3rd Annual Young Writers Workshop--Endicott College-- June 27-29

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For more information and to register, go to endicottyoungwritersworkshop2019.eventbrite.com

Endicott College (Beverly, MA) will host its Third Annual Young Writers Workshop at its seaside campus, June 27-28, 2019, for area high school students interested in creative writing. In addition to sessions focusing on poetry, fiction, and playwriting/screenwriting, this year’s 2-day Workshop will feature new sessions on humor writing, young adult writing, and “Improv for writers,” a session taught by one of the College’s theatre arts professors. Participants, who must be entering grades 9-12 in fall 2019, will create and refine new work, learn how to give feedback to their peers, and receive tips on how to promote and publish their work. They will develop their skills in a fun, supportive environment. The Workshop welcomes both novice and advanced creative writers.

Querencia Poems and Stories by Allie Hastings. ( Ibbetson Street Press/Endicott College Young Poet Series)

( Allie Hasting --Center)

Querencia  Poems and Stories by Allie Hastings. ( Ibbetson Street Press/Endicott College Young Poet Series) ($12)

REVIEW BY JO JO LAZAR

When Doug Holder asked me how I was enjoying Querencia by Allie Hastings, I told him immediately "I was much more committed to being mysterious in my poetry as a teenager!" I'm complimenting her adept voice so early in her career, as the clarity and conservation of symbols doesn't detract from the range of experiences and feelings in the work. I compare poems in this collection to the feeling I get reading Baudelaire (see, "An Umbrella for Two") and in the nature-centric pieces, some Mary Oliver. This is a fun, witty, generous collection, with scenes unfolding a petal at a time from a unique bouquet of life experiences and imagination. You walk London streets, beaches, take forest-strolls, and maybe get your heart stomped on a little at music stores, and coffee shops. These poems and stories are vibrant post cards from the heart of poetic moments, gifts still raw with "the thing itself" coupled with the balm of the narrator's wisdom.

The weather was cool enough to see the air of our breath when either of us spoke; I left my jacket in your car because I had fooled myself into believing autumn wasn't quite over yet--the sun was shining over our heads... The woods, at first glance, appeared a glorious fall wonderland, but very quickly upon our walk did I feel its brisk embrace tickle my shoulders, the shivers sending goosebumps to the surface of my fragile skin.

I almost asked you if we could turn around and go back so I could get my jacket out of your car.

But I didn't want to be that girl.

(-The Deceptive Nature of Love)

In the margin I wrote "real minutiae of womanhood and dating," I related with the hyper-awareness and hyper-analysis of these things. All the while the story is assonant, lyrical, layered like watercolor strokes in Jane Kenyon or Mary Oliver, and poignant because of too many thresholds of reality occurring all at once. My first takeaway from this story was the autobiographical narrator-fallacy-magic feeling that surely I had read something true! based on writer's felt experience. Hours later I realized it was another huge layer of liminality, perhaps the entire book Querencia's meta-theme too is "thresh-hold overload." Too many changes or possibilities occurring to the mind at once, so we become a slower camera, absorb every detail. All this crept up on me hours after reading, and I am still admiring this story (prose-poem) as a favorite in the collection; what could have been an easy cliché/play-scene, (a forest walk, a break-up or not? conversation is about to unfold) is unpeeling in a slow-reveal hours later in one's mind.

This lovely book boasts a wise and open "beginner's mind" as one says in Buddhism. The work is self-aware and not embarrassed to tell us in the more straight-forward lyrical poems that the narrator/writer is eighteen, but feels much older. Yet there is honest impatience to have lived more already, the act of nostalgia is literally tried on in poems like "Nostalgia." There's also a youthful sense of the number of times something has happened --tally feel, a mindset that any writer/journaler may not shake in a lifetime. The enclosed unit of only so many memories and references never detracts, I am still thinking about a girl's raincoat and boots, and another's forgotten jacket in the back of a car. I was taken to many childhoods, on foreign adventures, and became empathic tourist to universal and unique scenes of heartbreak. I feel privileged indeed to remember what poetry can do, to remember how to report back from the very sparks (scenes/memories/dreams) that make one want to write at all.

 jojo Lazar (jojolazar.com, @poetessS)

Tamaracks: Poetry Edited by James Deahl

Poetry often presents tiny glimpses into the honest, raw, and, sometimes painful, aspects of life, inviting readers to take a look inside a writer’s thoughts and relive their most vivid memories alongside them.  The first book of its kind for decades, Tamaracks: Canadian Poetry For the 21st Century contains poems that offer descriptive biographical and bibliographical information on the wide array of Canadian writers featured.  Commonly expressed topics in the collection include heavy-hitting subject matter, such as Canadian involvement in past wars, losing family members to tragic events, and staying faithful to God during pressing times.  Poems like Ian McCulloch’s “Poppa” - I listened for some echo of the concussion that had pressed him, still only a boy, into a premature and crowded grave - remind us of the thin line that separates life from death, while others, such as Joseph A. Farina’s “Morning Essence” - The sun has not risen, the darkness still owns us outside in the pre-dawn, spirits are waiting, I hear them like music stirring my soul - emphasize the importance of anticipating the blessings that await us even in the midst of tragedy and devastation.  Highlighting the works of 113 Canadian poets, this contemporary anthology of poetry successfully paints a complete picture of life in all its forms, giving light to untold stories that reveal the barest of human emotion.     

 

 ------ Allison Hastings

 Allison Hastings is a freshman at Endicott College in Beverly, MA, working towards her bachelor's in English/Creative Writing. On campus she is involved in Pep Band and two writing clubs: Her Campus, which is an online magazine targeted towards the female college student demographic, and the Endicott Review, which publishes a collection of student's writing and artwork every spring.

The Sunday Poet: El Ayala

El Ayala

El Ayala is a freshman at Endicott College majoring in Liberal Studies. She is originally from Norwalk, Connecticut and has been crafting stories and poems since before she could write.


If I Was a Spy…

If I was a spy,
that’d be a delight.
With girls and villains
and slow-motion fights.
I’ll arrive to the party,
pull up in a Rolls Royce.
As the girls all fawn,
they’ll all be my choice.
No one will know
exactly who I am.
Just that I’m important-
yes ma’am, no ma’am.
I’ll be an international spy, from a special agency, yes!
I’ll have shootouts in Paris,
crack a code in Hong Kong.
Sometimes when I’m leaving
I’d hum my theme song.
I’d be renowned, oh baby!
You’d all hear the story
of a lass, in gray converse,
making bad guys sorry.
A famous spy, the best kind.
I’d hide in the crowd.
They’d come for me, angry,
and see me standing all proud.
I’d be the best spy,
a spy like no other,
but I’ll never be a spy.
Instead, I’m a mother.
I’m not out defusing bombs,
I’m defusing tantrums.
I’m not finding empty vaults,
I’m filling empty tums.
I’m not breaking villain’s knuckles,
I’m holding a small hand.
I’m not fighting terrorists,
I’m negotiating demands.
Instead of my Rolls Royce,
I have a Chevy Traverse.
I’m not the best spy in the world,
I’m the best mom in the universe.

New book out from the Endicott College/Ibbetson Street Press Young Poet Series.

Talented  Endicott College undergraduate Dan Calnan has a new book out from the Young Poet Series at Endicott College.

 “In this collection, Calnan writes with a wisdom and authority beyond his years. Ranging in tone from witty to profound, these poems all demonstrate his intelligence and affinity with words. He is a writer to watch.” — Elizabeth Winthrop, author of Fireworks, December, and The Mercy Seat.

to order a copy go to http://lulu.com/ibbetsonpress

Ibbetson Street 43 due out in late June!

Endicott College Young Writers Workshop June 24-7

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Endicott College to Host Young Writers Workshop for Local High School Students

 The Endicott Young Writer's Workshop, which will be held on June 24-25, 2017.   This camp-like experience provides students who will be in grades 9-12 in the fall, and who have an interest in creative writing, an opportunity to meet other student writers and to work closely with three of Endicott's most accomplished professors and writers: Charlotte Gordon, Dan Sklar, and Elizabeth Winthrop. 

Here is a link to a press release about the Workshop from the College's website: http://www.endicott.edu/News/2017/4-28WritersWorkshop.aspx

To register

https://endicottyoungwritersworkshop.eventbrite.com


Contact  mherlihy@endicott.edu  

High school students with an interest in creative writing are invited to attend a Young Writers erlihy@endicott.edu; Tel-978-232-2178).

The Endicott Review Volume 28, Issue Spring 2011

(The Undergraduate Literary Review of Endicott College in Beverly, Mass. http://endicott.edu)


The Endicott Review
Volume 28, Issue 1
Spring 2011
Copyright © 201 by The Endicott Review
80 pages


Review by Zvi A. Sesling



The great thing about The Endicott Review (Endicott College in Beverly, MA.) is that there is always something for someone. Pardon the cliché, but it is true. The magazine has several sections entitled College, Nature, Childhood and Family, Love, Self, Death, Artwork, Dream, Miscellaneous. Each section provides writing by, in some cases, young, enthusiastic writers with promising futures and lots of talent. If the magazine has any weakness it is that there are no biographies of the authors and artists, which, of course would probably add another 20 or so pages. I would also like see a larger type, but with limited budgets. But that is all incidental to the terrific poetry, short stories, photographs and artwork contained in the Review’s 80 pages.

Richard W. Moyer is back with more nostalgia about Youngstown OH in 1940 and what intrigues me this time is that he went to Youngstown Rayen High School, where I attended the ninth and tenth grades. Sadly, his poems will have to serve as nostalgia because that venerable high school was torn down a year or two ago, an odd parallel to the demise of a once proud city. Personally, I hope he puts out a poetry book on the city.

So let’s look at the poetry where Emily Braile’s First Apartment takes us all back to those first days on our own, with or without roommates.

First Apartment: the opening lines of which remind me of the day I opened the refrigerator door and found a cold hamburger and beer, nothing else. Ah, what a breakfast, and I still can’t stand beer.

Cold beer and a
chicken nugget salad
eaten with chopsticks
by allies.

Or you can laugh with Tim Gager’s reminiscence When I’m Drunk I think About Phoenix which starts:

The time I just drove there
with an American Express
in my pocket but no coin
for a pay phone I found

by accident, a sunny bar
with green velour drapes frosted
with dust, must be dumb luck
Ma Bell’s out of order




Among the better poems in the journal is Endicott College Professor Doug Holder’s Portrait of My Mother At 85; Mark Pawlak’s short reminder of our high school or college courses, Teen Transit Talk; Johnny Clarke’s Angry Poetry For Self Loathing Lovers; Larissa Burgess’s Shoes; and Abigail Bottome’s Observing Couples. Before any other contributors think that not being mention mean their poems are not held in the same esteem, fear not, the all the poems are quality, it’s just that these poems were among my favorites.

The short stories are all worth a read as well, though Luke Salisbury’s Tell It Not, Paul Stephen Stone’s How To Train A Rock (as well as Parts 2 and 3), The Woman In Boston With Pamphlets by Lauren Peterson and Love On A Cold Sunday by Sara Peterson [any relations to Lauren??] were personal favorites, though readers may find others to their preference.

The magazine also contains excellent artwork and photography, the favorites (again, those not mentioned should have no thoughts of being less talented), being Avery Hopkins photo of a tree like a donut (or other thoughts), Melissa Paiva’s playing cards (a straight in poker) and Caitlin Cawley’s leaf with water drops. Doug Rosenberg had a number of interesting photos of which the black and white of a dog was my personal choice. Finally, Ruth Henderson’s photo montage was another favorite.

All that said, The Endicott Review presents a wide array of talent and I highly recommend to readers seeking new and established writers, as well as talented photographers. Take the time to get a copy to read it and enjoy it.






******** Zvi A. Sesling has published poetry in numerous magazines both in print and online in the United States, Great Britain, New Zealand, Canada and Israel. Among the publications are: Ibbetson St., Midstream, Poetica,The Deronda Review, Voices Israel, Saranac Review, New Delta Review, Plainsong, Asphodel, Haz Mat Review, Istanbul Literary Review, The Chaffin Journal, Ship of Fools, Chiron Review, Poetry Monthly Interational, Matrix, The Tower and Main Street Rag. He was awarded Third Place (2004) and First Prize (2007) in the Reuben Rose International Poetry Competition and was a finalist in the 2009 Cervena Barva Press Chapbook Contest. In 2008 he was selected to read his poetry at New England/Pen “Discovery” by Boston Poet Laureate Sam Cornish. He was a featured reader in the 2010 Jewish Poetry Festival in Brookline, MA. His poems have been published in the U.S., Canada, England, Israel and New Zealand. He is a regular reviewer for the Boston Small Press and Poetry Scene and he edits the Muddy River Poetry Review. He is author of King of the Jungle, (Ibbetson St., 2010) and a chapbook Across Stones of Bad Dream (Cervena Barva, 2011) and a second full length poetry book, Fire Tongue (Cervena Barva) is scheduled for 2011.