Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Paulie Lipman.
Paulie Lipman’s chapbook, from below/denied the light, is fresh of the presses being published in January of 2018. Lipman’s chapbook was the first collaboration between Sugar Booking Entertainment and Swimming with Elephants Publications.
Listen to Paulie read from his collections here:
Pick up Paulie Lipman’s chapbook, from below/denied the light from Bookworks ABQ
Keep your eyes open for Paulie Lipman coming to a town near you!
Paulie Lipman
Paulie Lipman is a former bartender/bouncer/record store employee/Renaissance Fair worker/two time National Poetry Slam finalist and a current loud Jewish/Queer/ poet/writer/performer. His work has appeared in the anthology ‘We Will Be Shelter’ (Write Bloody Publishing) as well as The Emerson Review, Drunk in a Midnight Choir, Voicemail Poems, pressure gauge, and Prisma (Zeitblatt Fur Text & Sprache).
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Lori DeSanti.
Lori DeSanti’s chapbook collection, Saltwater Under Brittle Sky, was published in the fall of 2015 by Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC.
Lori DeSanti’s Saltwater Under Brittle Sky is a lot like taking a walk through a sun shower on your own island, like waiting for the clouds to break and dry any wet that remains on your cheek—from dew to tears. This collection of poems is compact but beautiful, unpretentious in their succinct on page presentation. Each of the nineteen pages is no more than two pages long, and the collection is small enough to tuck into a back or inside coat pocket, a collection asking to be read in the open air, under trees and next to running streams.
Pick up Lori DeSanti’s Saltwater Under Brittle Sky from Amazon today!
Lori DeSanti
Lori DeSanti graduated with her MFA Degree in Poetry from Southern Connecticut State University in 2014. She’s the recipient of the 2014 William Kloefkorn Award.
Her work has been anthologized in Wising Up Press’ 2015 Anthology, “Siblings: Our First Macrocosm”, and the 2014 Writer’s Digest “Poem Your Heart Out Anthology”.
She is the feature poet at Erbacce Press for October 2015. Her work has appeared in Spry Literary Journal, Mouse Tales Press, Adanna, Drunk Monkeys, East Coast Literary Review, Winter Tangerine Review, Ekphrasis and elsewhere.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Brian Hendrickson.
Brian Hendrickson’s collection of poetry, entitled Of Children / And Other Poor Swimmers, was published by Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC in September 2014 after winning second place in our yearly chapbook competition.
Of Small Children / And Other Poor Swimmers is centered in the push-pull of place. Hendrickson wants to leave behind his Florida childhood, where every memory is still moist, but he continues “calling on the voices” and crossing back, wading into love, loss and danger with vivid imagery.
— Lauren Camp,
author of One Hundred Hungers and winner of The Dorset Prize (Tupelo Press)
Already own a copy? Please write a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads, or submit a review to swimwithelephants@gmail.com for publications on this site.
Brian Hendrickson
Brian Hendrickson’s poems have appeared or are forthcoming in a range of publications, including Indiana Review,North Carolina Literary Review, and New York Quarterly.
For his poetry Brian has been nominated for a 2011 Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net award, recognized as a 2013 finalist forSmartish Pace’s Erskine J. Poetry Prize, and awarded a 2013 New Mexico-Arizona Book Award for appearing in Beatlick Press’ La Llarona anthology.
Since earning an MFA in Creative Writing and Literary Arts from the University of Alaska Anchorage, Brian has taught and tutored writing at colleges and correctional facilities in Alaska, Florida, North Carolina, and now New Mexico, where he is currently pursuing a PhD in Rhetoric and Writing. Brian’s scholarship focuses on the role of writing in social movements and student activism.
In the battle and stand of this people sacrificing and dying to realize its aspiration, we seem like immortals more beautiful and gallant than anyone alive. And there is no power that can stop us on our luminous road.
~Jusuf Gërvalla
Swimming with Elephants Publications is honored to introduce you to our most recent release: Bekimi I Nënës, A Mother’s Blessing, poetry by Jusef Gërvalla, translated by Jack Hirschman and Idlir Azizaj. This is the first time this collection, originally published by the Naim Frashëri Publishing House, in Tirana, Albania in 1983, is translated in the English Language.
Gërvalla was known as a journalist and a musician as well as a poet, novelist, and founder of the Marxist-Leninist group, the National Movement for the Liberation of Kosovo. In 1983, a year after the original publication in his native Kosovo Albanian, Jusuf Gërvalla, his brother Bardhosh, and comrade Kadri Zeka were allegedly murdered by the Serbian secret service in their exile in Germany.
With the publication of Bekimi I Nënës, A Mother’s Blessing, Jusuf Gërvalla’s poetry, including selections from his three books: They Fly and Fall, Green Stork, and Sacred Marks, can be shared by the English-speaking population.
You can also find Hirschman’s first publication with Swimming with Elephants Publications, Passion, Provocation & Prophecyat Bookworks ABQ, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble.
Hailed as “one of the left’s most prolific and consistent poetic voices,” by Contemporary Poets, Jack Hirschman was born in 1933 in New York City and grew up in the Bronx.
He is known for his radical engagement with both poetry and politics: he is a member of the Union of Street Poets, a group that distributes leaflets of poems to people on the streets. He has also been instrumental in the formation of the Union of Left Writers of San Francisco.
The former poet laureate of San Francisco, Hirschman’s style has been compared to poets ranging from Walt Whitman, Hart Crane, Dylan Thomas, and Beat poets such as Allen Ginsberg. His poems’ commitment to leftist politics draws comparisons to Vachel Lindsay and Pablo Neruda.
In keeping with his political values, Hirschman’s books are published with small, independent presses, often in small runs (such as Swimming with Elephants Publications). According to the poet David Meltzer, Hirschman is “a great teacher who refuses to work in the university, a scholar of great merit who refuses to publish in the mainstream presses; most everything is published by himself, 150 copies.”
Though Hirschman has rejected mainstream success, he has published prolifically. His 50-plus volumes of poetry include A Correspondence of Americans (1960), Lyripol (1976), Front Lines: Selected Poems (2002), and All That’s Left (2008). His 1,000-page masterpiece, The Arcanes, was published in 2006. The work, written over decades, was heralded by Alan Kaufman in the San Francisco Gate as “unlikely and historically significant a literary production as, say, the appearance of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass or James Joyce’s Ulysses… like Whitman’s and Joyce’s masterpieces, it traces the progress of an individual consciousness through landscapes teeming with the horrible glory of modern life.”
But while he is known throughout San Francisco, his real literary fame has blossomed in Europe, where he frequently publishes both his original work and volumes of translation. Meltzer noted that in France “they consider him a major Communist poet.” Part of Hirschman’s dedication to politics and poetry can be traced to his numerous translations of radical poets from around the world.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Kristian Ashley Macaron.
Kristian Ashley Macaron’s chapbook, Storm, was published by Swimming with Elephants Publications in June 2015.
Kristian Macaron’s first chapbook of poetry features her various experiences in New England during the midst of some of the most powerful storms to pass through in the last several years. Her poetry is raw, honest, and revealing. This is a wonderful for collection for anyone who has experience the confusing effects of natural disaster as well as those who may have never had such an experience.
Already own a copy? Please write a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads, or submit a review to swimwithelephants@gmail.com for publications on this site.
Kristian Ashley Macaron
Originally from Albuquerque, NM where she attended the University of New Mexico, Kristian received her MFA from Emerson College in Boston, Massachusetts and thus melded her love for the colorful Southwest with the stunning New England coast.
Kristian’s first poetry chapbook, Storm (amazon), was released in July 2015 from Swimming With Elephants Publications in Albuquerque, NM. Her other publications of fiction and poetry are published in The Winter Tangerine Review, Philadelphia Stories, Duke City Fix: The Sunday Poem, Lightning Cake Journal, The Bellows American Review (The [BAR]), Ginosko Literary Journal, Elbow Room New Mexico, Watermelon Isotope, and Medusa’s Laugh Press.
She has taught scriptwriting at the Emerson College Pre-College Creative Writers’ Workshop and currently teaches English at the University of New Mexico-Valencia Branch. View Kristian’s work at Kristianmacaron.com
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Christopher Grillo.
Christopher Grillo’s chapbook, Elegy for a Star Girl, was published by Swimming with Elephants Publications in May 2017.
Each poem in Elegy for a Star Girl is categorized into three elements of existence: The Other World, The Here and Now, and Transcendence, and each poem is a combination of life experiences, Science Fiction, and space. These poems illustrate great depth within the soul, body, and mind, and the illuminating language and imagery express the universe as a metaphor. Life is questioned and answers are hard to find. Life is a journey that must be experienced from above. Sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride.
Already own a copy? Please write a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads, or submit a review to swimwithelephants@gmail.com for publications on this site.
Christopher Grillo
Christopher Grillo is the author of Heroes’ Tunnel (Anaphora Literary Press, 2015). His poems appear in Drunk Monkeys, Sport Literate, Biline, Spry, Aethlon, and more. Grillo is a graduate of the University of New Haven where he played strong safety for the Chargers, and of Southern Connecticut State University’s MFA program. He lives and works in New Haven, Connecticut as an 8th grade language arts teacher and moonlights as an assistant football coach at his high school alma mater.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Beau Williams.
Beau Williams’ full length poetry collection, Nail Gun and a Love Letter, is fresh of the presses being published in January of 2018. Williams’ chapbook is the result of a collaboration between Sugar Booking Entertainment and Swimming with Elephants Publications.
Already own a copy? Please write a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads, or submit a review to swimwithelephants@gmail.com for publications on this site.
Keep your eyes open for Beau Williams coming to a town near you!
Beau Williams
Beau Williams is a fairly optimistic poet based out of Portland Maine. He co-runs a weekly poetry class at Sweetser Academy and facilitates workshops at high schools and colleges around the New England area. His work has been published in numerous poetry websites and journals.
Beau has performed internationally and nationally both as a solo artist and with the performance poetry collectives Uncomfortable Laughter and GUYSLIKEYOU. He was the Grand Slam Champion at Port Veritas in 2014 and was the Artist in Residence at Burren College in Ballyvaughan, Ireland in January of 2017. Beau’s book, Rumham, is available for purchase on Amazon.com.
Already own a copy? Please write a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads, or submit a review to swimwithelephants@gmail.com for publications on this site.
Eva Marisol Crespin
Burque native, Eva Marisol Crespin is a slam poet who has been writing and performing poetry since the age of 12. Coming off a win at the 2016 National Poetry Slam Group Piece Finals, Eva has been a part of a number of slam teams who have seen final stage. She continues to slam and write poetry in her hometown of Albuquerque. She is currently working towards her degree in social work, working as a server, and teaching writing workshops in the community. She identifies as an Indigenous, Queer, Xingona, Xicana, who is sculpting words and ripping herself open to speak her truth.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Liza Wolff Francis.
Liza Wolff Francis’s chapbook, Language of Crossing, was published in the fall of 2015 by Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC.
Liza Wolff-Francis’s Language of Crossing is a collection of poetry that mirrors the true heart-stories along the US/Mexico border. Giving face, voice and humanity to all those who make their way across fronteras, her work is that of a necessary endeavor. She writes of a reality that must be ignored no longer. It is the struggle, strife, and violence that is endured by those who flee their country in hopes of a better life. Her poems, brutally honest and minute, rouse compassion as all good poetry must and begs the question of accountability. Language of Crossing is a political outcry, a finely tuned collection of endurance of a people, and a passionate advocacy for all to take notice. Wolff-Francis is a real activist planting poetic prayer flags across the vastness of a desert.
Already own a copy? Please write a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads, or submit a review to swimwithelephants@gmail.com for publications on this site.
Liza Wolff-Francis
Liza Wolff-Francis is a poet and writer with an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Goddard College. She was co-director for the 2014 Austin International Poetry Festival and a member of the 2008 Albuquerque Poetry Slam Team. She has an ekphrastic poem posted in Austin’s Blanton Art Museum by El Anatsui’s sculpture “Seepage” and her work has most recently appeared in Edge, Twenty, unseenfiction.com, Border Senses, and on various blogs. As a social worker, she has worked with Spanish speaking immigrant populations for twenty years. She wrote the play “Border Rising” from interviews with undocumented Mexican immigrants in Los Angeles. She currently lives in Albuquerque, NM.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Dominique Christina.
Dominique Christina’s full length poetry collection, They Are All Me, was published by Swimming with Elephants Publications in July 2015. Dominique Christina is an incompatible force in the poetry world and is the author of my collections. SwEP is honored to be able to share her work in this collection.
Listen to Dominique Christina perform her poetry here:
Already own a copy? Please write a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads, or submit a review to swimwithelephants@gmail.com for publications on this site.
Dominique Christina
Dominique Christina is a mother, an educator and an agitator born and raised in Denver, Colorado 40 years ago. She holds two Masters degrees in English Literature and Education respectively. A licensed educator, Dominique taught in the Denver and Aurora Public school systems in Colorado for ten years, directed college prep programs and taught in an adjunct capacity at Community College of Aurora and Metropolitan State University of Denver. She believes that words make worlds. In the slam world (competitive poetry) Dominique began in 2011. That same year she won the National Poetry Slam Championship. In 2012 she won the Women of the World Slam Championship. She won it again in 2014. She’s the only person to win that honor twice.
She is a Rocky Mountain Women’s Institute fellow. Her work has appeared on TV One’s season 3 Verses and Flow show. She has performed with Cornel West and was an invited guest to Washington DC to read her poem “Emmett Till” for the Till family and the parents of Trayvon Martin, a young man who was killed in Sanford, Florida. Her first book of poetry, The Bones, The Breaking, The Balm, was published by Penmanship Books 2014. Her second book, a collection of poetry, essays, and writing prompts, is set for publication in October 2015 by Sounds True Publishing. Her work also appears in numerous literary journals, anthologies, and magazines and has been featured in Huffington Post and Upworthy several times.
Dominique’s family was critical in the civil rights movement. Her aunt Carlotta Walls-Lanier was one of nine students to desegregate Central High School in Little Rock Arkansas. Her grandfather was a shortstop, Hall of Fame baseball player for the Kansas City Monarchs in the Negro Leagues before baseball was integrated. When he left, Jackie Robinson, who would later go on to integrate baseball, took his place. Dominique’s mother, Professor Jackie Benton, is named for Jackie Robinson. She is mother to four wildly expressive children who never use inside voices…ever. But they are the raw material of possible and give her plenty of reasons to praise.
Kevin Barger is a performance poet, writer, and retired slam organizer based in Asheville, NC. He was instrumental in bringing slam poetry back to popularity in Asheville after its rise, fall, and subsequent misfirings in the area by helping to lay the groundwork for Poetry Slam Asheville from 2008 through 2011. He has also appeared on many other stages in and around the Carolinas including the Lake Eden Arts Festival, Lexington Avenue Arts and Fun Festival, the Individual World Poetry Slam, and Southern Fried in which he was on the first team from Asheville sent to Southern Fried in nearly a decade. Now, semi-retired from the slam scene but itching to get back on stage again, he has compiled old favorites and new material in Observable Acts; his first endeavor onto the published page.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to SaraEve Fermin.
SaraEve Fermin’s collection, You Must Be This Tall to Ride, was published in the summer of 2016 by Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC.
Listen to her read here:
“So often in poetry collections, we read work that bear witness to the conflict, whether that be Poet vs. The World, Poet vs. Nature, or even Poet vs. Themselves. However, in You Must Be This Tall To Ride, we’re gifted with a unique perspective – namely, what happens after the battle is fought? Contained in these pages are poems that bear witness to the afterwards; to the fighter, post-victory & battle-wearied, who must carry on with their lives, with matters of day-to-day existence. If we consider the myth of Sisyphus, cursed for eternity to push the boulder up a never-ending hill, then we must look at this work as an exploration of what may have been, had Sisyphus ever found a way to finish his task.”
– William James
author of rebel hearts & restless ghosts
Pick up SaraEve Fermin’s You Must Be This Tall to Ride from Amazon or Barnes and Noble today!
SaraEve Fermin
SaraEve is a performance poet and epilepsy advocate from northeast New Jersey. A 2015 Best of the Net nominee, she has performed for both local and national events, including the 2013 Women of the World Poetry Slam, the Epilepsy Foundation of Greater Los Angeles 2015 Care and Cure Benefit to End Epilepsy in Children and as a reader for Great Weather for MEDIA at the 2016 NYC Poetry Festival on Governors Island. You might have met her volunteering at various national poetry slams. A Contributing Editor for Words Dance Magazine and Book Reviewer at Swimming with Elephants Publishing, her work can be found or is forthcoming in GERM Magazine, Yellow Chair Review, Drunk in a Midnight Choir and the University of Hell Press anthology We Can Make Your Life Better: A Guidebook to Modern Living, among others. Her second full length anthology, You Must Be This Tall to Ride, will be published by Swimming with Elephants Press in fall 2016. She believes in the power of foxes and self-publishing. Learn more: http://saraeve41.wix.com/saraevepoet
She loves Instagram: SaraEve41
Celebrate Poetry Month with Swimming with Elephants Publications and Bookworks this April!
During the month of April 2018, you will once again be able to find Swimming with Elephants Publications titles on the shelves of Bookworks, known as one of Albuquerque’s best local, independent bookstore.
Available titles range from our newest releases to our classics, but our supplies are limited so get there early and don’t pass up a purchase because it may not be there on your next visit.
All SwEP titles available in the store will be specially priced for $10, except of a small group which will be priced at $5 a book, while supplies last.
Check out our titles at Bookworks ABQ including theseNew Releases
from below/denied the light
Poetry by Paulie Lipman
Out of Denver, Colorado, Paulie comes “from below” and rises to join our parade of writers. A two time National Poetry Slam finalist, Paulie Lipman is a loud Jewish Queer poet, performer, and writer. His work has appeared in the anthology ‘We Will Be Shelter’ (Write Bloody Publishing) as well as The Emerson Review, Drunk In A Midnight Choir, Voicemail Poems, pressure gauge, and Prisma (Zeitblatt Fur Text & Sprache).
Nail Gun and a Love Letter
Poetry by Beau Williams
“This collection of poems alternately pierces the reader with astute and heartbreaking observations (Good Drums is a particularly devastating musing on white, male American-ness) while at the same time using evocative language to spar with and challenge the ideas of belonging and connection and love. These poems invite the reader to contemplate what it means to come from somewhere, and how it feels to long for a place that isn’t home but could be. They invite us to see the mundane as essential, and to see and celebrate the things that connect us to our identity. The title of this collection is apt; like a nail gun, these poems violently pierce, but do so in service to building something sturdy and sheltering, and everyone is a love letter to the dance that makes us who we are.”
– Sherry Frost, Educator
I Bloomed a Resistance From My Mouth
Poetry by Mercedez Holtry
“Mercedez Holtry’s poetry speaks to the origin stories of her Chican@ and Mestiz@ people. It is a mixed bag of mixed blood and the celebratory songs of family, culture and the history of the la tierra that she has blossomed from. Her poems are resistance and resilience. She is a fierce page poet warrior who also casts her spells from the stage, as a true bruja does. Oppressors beware. Holtry mixes up curses, prayers and incantations with her poetic brew. This is a poet who uses her mas palabras for healing and retribution. Her collection de poesia es muy firme, a true reckoning of what is to come from a generation of woke poets who have much to say and aren’t afraid to say it. “
-Jessica Helen Lopez, ABQ Poet Laureate
Wild Horses
Poetry by Courtney Butler
“Courtney A. Butler has written a book that manages to be strong and fierce while remaining innocent and full of wonder. Balancing the line between jaded adult and hopeful youth while painting the clearest picture of why the writing evokes that same sentiment- this is a fun, emotionally fulfilling collection that I will enjoy the 37th time as much as the 1st. I’ll be pre-ordering her next book, as there will surely be many more.”
-Wil Gibson, Author of Quitting Smoking, Falling In and Out of Love, and Other Thoughts About Death
The Promethean Clock or Love Poems of a Wooden Boy
Poetry by MJR Montoya
“These poems are a way of telling you what I saw, at least the remnants of those things. My poems have codes in them. They have forms that have long since lost favor. They have rhyme schemes and syllabic structures of old and new places. They have formlessness that abides by current trends, but embraces none of them wholesale. They are, as Milton once wrote, poems that attempt to champion the unnamable and the indeterminable. Mine are the equations of empty sets and irrational numbers as much as they are of ritual and nostalgia. I have decided not to appease all critique. I am at rest, because the people I trust most have said that there is something in them, something of where I am from, what became of my home, and what is becoming in the world. And for the first time in a long time I’m not ashamed of my part in this story. With all that I am, let these poems be a part of my apology to the world and to my beloveds, an apology for each moment as it passes to the next…”
~from the preface
the bones of this land
poetry by Kat Heatherington
“The Bones of this Land is an exquisite collection of poetry and craft at its apex. Heatherington is an expert at subtle but powerful verse. Her words read like a whisper but resonate like a bomb. Here is a book that will leave you satiated, but curiously enough, hungry for more. “
~Jessica Helen Lopez, author of Always Messing With Them Boys, cunt. bomb., Language of Bleeding and a recipient of the Zia Book Award
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to introduce you to the Podcast Pen and Poet, hosted by Rene Mullen.
Pen and Poet hopes to conduct “intimate conversations and readings with poets, both page and stage” and Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC has had several authors featured on Pen and Poet, including Kristian Macaron, Gigi Bella, Mercedez Holtry, Paulie Lipman, and Katrina Crespin.
Please take a moment to listen to the broadcast and learn a little more about some of our authors.
Pen and Poet is recorded in Albuquerque, NM. If you would like to participate and be interviewed on Pen and Poet, please contact the host, Rene Mullen. Contact information is located at the end of each broadcast.
The Winter Poetry Roundup was late, and the Spring Poetry Roundup is early. One of these roundups, I’ll actually be on time. But any time is right to explore the words of the finest poets of our community, so I don’t feel too badly about letting you know about them in advance. Today, I have six great poets for you to explore if you haven’t already, so let’s get right to it.
Poet and publisher Bryan Borland draws his inspiration from a variety of sources, as we all do. This chapbook came out of a book tour, consequently reflecting the geographic as well as social diversity of our country. It’s no surprise, then, that some of the poems are named after cities: “Chicago,” “Washington,” “Santa Clara”–but these poems are less about the locales than Borland’s relationship to them. Sharply…
“Bassam writes poems that feel like slow motion car crashes where, at every turn, you’re also reassured that it’s ok to feel like this, like even if nothing is going to be ok, there is strength to hold like a parking brake, like the axis of a planet. Bassam’s words are a gut punch, a pull to beating heart chest, a hand that holds yours in the bleak. One senses that the act of poetry for Bassam is truly one of survival. What a strength it takes to show our deepest insecurities, to not ask for forgiveness. To not be the hero of your own story. Bassam is a bright non binary voice. One that asks not for acceptance, but simply is, and tells the stories of body and mind that is so intimate and accessible to those of us who endlessly battle with our shapes, our selves. What a gift to give.”
—Charlie Petch, Spoken Word Artist, Playwright, Musician
About the Author
Bassam (they/them or xe/xim) is a spoken word poet, proud auntie, and settler residing on the traditional territory of the Dish with One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenant (Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee, Huron-Wendatt, and Mississaugas of the New Credit). they are a member of the League of Canadian Poets, an executive board member with Spoken Word Canada, and has toured Turtle Island performing spoken word. Bassam earned title of national poetry slam champion at the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word (CFSW) in 2016 with the Guelph Poetry Slam team, and Canadian Individual Poetry Slam (CIPS) finalist in 2017. they were editor-in-chief for ‘these pills don’t come in my skin tone’, a poetry collection exclusively by Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) on the topic of mental health and illness, released in fall 2017. a (gender)queer, Jewish person of Middle-Eastern descent and a long-time sufferer of body dysmorphia, bipolar and eating disorders, bassam believes in radical kindness as resistance to colonization, that there is no peace without justice, and that intersectionality is vital in the struggle against kyriarchy.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC has always worked with Amazon to get our books into the hands of people around the world. Occasionally, Amazon has specials on our books, which makes it a wonderful time to pick up some copies.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC is excited to welcome poet Paulie Lipman to our Parade. Paulie’s collection, from below/denied the light, will be released February 2017 and available during Paulie’s next tour, as well as online retailers.
Swimming with Elephants Publications author Gigi Bella is featured in this week’s (January 11-17) Weekly Alibi.
She has not only taken the cover, but has a lovely article on page 12.
Gigi will be in town for a few weeks preparing for shows and her upcoming tour. Her publication, 22, was released by SwEP in early 2016 and is currently available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, but you can get a copy in person at one of her upcoming events.
Come to El Chante: Casa de Cultura today, January 11, 2018 for the first Voices of the Barrio of 2018.
The feature is none other than the fabulous Matthew Brown!
Matthew Brown’s chapbook Verbrennan was release from Swimming with Elephants Publications in 2014 and is currently available at Amazon, Barnes and Nobel, and Bookworks Albuquerque.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC has a wonderful line up of poets releasing manuscripts in 2018.
Some poets are releasing their second book with SwEP, while others are joining the parade for the first time.
By forming a relationship with Sugar Booking Entertainment, we will be producing the books/ chapbooks of several of their touring poets this year, including Paulie Lipman, Wil Gibson, Mercedez Holtry, and Gigi Bella.
Keep an eye open for new publications and events near you!
Join us for an evening of spoken word poetry, musical theater, and general weird theater kid stuff. Featuring a performance by GiGi Bella and a special appearance by The Fridges. This is also a fundraiser for the Get In The Fridge Productions Spring Musical Godspell, as well as GiGi Bella’s upcoming tour. The artists greatly appreciate every single contribution!
Pay what you can ($8 suggested donation).
Note: This show contains content that may not be suitable for children.
About the artists:
GiGi Bella is the tenth ranked female poet in the world (WOWPS 2017). She is the current Project X Bronx Poetry Champion, the 2017 Vox Pop Indie Champion, a 2017 Fem Slam Finalist and a literal mermaid. She is also a 2016 National Poetry Slam Group Piece Champion and 2013 Semi-Finalist as part of The Albuquerque Poetry Slam Team. Her book, 22, is available through Swimming With Elephants Publications. She will commence her first US Tour in the Spring of 2018. She also has a rad musical theater background as a performer and teacher.
Get In The Fridge Productions is a new and upcoming theater company run by teens for teens (kinda like Kids Bop but way better, I promise). We specialize in making teenagers feel like they’re welcome as well as geeking out about our favorite musical obsessions. Please support our production of Godspell in April!
Join Swimming with Elephants Publications as we welcome Manuel Montoya to the Parade. He will be reading from his debut publications: The Promethean Clock or Love Poems of a Wooden Boy.
Copies of the publication will be available for purchase and signing.
Musical guest will be the Scarred Jefferies.
This is a potluck events so please bring snacks to share.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC is up to all sorts of adventures these days.
We are currently wrapping the publications of this last summer’s chapbook competition. Books by Kat Heatherington and Courtney Butler are now available and Manuel Montoya’s publication should be out by the end of this month/early December. Stay tuned to for updates.
We are also celebrating SwEP on Small Business Sunday on November 25th at Bookworks ABQ from 3-5. Reading at this event are Kat Heatherington, Jessica Helen Lopez, Manuel Montoya, Gina Marselle, Kristian Macaron, Bill Nevins, Manuel Gonzalez, and Sarita Sol Gonzalez (confirmed). Any other SwEP authors who are available are also welcome to participate. The majority of SwEP publications will be available for purchase through Bookworks. After the Bookworks show, the celebration will continue at Dialogue Brewery where we can drink and make merry. This is an open event and we are hoping for a great turn out. We also may have an article in the ABQ Journal to help promote the event.
In December, we will have the official release of Courtney A Butler’s book. The event will take place at the Lomas Performance Space and feature the musical stylings of Danny the Harp and the artwork of Judy Marquez. This event is on the evening of December 9th and promises to be great fun! Also, an open and free event, please come by and pick up a copy of Courtney’s new book.
The book release for Manuel Montoya will be early in the new year, so please keep your eyes open for that future announcement.
Our partnership with Sugar Book Entertaining is promising more books by touring poets in the new year. We are currently working with Beau William to put his book together and we are in the review process with several other poets.
SwEP is beginning to make some shifts toward becoming an official non-profit. We are in the process of creating a board and researching the paperwork and information to move us from an LLC. This move may create some shifts in our production model, but not to worry. All authors will be notified and given appropriate options when the transition occurs (later in 2018).
As we make this change, we will be looking for a new official logo. If you know anyone who is interested in this project please have them contact us at swimwithelephants@gmaill.com.
SwEP authors will begin receiving their royalty reports in December 2017. If you have updated your email, please notify us so that we can make sure you get your information. As always you will have an option to receive your royalties in cash or product as well as a time to review your continuation as a SwEP author.
Remember:
The best way to get your book into people’s hands is through featured performances, tours, and self-promotion. Please encourage your fans to review your book(s) via Amazon, Goodreads, review blogs, print newspapers, etc.
We will do our best to assist you by promoting your publication, events, reviews, and in any other way possible.
Also, as a SwEP author you are entitled to not only your own author copies at cost, but any other books in our catalog. Please help promote your fellow authors by submitting reviews of their publications and getting their publications out into the world.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC is excited to announce the release of Gypsy Horses by Courtney A Butler.
Come to her release party on December 9th from 7-8:30 at the Lomas Performance Space, 10601 Lomas Boulevard, ABQ NM.
Also at the release will be artwork from the talent Judy Marquez who created the cover of this lovely publication. Musical Guest to be announced.
“Courtney Butler has written a book that manages to be strong and fierce while remaining innocent and full of wonder. Balancing the line between jaded adult and hopeful youth while painting the clearest picture of why the writing evokes that same sentiment- this is a fun, emotionally fulfilling collection that I will enjoy the 37th time as much as the 1st. I’ll be pre-ordering her next book, as there will surely be many more.” – Wil Gibson, author of Quitting Smoking, Falling In and Out of Love, and Other Thoughts About Death
“Courtney Butler has a finesse with the image of the word, but it is her visceral emotion that feeds the reader’s need to connect on a gut level. Her words rumble throughout your body, clang around your brain and leave their stories imprinted on your heart.” ~Jessica Helen Lopez, author of Cunt.Bomb. and The Language of Bleeding
Courtney is one of the winners of this year’s chapbook competition, judged by ABQ Poet Laureate Jessica Helen Lopez.
The results of our summer Chapbook Competition has gifted us three amazing new authors and three amazing new titles.
Kat Heatherington’s the bones of this land was released in October.
Courtney A Butler’s Gypsy Horses is looking at a November release.
Manuel Montoya’s The Promethean Clock –or- Love Poems of a Wooden Boy should be available in December.
We have a few other titles on the plate for consideration giving us a very busy end of the year. Keep your eyes on our website for more updates in the coming weeks.
Want to support our press? Pick up one or five of the publications we offer. Find links on our website. Also, you may simply donate to our small business via the Paypal link on the home page (we’d rather you bought the books, but hey, support is support).
The SwEP staff is hard at work creating beautiful books for the winners of our chapbook competition. Our first place winner, Kat Heatherington’s The Bone of This Land, will be the first to be released and will be available soon. Keep your eyes open for the official release.
Cover Art “Infinite Horizon” by Gwendolyn Prior/ Five Line Studios
Congratulations to the winner of our chapbook competition.
1st Place: The Bones of this Land by Kat Heatherington
2nd Place: The Promethean Clock by Manuel Montoya
3rd Place: The Last Geronimo by Courtney Butler
Poets will be contacted the week of August 7th with an official contract offer and then production will begin. We are hoping to have a release event in the late fall where all three poets can present and share their work.
Thank you again to all who participated. Your continued support is essential to our continuous as a small press. For those going to the National Poetry Slam this year in Denver, keep your eyes out for SwEP authors and find Jessica Helen Lopez at the book selling event on Saturday.
We would like to extend a warm congratulations to the top five finalists in our Chapbook Competition.
In alphabetical order, the titles of the the top five chapbooks are:
(drum roll)
The Bones of this Land
The Longest Geronimo
Pop 1280
The Promethean Clock
Space on Earth
If your title is listed please stay tuned. We will announce the winners on July 29th at the Power to the People Poetry Slam at Duel Brewery. We hope to see everyone there to support our authors and participate in our book exchange. For those unable to attend the Slam, the winners will be posted on Sunday, July 30th and contacted the following week.
If you have a publication, please consider participating our book exchange at Power to the People Poetry Slam. Our goal is to get more reviews for our publications as well as those in the community. Trade your title for one of ours or purchase SwEP titles for $5.
If your title is not listed, we want to send well wishes for your future poetic endeavors. Thank you for sharing your work with us and support our small press. Please consider submitting in the future.
We would like to extend a warm congratulations to the top ten finalists in our Chapbook Competition.
In alphabetical order, the title of the the top ten chapbooks are:
(drum roll)
The Bones of this Land
Coffee and Cocaine
Diesel and Decay
Float True
The Longest Geronimo
Pop 1280
The Promethean Clock
Space on Earth
This too Shall Pass
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before
If your title is listed please stay tuned. We will release the top 5 next week and announce the winners on July 29th at the Power to the People Poetry Slam at Duel Brewery. We hope to see everyone there to support our authors and participate in our book exchange.
If your title is not listed, we want to send well wishes for your future poetic endeavors. Thank you for sharing your work with us and support our small press. Please consider submitting in the future.
Our guest judge, the unmitigated Jessica Helen Lopez, is working diligently to make her way through all the submissions. We plan on releasing a top ten this weekend, then narrowing it down to the top five the following weekend.
The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd prize winners will be named at the Power to the People Poetry Event at Duel Brewery on July 29th.
Swimming with Elephants Publications is going to host a book exchange at this event. Bring your book/chapbook/publication and trade it for another from the community. The goal is to increase book reviews for all participates and to get your book into the hands of more readers. We will also have books for sale for $5.
Thank you again for all who submitted and thank you for your continued support!
SwEP is spotlighting an author each month to find out what they are working on now and in the near future. Interviews are written and conducted by SwEP author, Gina Marselle. Ms. Marselle was lucky enough to catch up with Mr. Kevin Barger, as he was preparing to leave on tour from Asheville, N.C. to Washington, D.C. from July 6 to 12, 2017.
Kevin’s book, Observable Acts, is available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and by contacting the author.
This interview was conducted by phone on July 3, 2017 at 1:00 p.m. eastern time.
Greetings all,
Our first SwEP author spotlight is Performance Poet, Kevin Barger, who is currently on tour with a Poetry Cabaret in Washington, D.C. from July 6 through July 12, 2017 (for more information or for tickets: https://www.capitalfringe.org/events/1135-poetry-cabaret).
Tell us a little about your background in slam and performance poetry?
I met Spoken-Word and Visual Artist, Moody Black around 2008ish and was interested in his work. Black can be seen on All Def Poetry [see Black perform In The Field: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hU0zGh9aSQs&t=49s]. He hosted the first slam I competed in. Slam in Asheville, N.C. use to be a big thing before I got involved. In Asheville, when slam first started, it flourished but then it died. It went through a few cycles of popularity. It may have kept dying because Asheville is an artsy and nonjudgmental city and slam is judgmental—I mean we compete for scores and placement. People aren’t as interested in that. When I took over the slam in Asheville the Slammaster was on his way out and he left the slam responsibilities to me. I created a board of people to help run it and our slam became pretty popular, but then it began to take over my life. I was no longer concentrating on my own writing and performance. I was always promoting other poets and the slam scene in Asheville. Slam was my life from 2008 to 2011 [a number of Barger’s poems are on YouTube from this time period]. Eventually, a boyfriend brought it to my attention that I was no longer writing for self. I was like an addict, slam had become my addiction—my boyfriend encouraged me to stop and write for myself, to share my work for me and not for points. It made sense. Now, I concentrate on performance poetry, for the most part.
What were you like in school?
I was the really shy, fat kid that every one would pick on. Writing would allow me to escape. Once, in third grade, I wrote a book for a school assignment—a mystery, maybe about a lost shoe. It wasn’t very good but it was epic, and the shoe was eventually found at the dump. It was a hardbound book put together with duct tape. You know, I don’t ever remember not writing. In middle school, I entered a contest to have a poem published. It was a scam. I realize that now, but it was published on a plaque and the company wanted to sell my family a bunch of stuff along with the plaque. It was obviously a scam, eventually the sent my parents back the check they wrote the company. My parents still have the plaque and they appreciate it, but it really was a horrible poem. Mostly, I avoided school. I would eat lunch in the library. In high school, I was writing poetry—I came out in high school as bisexual my senior year. I dated a girl in high school and after for seven years, actually. But in high school, we would write poems to each other, as notes to hand off during homeroom class or in the halls. We didn’t pay too much attention in class, as we were writing these notes back in forth to each other. She stopped writing eventually, and I didn’t. When our relationship ended, I started writing more professionally. She stopped writing after high school, she just didn’t write—it wasn’t her thing—it was mine, and now, here I am.
Why do you write?
I write for catharsis, to empty myself. Once it is out of me and on a page, it is no longer mine—if someone else can connect to it then that is valuable as well, but at the end of the day, I am writing for catharsis.
Do you write on a typewriter, computer, dictate or longhand?
I use to have a leather bound journal and wrote with a pencil to edit as I wrote. Probably shouldn’t have done that, but I did it anyway—now I type on the computer. I can’t keep a new poem in my head—I have to write it down.
What are your ambitions for your writing career?
I am a serious writer. I don’t completely think of myself as a professional writer, but I do take it more seriously than most who write as a hobby. Any art you do for catharsis is really, really valuable. Once you start to make a name for yourself, the level changes and it becomes serious and important. Writing isn’t my whole life, I’m like the guy who comes and mows your lawn and sometimes I get paid—I might earn $10 bucks selling a book or really, I’m more likely to give you a book. Now, Neil Gaimen, author of American Gods, basically says you have to write all the time to be a writer, you can’t wait to be inspired—you have to write—I am not that strict of a writer.
When did you decide to become a writer?
I never really made a decision to become a “writer,” as I’ve always written. It is just a label that helps to make up me. I also make pottery sometimes, which makes me a “potter,” or I go hiking which makes me a “hiker.” It’s just a label that describes something I do sometimes. I think I am in the minority here by not buying into the mystique surrounding the term “writer.” I write poetry. I perform poetry. It is a label, but it doesn’t define me. I am gay, but that also doesn’t define me. Since I was in a relationship with a woman for seven years—there are things we do that fall outside the labels we adopt. There are a lot of labels to define us, but they should never confine us. We should celebrate all the things we do instead of just clinging to one.
Which writers inspire you?
So when I first started performance poetry I was really intrigued by Patricia Smith, Taylor Mali, Moody Black, and Rives. Rives is an amazing poet, he is godly. I recommend his TEDtalk Mockingbirds Remix2006 to everyone [it can me found: https://www.ted.com/talks/rives_remixes_ted2006/transcript?language=enn]. I am also inspired by Dorothy Parker (she wrote gossipy poetry) and Langston Hughes; I love writers from the 1920s, not sure why—I just do.
What are you working on at this minute?
Right now I am really excited about the Poetry Cabaret Collective that I will be performing with in D.C. It is a mish mash of music, poets, dancers, even a fire-eater—It is a fun show! My ambition is to discover fun ways to get my voice out there. I am a performance poet and I enjoy that aspect of my work right now. With the Poetry Cabaret I can do this. We did a lot of fundraising for this tour from a Zombie festival to a kickstarter. Now we are all traveling together—15 of us to D.C. We will perform in D.C. from the 6th through the 12th at The Capital Fringe Festival: https://www.capitalfringe.org/. Eventually, our hopes are to take this show on the road.
Note: The show is made up of the following artists (taken from Facebook events page):
Chief Creative and Director: Caleb Beissert
Music Director: Aaron Price
Poets: Kevin Evans, Justin William Evans, Justin Blackburn, Kevin Barger, Michael Coyle, Caleb Beissert
Dance Artists: Hester Prynncess, Union J, Tom Scheve
Musicians: Aaron Price, Polly Panic, Max Melner
How did you get involved with the Poetry Cabaret?
Caleb Beissert invited me. I met him through the slam poetry scene. He hosted an open mic I would go to recruit poets for the slam.
I consider myself a page poet, doing what you do is admirable—performing for crowds of people and participating in slams, festivals, and now this Poetry Cabaret show. I certainly admire stage poets. Even though, I don’t like to say (or label) stage verses page poet, but there is a difference. As a performance poet, how do you differentiate a stage poet from say a page poet like myself?
I agree there is a difference between stage and page poetry and spoken word and slam and performance, really. I think page writers worry about grammar and form—whereas stage, we worry more about sound of words and how powerful we can get something across. I don’t call myself a slam poet anymore, I love slam, will perform it, it was just detrimental to my writing. But, I don’t perform for points anymore—it was a competition and a strategy was always needed—in slam we are trying to one up the person who came before us. When I performed slam, I was not writing for myself, I was writing to score points. Don’t get me wrong, I love slam. The Slam community has a big family and slam helped become the person I am today. Going through that fire—is amazing. But years doing it can be difficult; there is so much work involved from the competition itself to the work in putting together shows—it is life consuming. On the other hand, performance poetry allows me to write for myself and perform on the stage. I have a lot of freedom to take risks because I’m not being scored. Really, say, if someone gives you a six, your soul is crushed…and then you second-guess yourself and your ability. The first slam I remember performing in I won, and it gave me an ego boost—I didn’t always win, but I did that time. Then I performed more and made a name for myself. I performed in festivals and people recognized my work and it was awesome when people came up afterward saying they loved my work…yet, with slam there is self-doubt, but at the end of the day it is really a love fest. One thing about stage poetry is after performing a poem there is immediate validation for who you are as a writer and performer. If you are in classroom setting or in a workshop editing a page poem then a lot of times people become critical and offer ways to improve your writing, grammar issues, etc. In the classes, I only saw my mistakes. Really, in thinking about it, poetry, at one point was something that could only be understood by academia and it killed the art form. Now, this is something that we poets are working on is that poetry needs to be for everyone so we all can read, write, and share. Poetry connects us through emotions—that is me talking as a stage poet. I don’t limit myself to form, but if I just want to get everything out on a page then I do, but ultimately, it is going to be performed.
What genre are your book(s)?
Poetry. I only have the one book.
What draws you to this genre?
I love poetry; it feels like something I have always done. The short form suits me. I like writing essays, too. I love reading fiction, however, my poems can be confessional. It can be dangerous because it can turn into your diary—it needs to be topic based. As the writer, we want empathy not sympathy from sharing our poetry. At first, I was a very political poet and shared poems about gay rights and issues. Lately, I’ve moved away from that to write more emotional things. I don’t box myself in.
How much research do you do?
Not a lot. It is more about how I feel in a moment. If I am making a reference…I may research about that topic enough to make sure I get a specific line or thought right. My poem “Little Brother” is about the shooting of Lawrence King, and I really had to learn that story in order to make a larger point. Mostly, though, I have an outpouring of words that I have to immediately write it down. Writing for me is kind of like trying to catch air. I’ll lose a piece if I’m unable to get it on paper as soon as the thought occurs. I don’t want to lose it so later I will go back to edit.
How do you edit your work?
I really have a difficult time finishing a poem. As far as editing, I show it to different people, and get feedback—then I edit. I will read it out loud and feel the words in my mouth and make sure that they sound like they belong together. I don’t edit per se for grammar and such. I may write a poem and have a need to share it at a show. I just tell the audience, I just wrote this. Let me know what you think. Some poems I don’t share at all.
Tell us about the cover/s and how it/they came about.
Kat had a graphic designer for my book. I helped to decide the final look for the cover with feed back from others.
Do you have any advice for other authors on how to market their books?
I market myself by performing. I take my books with me. I am trying to figure out how to market myself better. I like to make sure my book is in my bio when being introduced. It is hard to market. I tried advertising online, but it wasn’t successful. Performing poems and having books available is the best way for me. I love the connection made when I hand a book over or sign a book to someone. Love having a book out, and selling a book, I am just as an apt to give a copy of my book away as I am at selling it.
Which social network works best for you? How can people connect with you?
Facebook is really the best way.
How many shows a year?
I maybe perform in three to four big shows each year—I’d like to do more. I try to show up at open mics, too, when I can. There’s one hosted by Caleb, the host of the Poetry Cabaret, every Wednesday in Asheville that I get to sometimes.
If you would like to find more about Kevin Barger then please connect through SwEP or contact the author directly through Facebook or Facebook Messenger. Samples of his work are in his most current manuscript; Observable Acts: A Collection of Poetry (SwEP, 2015) https://swimmingwithelephants.com/ or you may find a sampling of his slam poetry online. Here is Kevin Barger performing “Lullabye” at the Asheville Poetry Slam at The Magnetic Field (January 2010): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xu47N3zXhTs.
Interview Conducted By the Always Brilliant Gina Marselle
Gina Marselle, M.A.Ed, is a New Mexico educator who lives in Albuquerque with her husband and children. She has published poetic work with The Sunday Poem Online Series, in the Alibi, the Rag, SIC3, Adobe Walls: An Anthology of New Mexico Poetry, Catching Calliope, Fix and Free Poetry Anthology I and II, and La Palabra Anthology I and II. Aside from poetry, she is an accomplished photographer. Her photos of New Mexico poets have been featured in the Santa Fe Magazine, Trend (March, 2011). She also photographed the cover of Jessica Helen Lopez’ poetry book, Always Messing With Them Boys (West End Press, 2011), and has her photography featured in September: traces of letting go a poetry book by Katrina K Guarascio (Swimming With Elephants Publications, 2014). Finally, A Fire of Prayer: A Collection of Poetry and Photography is her first full-length manuscript (Swimming With Elephants Publications, 2015).
Paulie Lipman
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Brian Hendrickson.
In the battle and stand of this people sacrificing and dying to realize its aspiration, we seem like immortals more beautiful and gallant than anyone alive. And there is no power that can stop us on our luminous road.
Jack Hirschman
In keeping with his political values, Hirschman’s books are published with small, independent presses, often in small runs (such as 
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Kristian Ashley Macaron.
Swimming with Elephants Publications, LLC would like to reintroduce to you to Liza Wolff Francis.
Swimming with Elephants Publications 