CHRIS ARVIDSON

words and art
 

You guys, this is a great Festival. I'm really honored to have been selected. Maybe I'll even go next year if they like me again?  I mean check out this video (click on the 2025 Festival highlights)  -- is this not what poetry and baseball and writing and humanities is all about?  https://baseballpoetryfest.org/videos/

Spent the week in Michigan, doing art, hanging out, the basic stuff. But damn, it was supposed to be cooler there, that's the rule and a lot of the attraction of going up in August. WRONG. It was hotter there than Charlotte during my visit. Not very fair, but still, sitting in Lake Michigan is definitely cooler than NC. 

 

Finished up my last reading for the book at Malaprops just before I went, and that was of course of real honor and a treat. Next writing fun up - Tablerock Writers at Wildacres in a couple weeks. Did you know that you can get the weather predictions two weeks out on weather.com? Of course it can change, but so far it looks like low 70s/high 50s for my time there. PLEASE!

After Georgann Eubanks' wonderful book launch on Zoom (Rural Astronomy is the book), I rejiggered myself for the reading/signing at Main Street Books in Davidson. Instead of just launching into the poetry after the introduction, I said a few words, just a handful of sentences, about where or how or what the heck the poem I was reading came from.  As best I remember of course. I think it made for a better program, and some of my "regulars" who were there that night agreed. One of the things it did was open up the discussion later about ekphrastic writing, and the ways that seeing and smelling things can be powerful poetry prompts. 

 

The next, and last, reading/signing I'm doing this summer is at the grandaddy of bookstores in North Carolina, Malaprops. I'll be part of their Poetrio Sunday program on August 3 at 4:30 p.m. I don't know yet who the other poets are on the bill, but I will post it as soon as I know. Malaprops is in Asheville, and is an institution in book land around here. I am thrilled to be able to read there. Makes me feel like a REAL poet. 

So much fun at The Belmont Bookshop... it's a really welcoming place, with great places to sit and read and a kids' room upstairs I know I'll have to bring the grands. Super nice owners and Marlo the Poet ran a compelling open mic after my reading. Good words. Good. people. Everything you want in a bookstore. If I lived there, I'd live there. :)

Come listen to a short program from me from the new book "Nobody Cares What You Think" and bring your own new stuff to share. Or, just come listen!

Coming up Friday, May 16, at That's Novel Books, Camp North End -- CHARLOTTE POETS READ. The buds will be there:  Isaac Akanmu, Jay Ward, Ro Sue, Cole Kissam, and ME. Followed by an open mic. Show begins at 6:00 p.m. - that's when you need to sign up for the open mic. Come on out to Camp North End and That's Novel Books, an excelent place for writers and readers. We will be having fun. 

My Park Road Books reading yesterday was FUN FUN FUN. Very respectable turnout that included all my walking posse, many writing buddies, and even author Judy Goldman who is such a fantastic listener and reviewer of such things. It was a big honor and I think people really liked it. We wrote a poem together during the reading, everyone writing one line each and here it is below. That was the shennanigans part of the afternoon I had promised. 

 

THIS IS WHAT I SAW YESTERDAY: IT MADE ME THINK

 

To call my mother, to giver a copy of the picture I had taken of my little one's smile

And I thought about "fleeting"

A dog barking at the leaf blower, ferosiously, as though his life depended on it.

A woman in the ugliest shirt I've ever seen, flapping bright-pink in the breeze

Seemed lost in the city or lost in thought...

How do the birds know to be silent when a predator is near?

Probably because they will hear them

They puff themselves up and fly past their fear

Up, up, up

Around the corner, up the stairs. Don't fall

Or not, just let go you might fly.

But before you go take off your clothes your skin your teeth

Hydrate and floss. You'll be glad you did.

I saw a player fall over 200 picks beyond his expected NFL Draft spot. It made m find out why.

I watched 200 people get excited over 6 students sharing what their school meant to them...they pulled out their checkbooks.

You guys, please come see me at Park Road Books, Sunday, April 27, 2:00 p.m.  There will be reading. There will be signing. There will be some kind of shenanigans. BE THERE! Park Road Books is in Charlotte at the Park Road Shopping Center: 4139 Park Road.