The fledgling Powell River Live Poets’ Guild has overtaken the literary world by charging ahead with a Youth Peace-Poem Contest in the spring of 2008, in connection with the International Peace-Poem Project, School District #47, and the Powell River Writers’ Festival, and then publishing the delightful results on Lulu.com, an online marketplace for digital content.
You can secure your copy of the most uplifting, hopeful, and charming collection of youthful thoughts on peace and the future possible by contacting the guild.
Editor Eva van Loon, founder of the Guild, is over the moon with the Guild’s first publishing venture, which is intended to fund the annual contest. “Powell River responded strongly to the first year of the peace-poem contest—nineteen classes participated. The originators of the project, the Maui Live Poets’ Guild, could hardly believe this; they had to work for years before the entire island of Maui participated. But here, our kids are right on top of this issue. This year, another school district is interested in joining up! But nothing will ever be so special as this sweet little book, all our own. Entirely from the Pearl on the Sunshine Coast.”
The Grand Prize first-place winner of 2008 was only seven years old when she wrote about the immortality of friendship. A drawing by Elisa Almquist, now age eight, graces the cover of the anthology, which is subtitled Friendship Never Ends, after her poem. “Hopefully, future winners will also supply art for future anthologies,” says van Loon, whose only regret about this first project is that the print-on-demand industry has not yet made it financially feasible to print all the drawings, and some of the multisensory projects, which were submitted.
PRIPPA 2008 (which stands for Powell River International Peace-Poem Anthology 2008) is available by email to the Guild at kaimana.wolff@yahoo.com or by phone at 604-483-4940. Hurry: the order will be placed December 1.You can preview PRIPPA 2008: Friendship Never Ends at http://lulu.com/content/5038297.
by Eva van Loon
Flushed with the joy of publishing PRIPPA 2008: Friendship Never Ends, the first annual anthology of winning peace poems by Powell River’s kids, the Powell River Live Poets’ Guild has and found congenial homes for carrying on its poetic activities in the new year.
McKinney’s Irish Pub, in the Rodmay Hotel in Townsite, has graciously offered the LPG a Poets’ Corner, with fireplace and bookcases, where you can sink down with a book anytime, or join the group some Tuesday late afternoons to share poetry, your own or others’, while enjoying a glass of cheer.
If you haven’t been to the refurbished Pub since it re-opened just over a year ago, it’s high time you checked out its historically appropriate renovations and the well dressed ambience, suggestive of the Rodmay’s historic beginnings. The Poets’ Corner is collecting books published during the first three or four decades of the last century, especially old books with an Irish flavor, to find their permanent home on McKinney’s bookcases. Books that are not part of the permanent collection can be purchased for a toonie, with proceeds going to support the Guild’s spring peace-poetry contest for kids and the publication of the anthology of winning poems.
Next Guild gatherings at McKinney’s are on February 3 and 17. (Why not come prepared to dance? Salsa dancing happens right after poetry at McKinney’s—you may be unable to tear yourself away!)
Breakwater Books, a wonderful teahouse as well as the closest thing PR has to a book emporium, is the Live Poets’ Guild second home, hosting meetings some Saturday late afternoons. A hot herbal tea, a sweet pastry, and some provocative poetry sound like the perfect alleviant for a dark gray winter afternoon. Next meetings of the Guild at Breakwater Books are February 14 and 28. (I wonder what the theme might be on the 14th....)
Breakwater Books, along with Kingfisher Books on Marine, also sell Friendship Never Ends, a unique and sweet souvenir of the children’s thoughts in Powell River. The initial issue is graced with grand-prize-winner Elisa Almquist’s charming drawing on its cover. At $12.95, the 104-page book is something of a miracle, not only for its thought-provoking content and the fact of its existence, but also for its low price. There are fewer than 15 left of the 100 LPG brought into town just before Christmas. LPG plans that PRIPPA 2009 (the initials stand for Powell River International Peace Poem Anthology) will come out earlier and will be produced entirely in Powell River with new publishing services available.
Poems for Obama, the latest project of PRLPG, will send 49 quintessentially Canadian poems to president Obama and publish them locally in a beautiful book. Want to take part in the judging? Attend the next Guild meetings.