Poetry Night with Margaret Hasse and Emilie Buchwald

Margaret Hasse was among the remarkable generation of young poets who came of age in the 1970s and 80s with the publication of her first book, Stars Above, Stars Below. Forty years and many publications later, she presents us here in Belongings with a retrospective look at her multifaceted achievement along with a generous selection of recent poems bearing witness to a tirelessly curious and creative mind. These poems remain rooted in events of daily life—reading a book, taking a child to the bus-stop, gardening—events that Hasse may ponder and describe with a startling sense of whimsy or a deep moral concern. Often both. The result is a rich tapestry of “belongings” that extends from cherished personal memories outward into a skein of relationships as rich and vivid as life itself.

Margaret Hasse began reading and writing poetry as a child and never stopped. She grew up in South Dakota and attended college in California where she earned a B.A. in English from Stanford University. After moving to Minnesota in 1973 she became deeply involved in its rapidly growing literary community. Over the years Margaret taught writing in correctional facilities, at The Loft Literary Center, for COMPAS Poets-in-the-Schools, as a freelancer, among other places. Alongside writing and teaching poetry Margaret worked for and as an adviser to arts organizations in the state and nationally. She also obtained an M.A. in English (with a creative writing emphasis) from the University of Minnesota.

Margaret’s poetry has been widely published, including in six full-length books, two chapbooks, a “new and selected” collection, and in journals, anthologies, and, remarkably, in St. Paul’s sidewalks and on public transit. Her work as a poet has received recognition through a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, Loft McKnight Awards, Minnesota State Arts Board grants, and other honors. Margaret has lived in St. Paul for almost forty years with her husband, David Grothe, where they raised their two sons, Michael and Alex. To learn more, visit: margarethasse.com or https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/margaret-hasse

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The poems in Emilie Buchwald’s new collection celebrate the thrills and remorselessness of childhood and also the insights and confidence that come with maturity. Buchwald shares her dreams as well as her concerns about the world, and succeeds also in capturing more than once the precious wordless exchanges of intimacy that take place between seasoned couples.
We accompany her as she relives memories in “Riding the Waves at Rockaway”and “Camp Bugler.” In “Making Bread” she crams an astonishing world of experience into seven short lines, combining “child’s paste,” “wild god of yeast,” and “risen belly” into an evocative whole that takes us suggestively beyond the bread that we can almost smell. Nature is everywhere in these poems, from the “tiny pink Dutch shoes” of the redbud tree, gone too soon, to the description of ravens’ hitting the ridges of a Palm trees “with a hard thunk, like marines on a mission.” We hear echoes of history, as Buchwald reflects poignantly on her father’s enjoyment of I Love Lucy in his favorite chair, while never forgetting the language and customs he was forced to leave behind. Cutting back a household plant leads her to question what she might cut back about herself in order to “linger in sun and air.” Poet Connie Wanek has aptly described Buchwald’s new collection as “spare and beautifully crafted.” The poems in Incandescent are a testament to a life fully lived and appreciated.

Emilie Buchwald’s book of poems, The Moment’s Only Moment, received an IBPA Silver Benjamin Franklin Award. Her poems have been published in various journals, including Harper’s, The American Scholar, American Quarterly, Kenyon Review, and The Lyric. Buchwald taught poetry at The Loft Literary Center, edited three poetry anthologies, and the Poetry Society of America’s Wallace Steven Centenary Celebration. She is the author of A Milkweed Chronicle: The Formative Years of a Literary Nonprofit Press and the award-winning children’s books, Gildaen, Floramel and Esteban, and Buddy Unchained.

Buchwald was the cofounder and copublisher of the journal Milkweed Chronicle, before becoming the publisher of Milkweed Editions, editing or coediting more than two hundred books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction titles centered on social justice and the environment. Buchwald came out of retirement to found The Gryphon Press, www.thegryphonpress, children’s picture books that are “a voice for the voiceless,” about the harsh realities faced by animals, domestic and wild, books that create empathy for every animal life. He awards include: The Lyric Memorial Award, The Kay Sexton Award, the McKnight Foundation Distinguished Artist of the Year Award, the A.P. Anderson Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award.

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