Episodes
Monday Apr 05, 2021
Celebrating National Poetry Month
Monday Apr 05, 2021
Monday Apr 05, 2021
In this episode, Host editors Claire and Annar, and publisher Joe celebrate National Poetry Month by reading a few poems and discussing how they serve as examples of how each of us as individuals find access, or entry points into poems, and why we love poetry.
The poems we discussed in this episode are:
“Diving Into the Wreck” by Adrienne Rich from Diving Into the Wreck
“Poem for an Antique Korean Fishing Bobber” by Dobby Gibson from Little Glass Planet (Graywolf Press)
“Girls Respond Quickly to a Call from Up High” by Sawako Nakayasu from Some Girls Walk Into the Country They Are From (Wave Books)
For the entire month of April, we are offering 20% off all poetry titles through our website, www.hostpublications.com, and as a special bonus: we’re also handpicking a complimentary Host 88 poetry title with every order we fulfill, all month long! Thanks for celebrating poetry with us, and as always, thanks for listening.
Monday Mar 08, 2021
Submissions CLOSING SOON for the Host Publications Chapbook Prize
Monday Mar 08, 2021
Monday Mar 08, 2021
Just a quick PSA announcing that the submissions window for the Host Publications Chapbook Prize will be closing at 11:59pm CST on Monday, March 15th!
Submissions guidelines and more information about the prize can be found on our website.
We can't wait to read your work!
Wednesday Mar 03, 2021
Wednesday Mar 03, 2021
Welcome to Congress of the Spirits: a poetry ritual and performance. We wanted to create a sacred space in the airwaves for us to commune in, focusing on nourishing our depleted spirits with poetry that stimulates the imagination and crosses over into the dreamworld in which we can imagine a better future.
Before this magical reading, Claire and Annar offer a short meditative ritual to enter the virtual and imaginative space of the performance, where we can all share in the experience of poetry.
For the ritual: If you have these things (or some of these things) on hand, please gather: a scented item that brings you comfort, a scrap of paper and a writing utensil, and a candle. If not, you just need your imagination.
Our Magical Readers:
lily someson is a poet and essayist from Chicago. She has obtained a B.A. in Poetry from Columbia College Chicago and is a winner of the 2020 Eileen Lannan poetry prize with the Academy of American Poets, as well as the Spring 2021 Host Publications Chapbook Prize for her chapbook, mistaken for loud comets. She has been published or is forthcoming in Court Green, Queeriosity, and Columbia Poetry Review among others. She is currently a first-year Poetry MFA student at Vanderbilt University and an assistant poetry editor of the Nashville Review.
On Ritual, lily says: Some of her favorite rituals include grocery shopping, antiquing, postcard collecting, and visiting Lake Michigan on warm summer mornings.
Taisia Kitaiskaia is the author of four books: The Nightgown and Other Poems; Literary Witches: A Celebration of Magical Women Writers, a collaboration with artist Katy Horan and an NPR Best Book of 2017; and Ask Baba Yaga: Otherworldly Advice for Everyday Troubles as well as its follow-up, Poetic Remedies for Troubled Times: From Ask Baba Yaga. She is the recipient of fellowships from the James A. Michener Center for Writers and The Corporation of Yaddo.
On Ritual, Taisia says: "I have a small wooden fairy door against a big bald cypress in the yard. On special occasions, I'll leave a note or talisman behind the door.
Heather Christle is the author of four poetry collections, most recently Heliopause. Her first work of nonfiction, The Crying Book, was published in 2019, with translations now appearing in many languages throughout Europe and Asia. She teaches creative writing at Emory University.
Heather says: My favorite ritual is taking a nap, which I do every day. I do not mean to sound flippant; I cannot imagine how I could maintain waking consciousness and awareness of the world without that intervening rest.
Claude Cardona is a queer poet from San Antonio. Her chapbook What Remains is a collection of poems about longing and loving as a Chicana in Texas. Cardona is also the co-editor of Infrarrealista Review, a publication for Texan writers.
Claude's rituals include: burning letters full of wishes under the full moon, leaving offerings on her altar, and always offering her friends 3 card tarot readings.
Faylita Hicks is an activist, writer, and interdisciplinary artist. They are the former Editor-in-Chief of Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review and the author of HoodWitch (Acre Books, 2019), a finalist for the 2020 Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Poetry. They have been awarded fellowships and residencies from Tin House, Lambda Literary, Jack Jones Literary Arts, Broadway Advocacy, and the Right of Return USA. Their work is featured or forthcoming in Adroit, American Poetry Review, the Cincinnati Review, Ecotone, HuffPost, Longreads, Palette Poetry, Poetry Magazine, The Rumpus, Slate, Texas Observer, VIDA Review, Yale Review, and others.
Faylita talks about ritual at the end of their reading, but they say this: “I chose these poems because they have little bits of my rituals inside of them.”
Dorothea Lasky is the author of six books of poetry and prose, including Animal (Wave Books). She teaches poetry at Columbia University School of the Arts and lives in New York City.
Dorothea Says: My favorite ritual involves taking endless naps and walks, and then spraying new mixes of scents everywhere before writing. This ritual is my greatest luxury and hasn't happened in so many years, but I am hoping it will again one day soon.
Monday Feb 15, 2021
Celebrating Black History Month
Monday Feb 15, 2021
Monday Feb 15, 2021
In this episode, we celebrate Black History Month with a reading and discussion of the anthology African American Poetry: 250 Years of Struggle and Song edited by Kevin Young, Poetry Editor of The New Yorker.
This incredible anthology is described as "A literary landmark: the biggest, most ambitious anthology of Black poetry ever published, gathering 250 poets from the colonial period to the present," and in it we found familiar voices that we know and love, as well as new poets, and some whose work is hard to find or long out of print. This is a perfect start to reading African American poetry, and we highly recommend getting yourself a copy!
Though there are so many great poets in this anthology, here are those we highlighted in this episode:
For further listening, we recommend a recent episode of The New Yorker Poetry podcast called "Radical Imagination: Tracy K. Smith, Marilyn Nelson and Terrance Hayes on Poetry in Our Times"
We also recommend two AWP events, for which poets we highlighted in this episode will be panelists:
Sunday, March 7th 1:30-2:30pm Central Time
Sn119. Poem About My Rights: June Jordan Speaks, Sponsored by Copper Canyon Press.
(Michael Wiegers, Rio Cortez, Jericho Brown, Monica Sok)
“I am not wrong: Wrong is not my name / My name is my own my own my own.” A panel of poets and editors will read and discuss iconic works by June Jordan, including the electric, revolutionary “Poem About My Rights.” In her too-short career, Jordan boldly, lyrically, and overtly called out the harms caused by anti-Black police violence, sexual abuse, and heterosexism, lighting a way forward for other writers. Each poet will offer one poem of their own to honor Jordan’s literary influence.
Wednesday March 3rd, 3:00-4:00pm Central Time
W136. The Futures of Documentary and Investigative Poetries.
(Solmaz Sharif, Erika Meitner, Tyehimba Jess, Philip Metres, Layli Long Soldier)
Investigative or documentary poetry situates itself at the nexus between literary production and journalism, where the mythic and factual, the visionary and political, and past and future all meet. From doing recovery projects to performing rituals of healing to inventing forms, panelists will share work (their own and others') and discuss challenges in docupoetic writing and its futures: the ethics of positionality, appropriation, fictionalizing, collaboration, and political engagement.
Thank you for joining us in honoring the lives and writing of Black poets, past and present, and as always, thanks for listening!
Monday Feb 01, 2021
In Conversation with lily someson
Monday Feb 01, 2021
Monday Feb 01, 2021
Welcome to Season 2 of the Host Dispatch!
We're so thrilled to kick off Season 2 conversing with the warm and magical poet, lily someson. lily is the Spring 2021 Host Publications Chapbook Prize winner for her chapbook called mistaken for loud comets, forthcoming in February 2021.
lily someson (she/they) is a poet and essayist from Chicago. She has obtained a B.A. in Poetry from Columbia College Chicago and is a winner of the 2020 Eileen Lannan poetry prize with the Academy of American Poets. She has read at the Poetry Foundation’s Open Door Reading Series and has also been published/is forthcoming in Court Green, Queeriosity (Young Chicago Authors), and Columbia Poetry Review among others. She is currently a first-year Poetry MFA student at Vanderbilt University and an assistant poetry editor of the Nashville Review.
mistaken for loud comets is a collection of poems that peers deeply into experiences around incarceration, queerness, and the Black body in America. This is deeply personal work, and there is a tender heart at the center of this chapbook that made us fall in love with it at first sight.
The pre-order link is live on our website, hostpublications.com, and the first 100 pre-orders will receive a fun party pack of accompaniments to Lily’s work.
On February 27th, tune in at 7pm to the Malvern Books’ YouTube channel for the book launch for mistaken for loud comets and join us for a special reading by lily someson followed by a Q&A.
Monday Jan 25, 2021
Submissions OPEN for the Host Publications Chapbook Prize!
Monday Jan 25, 2021
Monday Jan 25, 2021
We are delighted to announce that the Host Publications Chapbook Prize will be open for submissions from January 20th-March 15th. Two selected manuscripts will be published, one in the Fall of 2021 and one in the Spring 2022. Prize winners will be announced May 15th.
ABOUT THE HOST PUBLICATIONS CHAPBOOK PRIZE
The Host Publications Chapbook prize awards a womxn writer $1000 + 20 author copies, dedicated, extensive editorial work from our skilled editors, a book launch at Malvern Books (pandemic permitting) and energetic promotion from our staff.
Our chapbooks are perfect-bound, feature striking cover designs, each receive an ISBN, and are distributed nationally. We treat our chapbooks just like full-length titles in terms of aesthetics, production, marketing, and editorial love and care.
Submissions are open to any US-based womxn poet writing in English, regardless of publication history. We strive to elevate voices of marginalized groups who have been historically silenced. Writers of color, LGBTQ+ writers, disabled writers, immigrant writers: you are all welcome and wanted here.
We are not looking for any particular kind of poetry, but are open to all kinds of poetry with the exception of translated works. Please familiarize yourself with what we’ve published so far by checking out our former prize winners: mónica teresa ortiz, Stephanie Goehring, Julie Howd, Claudia Delfina Cardona and lily someson.
Our reading fee is $10. You may submit additional manuscripts for an additional reading fee for each. A limited number of free entries are available for poets for whom the reading fee presents a hardship. (email us at submissions.hostpublications [at] gmail.com for details.)
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
Once the submission fee is purchased, you will see a download PDF link (and be emailed a link as well). The PDF will review our submission guidelines and under "FORM LINK" you will see a clickable link to our application.
Submit a manuscript of 30-40 pages (in .docx and .pdf formats), set in 12-point font in Times New Roman or equivalent. Each poem should begin on its own page. We do not accept hard copy submissions.
While individual poems may have appeared in journals, magazines, etc., the manuscript as a whole must be previously unpublished.
Reading fee of $10. You may submit additional manuscripts for an additional reading fee for each. A limited number of free entries are available for poets for whom the reading fee presents a hardship. (email us at submissions.hostpublications@gmail.com for details.)
Simultaneous submissions are welcome. Please let us know if it is a simultaneous submission, and notify us immediately if the work is accepted elsewhere. If we accept your piece, please withdraw it from consideration elsewhere.
Note: By submitting, you agree to let us send you the occasional email newsletter with relevant announcements. You may opt out at any time.
Wednesday Dec 16, 2020
Haunted Christmas Tales
Wednesday Dec 16, 2020
Wednesday Dec 16, 2020
In this episode, we discuss the age-old tradition of reading ghost stories on Christmas! Here are the books we discuss in this episode:
The Green Room by Walter de la Mare
Christmas Eve on a Haunted Hulk by Frank Cowper
The Diary of Mr. Poynter by M. R. James
The Night Before Christmas by Nikolai Gogol
This is the last episode of Season 1, and we want to thank you for listening from the bottom of our hearts.
For season two of The Host Dispatch, we want to connect more with our community and to get your voices in the mix! We plan to read listener stories, poems and experiences on air. To that end, I’d like to put out a call for submissions for the beginning of season 2:
"2020 has been such a difficult year for so many of us, in ways we never could have imagined. There has been so much suffering and loss due to the pandemic, so much social upheaval in pursuit of justice for black lives, and the bipoc community, and the conversation won’t end here. As a community of book lovers, I feel we’ve learned that books are not only an escape from reality, but can be tools we use to cope with and better understand our reality. I know I’ve learned just how powerful a book can be in helping to change the minds and hearts of those who are willing to listen. To that end, we want to hear from you: Tell us What book has helped you cope this year? What book feels like the most important book for the year 2020? What should we be reading to carry us into the new year, to face whatever challenges may come in 2021?
We want to hear about your experience with these books, and to create a powerful reading list to share with our listeners and our community to kick off 2021 in the best way possible! All genres welcome!"
Thursday Nov 26, 2020
Celebrating Native American Heritage Day
Thursday Nov 26, 2020
Thursday Nov 26, 2020
In this minisode, Host editors Annar and Claire offer ways in which to pay respect to native people during the ever-problematic Thanksgiving holiday and its frightening capitalist cousin, Black Friday, which has been deemed Native American Heritage Day. This is a time to honor indigenous cultures, and to educate ourselves about the history of this land, and the challenges Native people have faced both historically and in the present, and the ways in which we can be of service to their communities.
Annar offers three easy ways to get involved in Native American Heritage Month:
Get Educated
- https://nativeamericanheritagemonth.gov
- https://www.nps.gov/index.htm
Donate
- https://www.firstpeoplesfund.org
- https://www.navajohopisolidarity.org
Practice Land Acknowledgment
- https://nativegov.org/a-guide-to-indigenous-land-acknowledgment/
Claire and Annar also discuss a new poetry collection, When the Light of the World Was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through: A Norton Anthology of Native Nations Poetry edited by US poet Laureate, Joy Harjo.
Monday Nov 23, 2020
In Conversation with Poet Julie Howd
Monday Nov 23, 2020
Monday Nov 23, 2020
In this episode, Host editors Claire and Annar converse with the delightful poet, Julie Howd.
Julie is a poet and educator from Massachusetts. She is the author of Threshold winner of the Spring 2020 Host Publications Chapbook prize.
Julie’s poetry is a delightful force, and the poet has come to consider herself an “eco-surrealist” writing poetry that is deeply in tune with the threats facing our natural world, our sanity, and our joy.
In this conversation, Julie and the Host team discuss some of the poems in Threshold, what kinds of toast they’ve been making these days, how many blankets are appropriate to use when working from home, where poetry comes from, and a bevy of other hilarities and affairs facing the life of the artist in the year 2020.
Julie's chapbook, Threshold, will be the next selection for the Host Chapbook Club, for the Dec. 10th meeting. You can buy a copy here and sign up for the Chapbook Club here.
Here are links to some of the books, music, TV shows and more discussed in this episode:
Weighted blanket that feels like a real blanket
The Musical Brain by César Aira
Friday Oct 23, 2020
Spooky BooOooks
Friday Oct 23, 2020
Friday Oct 23, 2020
In this episode, the Host Publications team chats about the scary books they've been reading get into the spirit of Halloween from home this year. They discuss the new HBO Series Lovecraft Country, the Horror genre and subgenres, & what makes a book scary.
The books discussed in this episode are:
Dracula by Bram Stoker
R E D by Chase Berggrun
Rogomelec by Leonor Fini (“ROGUE – MELL- IC”)
The Great Nocturnal: Tales of Dread by Jean Ray
& The Dunwich Horror by H. P. Lovecraft
Stay tuned after the episode for some special bonus content, where Annar and Claire talk about vampire movies, and our personal favorite Halloween costumes.