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SAVE THE DATE: THE NEXUS CAFE™ ~ In conversation with Natasha Head about online poetry connections and community

THE NEXUS CAFE™

logoJoin us for a chat about online poetry connections and community … and THE POET BY DAY: for everyone who eats, sleeps and breathes poetry and wishes poetry was their day job …

On 28 February 2016, Sunday, at 2:00 p.m. ET

3 p.m. AT – 1 p.m. CT – 12 p.m. MT – 11 p.m. PT

THE POET BY DAY is in the process of reinvention, transitioning to an information hub on all things poesy with special – but not exclusive – light on:

  • global poetry initiatives for peace, sustainability and social justice
  • she-poets
  • minority poets
  • poets just finding their voices in maturity

The complete Mission for The Poet by Day is in the blogroll to your left.

My thanks to Natasha Head (Tashtoo Parlour) and Roger Allen Baut (Chasing Tao) for the opportunity talk about community building and what this particular site has to offer you.

THE CREATIVE NEXUS™ produces two Internet radio shows: Blue Sky Highway™ and the Nexus Cafe™ on Blog Talk Radio. Blue Sky Highway is also available on Soundcloud. Past episodes of both shows are archived at Blog Talk Radio and Soundcloud. Roger and Natasha tell me that a separate Nexus Café Soundcloud account is in the works.

“The Creative Nexus is NOT just about sharing your own work with the world…it’s about sharing everyone else’s! We are a group of artists, writers, artisans, musicians and more. Many of us have to reconcile the real world with our passions, and it’s nice to know you’ve got a supportive community behind you when one of those real world wrenches steals time from your online promotion and sharing of your work.

“Together we will reach higher than we have ever dreamed, and in that same mission, we ask YOU to share us with YOUR world. Please feel free to use the logo below and post to your site or space with a link back to us. It’s a huge good karma wheel we hope to get rolling, and in the spirit of the NWCU we welcome you as a spoke in that wheel.”

Natasha Head and Roger Allen Baut

Logo © The Creative Nexus, All rights reserved

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“The BeZine” – Table of Contents with Links to Features – Feb. 2016 “All God’s Creatures”

15 February 2016 (The BeZine)

photo 2-2“All God’s Creatures” … and what a menagerie we have, mostly dogs, cats and human beings … okay, a spider, a pig, a frog, a fly and a few birds.

This is a fun issue, though it has its inspirational moments too with the themed lead features by our premier essayists, Michael Watson and Priscilla Galasso; a lesson in detente from our resident cannoness, Terri Stewart; and with characteristic grace, good criter-loving book recommendations and a call for compassion from Corina Ravenscraft. Judith Westerfield is back for a visit with An Amnesty for Daddy Longlegs, a short piece with a double-edge.

Under humor, Mafia Cats (Roger McGough) and The Pig (Roald Dahl) should put smiles on your faces.

For the poetry lovers, there is quite a collection of poems in both the themed section and under “More Light.” Michael Dickel and John Anstie share themed poems.

Core team member, Joseph Hesch, offers two signature pieces – one poem, one flash fiction – and resident skeptic, James R. Cowels, tickles our brains with Life, Death, and the “Establishment Clause.”

Under art, check out Gretchen Del Rio’s beautiful spirit-animal paintings of my grand-kitty, Gypsy Rose.

Aprilia Zand is back – Hooray! – this time with a poem.

New in this issue with impressive bios and even more impressive work: Roger Allen Baut, Ann Bracken, Christi Moon and Judith Black.

You’ll enjoy a couple of true adventures in the Storytelling section with Judith Black in Turkey. She’s a funny lady.

Under best practices learn how Zena Hagerty and fellow artists turned the James Street area of Hamilton, Ontario from a rough neighborhood into an arts enclave where art crawls are held regularly, pulling the community together.

The featured interviews this month are Sharon Frye, Matt Pasca, Michael Dickel and Charlie Martin. All the interviews offer value added by virtue of vision and wisdom.

Many thanks to Michael Dickel for introducing Ann Bracken and Matt Pasca, to Naomi Baltuck for introducing Judith Black, and to Native American Girl for the music selection.

Enjoy! Let us know what you think in the comments section and with your likes. Thanks for joining with us in the celebration of life, love and art.

In the spirit of peace and community,
Jamie Dedes
Managing Editor

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THEME: ALL GOD’S CHILDREN

Lead Features

At the Bird Feeder, Michael Watson
All that Matters, Priscilla Galasso
Reflections on Snowy Owl and Raven, Terri Stewart
Animal Stories, Corina Ravenscraft
Campaigning for Compassion, Corina Ravenscraft
Giving Amnesty to Daddy Longlegs, Judith Westerfield

Humor

Mafia Cats, Roger McGough
The Pig, Roald Dahl
Cat v Comma, Grammerly

Poetry

A Dog’s Life, John Anstie
Snow Dog, John Anstie
Frog, Michael Dickel
Fancy Flight, Michael Dickel
Reading the Signs, Aprilia Zank

Art

The Several Faces of Gypsy Rose, art/Gretchen Del Rio, words/Jamie Dedes

MORE LIGHT

Special Feature/Best Practice

How One City’s Artists Transformed a “Rough’ Neighborhood into an Arts Enclave, Zena Hagerty

Storytelling

Welcome to Istanbul, Not Constantinople, Judith Black
Stray Dogs and Shtreimels: What Does Istanbul and Mea Shearim Have in Common?, Judith Black

Poetry

Ghost Dance, Roger Allen Baut
The Code, Ann Bracken
Transformation, Joseph Hesch
Musicman, Christi Moon
Dandelions, Christi Moon
Nyctalopia, Christi Moon

Flash Fiction

Kansas Pacific, Joseph Hesch

Essay

Life, Death, and the “Establishment Clause”, James R. Cowles

Music

Red Shift Blues, The Sweet Lowdown
Chickens Under the Washtub and Western Country, The Sweet Lowdown

Getting to Know You

Interview with Sharon Gariepy Frye, a.k.a. Sharon Frye
Interview with Matt Pasca
Educating the Teacher: Poet to Poet, Ann Bracken and Michael Dickel
Charles W. Martin and the Ever-loveable Aunt Bea

photo-1-2Connect with us …

Beguine Again, Spirtual Community and Practice

Facebook, The Bardo Group Beguines

Twitter, The Bardo Group Beguines

© 2015, photographs, Jamie Dedes, All rights reserved

 

 

 

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LATE BREAKING NEWS: THE CREATIVE NEXUS™

img.paper.liThis week’s edition of THE CREATIVE NEXUS™ is available for a nice leisurely Sunday night read. The Creative Nexus is a community paper for progressive Artists, Artisans, Musicians and Writers to interact, share and promote each other’s laudable work, for the betterment of all. Roger Allen Baut, Editor 

Illustration: Copyright Roger Allen Baut

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Natasha Head: “Nothing Left to Loose” & “Pulse”

Natasha Head, Poet & Writer, Nova Scotia
Natasha Head

Canadian poet Natasha Head (The Tashtoo Parlour and, along with Roger Allen Baut, The Creative Nexus™) is the author of three poetry collections.

 

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Natasha says she …

“has been weaving words since I was but a wee lass running with crayons and scribblers …”

… and she continues with her poems online along with Running With Crayons, her whimsical art

Natasha’s debut poetry collection was Nothing Left to Loose (Winter Goose Publishing, 2012)  It was a Pushcart Prize nominee. A year later – almost to the day – Pulse (Winter Goose Publishing, 2013) was launched, the second of her three collections. Natasha’s third collection is Birthing Inadequacy (Lulu, 2014).

Nothing Left to Lose is a collection of self-contained poems that tell the author’s personal story of everyday difficulties, disillusionment, and disappointment to which we can all relate. Ultimately it is about trial and transformation, which is the essential theme of both books.

Trapped between what was, what
is …no movement; fear
holds me motionless.

All directions equal no choice, as
fear gives way to chaos …
enslavement.

What needs to be done, I
don’t want to do, my thoughts
constant, my nightmares

real, feeling force, breaking
pressure, resisting to the point
of stagnation

Static, Natasha Head in Nothing Left to Lose

Pulse is a short epic, a narrative stream of poems that together form a modern-day odyssey of a family caught in a web of prostitution and abandonment, alcohol and drugs, delusion and deceit. When the worst happens to the young woman who is central to the story she is wrapped in silence … at first unchosen and then embraced … In this silence appears the potential for her to reinvent herself. She is being tested. Will she answer the call to transformation?

Pulse is a dramatic fiction, but I didn’t find it melodramatic or manipulative, which it could have been in hands less skilled than Natasha’s. The poems here are lucid and direct. The language is plain and mostly understated, interesting in its relative coolness juxtaposed against the girl’s grit as it unfolds.

There is nothing worse
than waiting in the dark,
no distraction,
alone.
Mother trying her best
and she
ducked low
in the furthest corner
of a forgotten closet
where she was safe to shine the flashlight
on ancient magazines
and little golden books
where she would realize
there was no such thing as fairy tales,
and princes never stayed.”

Sal, Natasha Head in Pulse

© 2016, review, Jamie Dedes, All rights reserved; portrait, cover art, and poems, Natasha Head/Winter Goose Publishing, all rights reserved ~ used here with permission