Fountainverse 2018 Recap

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On October 12th, 13th, & 14th, small press poets from all over North America descended upon Kansas City to read poetry, sell poetry books, and enjoy all that KC has to offer. What used to go by the moniker of “The Kansas City Poetry Throwdown” (cf. https://jasonpreu.com/2016/04/19/some-of-the-writers-from-this-weekends-poetry-throwdown/ & https://www.facebook.com/pg/Fountainverse/videos), was this year rebranded with a new mission to focus on small presses publishing poetry.

In attendance were:

Outlandish Press (Cleveland, OH)

Spartan Press (Belle, MO)

Epic Rites Press (Alberta, Canada)

Aztlan Libre Press (San Antonio, TX)

Write Bloody Publishing (Los Angeles, CA)

CWP Collective Press (Buffalo, NY)

Additional, there were many representatives from Kansas City area poetry organizations & events, such as Kansas City Poetry Slam, The Riverfront Reading Series, and the Latino Writers Collective.

We partnered this year with Kansas City’s Charlotte Street Foundation and their help and support pushed us into new levels of what we could provide attendees and audiences.

The team that puts this event on is made up of Jeannette Powers, Samantha Slupski, Brandon Whitehead, and me.

I encourage any and all small poetry presses out there reading this to reach out to us (https://www.fountainverse.com) and make plans to attend next year. I can’t emphasize enough how much collaboration and cross-city pollination occurs every year after we put one of this events together. Even if you are not selected as a featured press/reader, there are plenty of opportunities for you to present and perform and sell your work.

Fountainverse 2018 Recap

Preu’s Wager

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A rational person, or collective of persons, should live as though human-caused climate change exists and seek to reverse human-caused climate change. If human-caused climate change does not actually exist, such a person, or collective of persons, will have only a finite loss (some pleasures, luxury, convenience, etc.), whereas they stand to receive infinite gains (as represented by the perpetuation of the species) and avoid infinite losses (extinction).

Preu’s Wager

Huron Cemetery Poems IX

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August 22, 2018

It’s too hot to sit with the dead today
     so I float above them,
     hanging on for dear life to the strings
     of a bunch of many-colored balloons.
Up high, where the air is much cooler,
     the oxygen less dense.
The vacuum of space waits hidden above me;
     a black, gaping maw poised to chomp.

Death above, death below, dying in between,
     one hand gripping balloon strings,
     the other trying to choke down a mustard-soaked sardine sandwich.
In the distance, beyond the curve of the earth,
     a thing so monumental its name cannot fit into a human ear.
In the distance, all lived pasts and livable futures.

There may be a mustard stain on my crisp, white shirt
     but I’m afraid to look.
Perhaps the dead have asked me to stay away today.
It’s probably not so hot outside after all.


Capture

Huron Cemetery Poems IX

A Meow in the Wind

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I dreamed of an oscillating fan built to temper and tame near-feral cats. They called the fan The Cat Whisperer. What luck! For I co-habitate with near-feral cats who shit where they please, rob the birds of every song, and carve my furniture to shredded signs of true ownership. I turned on the demo unit and the fan whirred to life. I wanted to believe The Cat Whisperer would work. I wanted to tame that which the wild had first dibs. I wanted to interrupt nature so friggin’ hard.

A Meow in the Wind

The Vulgar Mistake of Dreaming

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Come up, come up

Let us show you the attic

Easy now, mind the dust

Mind the dust everywhere

Stand up, stand up

Tall now, look around now

There’s a box of old books

Too fragile to read through

Those cobwebs in the corner

The prior owner’s condition

Gaps in the insulation

A real character builder

Now step over here

There’s something to see

Look down, look down

Yes, that hole at your feet

You see? Sleeping soundly?

Not knowing you’re up here

And oh! how you’ve wondered

And held your suspicions

How easy we’ve made it

For you to never stop watching

Never stop, never stop

Who’s she dreaming of now?

The Vulgar Mistake of Dreaming