2022 - Collapse Press

2022

The Friday Collapse,Winter Season and Press Updates

We have had a busy Summer/Fall season for The Friday Collapse, our virtual monthly poetry series that takes place on the last Friday of each month. We usually take a brief break for November and December and come back in January. We will do this again this year, with a few other scheduled events like book launches and readings outside of the Friday Collapse schedule. We will host a virtual book launch reading for Han Raschka this month on November 11. (see previous posts) Collapse Press participated in a book festival this month on the East Coast with author events and book sale opportunities. We have a few other opportunities coming up as well, and will be sharing as usual on social media/pages. @collapsepress #collapsepress #thefridaycollapse We have had a few discussions in our facebook group (Letters for the End Times) about the possibility of an anthology, with proceeds going to a particular cause that is important to the community. We are still thinking about a timeline for that, and what that process will look like. Please look for some more specifics here on our website around February-March 2023. Of course, we are an independent press and in addition to the organizing, events, and table opportunities, we produce books. We are pretty clear on our mission with that effort and the goal has been to seek out authors without the pressure of quantity and catalog building. It is a community effort, and as many of you know it is not the most lucrative work financially and the hours of time don’t translate into a sustainable business model. We do what we can when we are able, and it is important to us that we are able to give our time and energy to the manuscripts that we are committed to….

“Splinters”, by Han Raschka, Release

Purchase Splinters Poetry by Han Raschka

Splinters, the debut poetry collection by poet Han Raschka, is out now from Collapse Press. A virtual launch event with featured poets will be hosted on Friday, November 11, 2022. You can look under events on the Collapse Press facebook page for details. Joining Han for the virtual launch will be poets K.R. Morrison, Kelliane Parker, Norm Mattox, Richard Loranger, and Paul Corman-Roberts. The book is available on Amazon here. The ISBN is 978-1-7352669-4-7. $20.00 US.

Book Launch: “Splinters”

Book release announcement for the poetry book Splinters, by poet Han Raschka from collapse press

Please join us at Collapse Press for a special virtual poetry event to launch the release of “Splinters”, by Han Raschka. We are scheduled to release this title on September 23, 2022. Please check out the Collapse Press Facebook page for the event to RSVP and share. (Thank you!) Han will be reading from their new book of poetry and will be joined by additional featured poets to celebrate. We will be adding more details about the features and their bios soon.

Coming Soon: “Splinters” from Collapse

Cover of the poetry book Splinters, by Han Raschka

We are thrilled to share that we are on track to release our next title- “Splinters” by poet Han Raschka. If you have not encountered them before, please check out the book launch in September 2022 and see what some in our community had to say after some background on Han: Han Raschka (they/them), is a bipolar, bicoastal, non-binary poet currently residing in Boston, MA. Born in the Midwest and forged by both the arts and an unhealthy dose of Catholic fear, Han spends their time drinking coffee at an unacceptable time, begging their mother for pictures of their three dogs, and writing poetry like it hasn’t gone out of fashion. You can find Han on Facebook, Instagram, and other social media sites. Their work has appeared in Anti-Heroin Chic, Eunoia Review, Brooklyn Poets and the Lake County Bloom. Splinters is Han’s first collection of poetry. “writing poetry is a lifesaving, life affirming ‘super power’ that acknowledges trauma, sees the multiple deaths that are in store with the clearest vision, and the voice of love that heals the broken heart and the broken mind.” “in han raschka’s collection of poems, splinters, the voices that have the most volume, in the front of our minds, fill the silence with horrorful words and things that should never be spoken as truth. raschka writes poetry in the voices of their tormentors. they are a captive audience to the replay and echo of trauma in memorized detail.” “describing the inner battles to breathe one more breath, we are granted light and peace when their voice speaks a whisper of a lover’s glance, and the promise of love they will live for.” -norm mattox, author of Black Calculus (Nomadic) and the forthcoming Get Home Safe: poems for crossing the community grid “A poem, a prayer,…

Richard Loranger on “Find Me in the Iris”

Richard Loranger, author of multiple books including “Unit of Agency” available here at Collapse Press, wrote a thoughtful piece on “Find Me in the Iris” (Collapse Press) this month. Please visit www.richardloranger.com when you can and check back often. Richard comments on all kinds of topics over there, from books he is reading, books he has written, art, and more. Check out Non-Norm Part 1 and hear about Richard and others in Maintenant. His posts makes us want to buy even more books! From Richard Loranger, poet: Find Me in the Iris, E. Lynn Alexander (Collapse Press, Alameda, CA), 2022 Bottles. Corked. And Closed.Women. Mothers.SuspendedIn their AgesSelves, the slurry sedimentTheir labels going brown. E. Lynn Alexander’s work performs an interesting dichotomy by pushing you almost clinically away from its topic while stabbing you in the heart. The topic, as parsed above: women, enacted alternately as specimens in jars and as “Honey. Wheat. And Figs.” Alexander takes on the essential and difficult task of examining the lives and strife of women past, including her mother’s and, we gather, her own. In doing so, she and the work strive to understand the past in a way tangible enough to be used as a springboard to a future undetermined and a place not yet seen. We are spurred on by the line repeated throughout, “What will the grief of me teach you?” As the title suggests, Find Me in the Iris is in part a quest—to break through grief, to let the dead rest, to break out of precedent, to let the honey be the honey. There’s a lot going on here in compelling language that wavers between rant and chant, but one of the things that struck me most was the book’s “form”. Posed as a series of poems that are a series of…

Collapse Press on Bookshop

Collapse Press Books and More on Bookshop

We have added book shelves on Bookshop, which is a website that provides an online platform for purchasing books while also supporting local, independent book stores who get a portion of sales. We have a shelf set up to help you find Collapse Press books as they come out and can be added, and a growing list of books by writers in our community so it is easy to find books mentioned on our shows, events, etc. If you have ever listened to a poet read at an event and looked for their book, you know that it isn’t always as easy to find titles as it should be. Maybe you forgot the name of the book, but would know it if you saw it. Maybe you didn’t know the writer had a book but might stumble upon it in the list… This might be a helpful place to browse. It is a new platform for us, so we figured it can’t hurt to set up a few lists while supporting independent local stores with the ease of online shopping and shipping. When possible, we always encourage people to support writers, presses, and independent book sellers directly. If you can’t, this might be an alternative. It goes without saying that no matter how you obtain a book, it is hopefully supporting that writer and press in some way. Here is the link to check it out: here ( https://bookshop.org/shop/collapsepress ) We also recommend the Bookshop page of Karen’s Book Row, which has great curated shelves with books connected to particular topics. If you are looking to browse, definitely check out her lists. Karen’s Book Row on Bookshop here.

Book Launch: Find Me in the Iris

Please join us for a virtual launch reading on Friday, July 1, 2022 for Find Me in the Iris, by E. Lynn Alexander. This event will be hosted on zoom and streamed/archived on the Collapse Press Facebook page. This reading will feature poets K.R. Morrison, Taneesh Kaur, Chansonette Buck, Karen Lillis, and E. Lynn Alexander. Please see the Facebook/Instagram posts for more details and links. This is the second book of poetry by E. Lynn Alexander, from Collapse Press. In Find Me in the Iris, she continues to explore the themes of The Shouldspeak Disease on the language of shame and internalized expectations, conditioning, regulating norms and binaries as effacing and modern measurements that are increasingly toxic to both individual and nature. The destructive relationships between reduction and disrespect vs honoring and co-validity have modern consequences. Increasingly disconnected from a silenced but ancient maternal psyche, the modern contrasts of hierarchy and individualism pull us away from our roots and exploring the natural, mystical, and spiritual can be restorative acts of reclaiming. “Mother” in this case is origin, generational and collective, where a consciousness of legacies tapped affirms the past and honors the future. The state of the world is in front of us. Why are we destroying everything at such an alarming rate, turning the corner on so much that is irreversible? Our path is one that rewards extremes: self centered, immediate and empty gratification, consumption, competition, exhibitionism, self interest. To commune and cooperate is to be “weak”, to share knowledge is to lose “advantage”. Where shame is the tool, coerced participation is the result. The desire to diminish and destroy pushes us to channel our energies defensively and we are depleted. We feel hopeless and powerless because we are surrounded by that message. But it was not the message of our mothers. “In…

The Friday Collapse June 2022 Anniversary Edition

Hard to believe that it has been a year of Collapse! We are celebrating our first year of The Friday Collapse with a robust roster of features from our first year. The event will be on the Collapse Press Facebook page, and we will also stream this virtual event on Facebook. Note- no open mic for this show. Below are our guests, you won’t want to miss this. Friday, June 24, 2022- THE FRIDAY COLLAPSE ANNIVERSARY EDITION: Joel Landmine Han Raschka Richard Loranger Cleveland Wall Jack Varnell Darrell Parry Taneesh Kaur Josiahluis Alderate Kelliane Parker Chad Frame Mimi Gonzales Norm Mattox KR Morrison Kim Shuck

Spring 2022 at Collapse

We had a busy but amazing Spring here at Collapse Press with another book release, launch event, and monthly poetry series The Friday Collapse. In February, we hosted features Missy Church and William Taylor Jr. in anticipation of Missy’s book release later in the month. Deathaiku was released, and you can check out the “Purchase Books” tab above for information on ordering. This book explores death from a perspective of dignity and the natural cycle of life. Find out more about Missy Church and her new book by checking out the above tabs. In March, we hosted poetry features Ruth Crossman and Norm Maddox, along with a full list of open mic participants. In April, we hosted K.R. Morrison and Kelliane Parker, who collaborated on a poem for the reading. In May, we had features Han Raschka and Darrell Parry. We will be publishing a manuscript by Han in Fall, 2022.

The Friday Collapse: March 2022

Please join us for The Friday Collapse, a monthly virtual reading series with featured poets and open mic. Hosted by Paul Corman Roberts and E. Lynn Alexander, this series brings poets together from all over to transcend the typical barriers of geography, travel, and access. We typically post the event details on the Collapse Press Facebook page and instagram @collapsepress. The vent is hosted on zoom with a livestream on Facebook. Our features for March are Ruth Crossman and Norm Mattox. This will be on Friday, March 25 at 9:30 EST and 6:30 Pacific.

Year: 2022