For the last ten years, the editors at Blue Begonia Press in Yakima, WA, have kept a poetry pole in the press’s front yard. Passersby press their poems to it with colored pushpins, and the press also receives poems by mail from all over the world. Jim Bodeen, the press’s resident poet and editor, describes the pole, rather poetically, on Blue Begonia’s website.” The pole, intersecting the Path of Butterflies and Hummingbirds with the Path of the Mailman, validates and confirms the actions of poetry in the world.”
A few years ago Blue Begonia published Weathered Pages: The Poetry Pole Anthology, which features more than 200 poems by a mix of “male and female, young and old, gay and straight, free and incarcerated, Native, Asian, Latino, Anglo and African-American.” There are also a few from Inklings Bookshop employees. Inklings owner Susan Richmond tells us that the anthology continues to sell well at the store. You can order it by emailing here.
How fun to read about our own Blue Begonia Press! They are launching another one this week by Elizabeth Austen called Every Dress A Decision.