagin Maples puts it: “This work won’t allow itself to be pinned, even by its author. It follows its own north.” We can’t wait to get it into your hands.

Read “Confessions of a Pareidoliac,” an essay from On Dreams, in On the Seawall.

Preordered copies begin shipping in mid April, ahead of the official release in May. Read more about this fascinating collection.