Poetry Society’s New President
Jim Ahearn, a member of Springfed Arts-Metro Detroit Writers was elected president of the Poetry Society of Michigan at their fall meeting on October 24, 2009. He is a member of Mary Jo Firth Gillette’s Wednesday afternoon workshop and also Mary Ann Wehler’s TPL Poetry Reading Group. Dawn McDuffie is another of his SAMDW mentors and he is a long time member of The Downriver Poets and Playwrights organization that meets in Wyandotte. Jim previously served as vice president for PSM and was their contest coordinator this year.
In 1935, poets Jessie Wilmore Murton, Clifford Allen, Carl Edwin Burkland, and others formed a poetry group that became known as the non-profit Poetry Society of Michigan (PSM).  Mr. Burkland was elected President and the slogan, “Sing then I must, until my song be heard,” was adopted. Statewide meetings are held at a central location twice each year in the Spring (April) and the fall (October) each year. New officers are elected every two years.  PSM encourages the formulation and/or the affiliation of groups in all areas of the state and welcomes input and support from each of them. Visit their website at www.nfsps.com/mi/home.html

Mandala Press is up and running. 
Above is a sample of one of the poetry/photography cards now available.  For those with an interest in unusual cards for sale, some will be recreated in a larger format. More will be added as the weeks progress.  Comments to Therese Becker are welcome at www.mandalapress.com

DRIFTWOOD NEWS - The 100-Word Issues
The next four issues of Driftwood (collectively referred to as Driftwood 10) will be a little different from previous issues.  Published quarterly, these 4 issues will each carry a theme, and all of the work within the issue - poetry and prose - will be of exactly 100 words. Not a word more or a word less (excluding title). The themes for the next four issues will be: Winter 2009/2010 Issue – Earth, Spring 2010 Issue – Air, Summer 2010 Issue – Fire, Fall 2010 Issue – Water. Only 20 works will be selected for each issue.  Each issue will be edited by a Guest Editor, to be announced.  Payment will be 2 copies of the issue and the opportunity to purchase additional copies at half price. Submission guidelines must be followed to the letter, and can be found at http://www.ludington writers.com/driftwood.htm

Lucinda Sabino, SA-MDW member’s new chapbook, “We’re Coming Close” has just been published by Pudding House Press.

Detroit’s C-Pop Gallery Bids Farewell
C-Pop’s final exhibit, It’s All About ©: A Farewell, opened on Saturday, May 2. The copyright logo that has represented Detroit’s Cultural Center with cutting-edge art for over a decade and a-half will be closing their doors on “gallery row” in June.

The farewell exhibition features numerous innovative artists that have blossomed out of C-Pop throughout the years. Artists like Niagara, Glenn Barr, Tristan Eaton and Tyree Guyton.
Current owner and artist, Tom Thewes plans to continue promoting the legacy and the artists in off-site type of shows and on C-Pop’s Web site.

The Detroit-based brand has achieved national and international acclaim. “I don’t know what the future is going to hold for me personally, but the brand will live on,” said Rick Manore, founder of C-Pop.

“For people of my generation this has been like the place to go to get exposure for a lot of local lowbrow art, so it’s kind of a loss for our generation,” said longtime C-Pop patron Jason Thompson of Ferndale. Local artist Michael Rappaport adds the sentiment of many of C-Pop’s artists and patrons, “It’s the end of an era.”

Fanning to join Howe, Laux and Liebler
at Springfed Writers’ Retreat Oct 8-11, 2009
Robert Fanning will join a poetry staff that includes Marie Howe, Dorianne Laux and M.L. Liebler for our fall retreat at the Birchwood Inn, Harbor Springs.
Robert Fanning is Assistant Professor in the English Department at Central Michigan University, a graduate of the University of Michigan and Sarah Lawrence College. His writing awards include a Creative Artist Grant from ArtServe Michigan, the Inkwell Poetry Award, and the Foley Poetry Award. Fanning is the author of The Seed Thieves and has just released American Prophet, his second book with Marick Press, a collection of poems that details the sojourns of a so-called Prophet across the American landscape, from coastal beaches to strip malls to cities to heartland farms. As the Prophet tries continually but fails to reach “his people,” his urgent messages go unnoticed or get swallowed by the machines and cacophony of contemporary America. SA-MDW Poet Vievee Francis says, “No matter what the reader’s background, we find ourselves walking in the Prophet’s shoes, feeling his grope toward vision, and his frustration as he loses sight of it. It takes an adept poet to pull this off, but these lyrics work the way poetry is meant to work, they move us past presumption and lax acceptance, past what we think we know, to make us rethink our staid convictions, whatever those might be.”

John Updike, prize-winning writer,
dead at age 76
By HILLEL ITALIE, AP National Writer
NEW YORK – John Updike, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, prolific man of letters and erudite chronicler of sex, divorce and other adventures in the postwar prime of the American empire, died Tuesday, January 27 at age 76.

Updike, a resident of Beverly Farms, Mass., died of lung cancer, according to a statement from his publisher, Alfred A. Knopf.

A literary writer who frequently appeared on best-seller lists, the tall, hawk-nosed Updike wrote novels, short stories, poems, criticism, the memoir “Self-Consciousness” and even a famous essay about baseball great Ted Williams. He was prolific, even compulsive, releasing more than 50 books in a career that started in the 1950s. Updike won virtually every literary prize, including two Pulitzers, for “Rabbit Is Rich” and “Rabbit at Rest,” and two National Book Awards.

Howe and Laux on for Springfed Writers’ Retreat Oct 8-11, 2009
Poets Marie Howe and Dorianne Laux will be on staff for our fall retreat at the Birchwood Inn, Harbor Springs. Marie Howe is the author of three volumes of poetry, The Kingdom of Ordinary Time (2008); The Good Thief (1998); and What the Living Do (1997). Dorianne Laux is the author of Facts About the Moon,a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, Smoke (2000); What We Carry (1994), finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; and Awake (1990). Also participating is former Walloon Writers’ Retreat attendee Irina Reyn, now receiving acclaim for her debut novel What Happened to Anna K?, a contemporary take on Anna Karenina. Returning writers include Jack Driscoll and our beloved M.L. Liebler. Mark October 8-11, 2009 on your calendar now and stay tuned for more details.

Lamb's Retreat for Songwriters Filmed
for Michigan Public Television
The 13th Annual Lamb's Retreats for Songwriters were held on the weekends of November 1-4 and November 8-11 at the Birchwood Inn, Harbor Springs, MI. On staff the first weekend were Michael Smith, Dick Siegel, Kitty Donohoe, David Mosher, Josh Davis, Anne Heaton, Seth Bernard and Daisy Mae. The second weekend staff featured Tom Prasada Rao, Cary Cooper, Chuck Brodsky, David Massengill, Corinne West, Michael Crittenden and Kirby. The second weekend was filmed by a production crew from University of Michigan Flint in conjunction with the Michigan Humanities Council. A short film documentary about the retreat and John D. Lamb's song assignments will begin airing on Michigan Public Television early in the new year. The film will also be viewable at The Michigan Humanities Art Council website www.michiganhumanities.org/media/

Walloon Writers’ Retreat Renamed and Relocated
Springfed Writers Retreat
Springfed Arts will begin hosting the newly christened Springfed Writers Retreat, October 9-12, 2008 at the Birchwood Inn, Harbor Springs, MI. Director John D. Lamb had hosted the Walloon Writers’ Retreat at Michigania, a University of Michigan affiliated facility near Boyne City for nine years. Lamb says that the move to the Birchwood Inn will be a smooth one. He has been hosting his songwriter retreats at the Inn for thirteen years and claims that much good writing happens in Harbor Springs, the city that inspired the name Springfed Arts. The rooms and beds at The Birchwood Inn are more comfortable than cabins and the walkways to the conference area are closer and easier to travel. Good shopping is nearby and the fall colors will be peaking. Lamb assures that he will continue to offer quality staff and quality food. The Springfed Writers Retreat will announce this year’s featured guest writers in an upcoming newsletter.

Dear John letters for the 9th annual
Walloon Writers’ Retreat held September 27 -30.