We are living in a time, and in a world, which for most people alive today would have been unthinkable and unknowable a few short months ago, when the calendar flipped to the first day of the third decade of the 21st Century. We are "self-isolating." We are apart from our friends and loved ones. Alone with our thoughts and at safe social distance from each other. We are all trying to figure out how to cope. COVID-19 has changed everything. The program of ShiftPoetry(TM) is one way to help us all come to terms with this new reality. ShiftPoetry is an exercise in self-reflection, self-expression, and self-healing. Simply put, this "technology," conceived by Barbara Ligeti and Howard Kern in 2018, is an approach to writing spontaneously in order to free the mind, confront one's emotions, and promote a feeling of personal well-being. "Poetry" according to American Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith among others is simply "writing without rules." Kern and Ligeti advocate generating this kind of expression to "shift to a better place" - thus ShiftPoetry. ShiftPoetry in the Time of COVID-19 is an interactive workbook designed to emulate the ShiftPoetry experience of our live workshops. It contains a series of writing prompts, for you to respond to, as well as examples of poems that previous ShiftPoetry workshop participants have created. Our prompts naturally guide one from dark to light, from issue to solution, from a question to an answer, or at least a greater understanding of the question. The goal is that everyone will find understanding and love of self and others with this work. For more about ShiftPoetry please visit our website at www.shiftpoetry.com.

Shift Poetry in the Time of COVID-19: An Anthology of Healing Poems and a Workbook to Help You Write Yourself Well

Self-Help

Creativity

Shiftpoetry(tm)

Poetry Without Pants: Written When Nobody's Looking is the second volume in an evolving series of books created by ShiftPoetry(TM), a program designed to use freewheeling writing (poetry in the broadest sense aka writing without rules) to get to a better place in life. ShiftPoetry(TM) is bibliotherapy - using words to heal, to understand problems, to find solutions. Journaling and memoir writing are forms of bibliotherapy but ShiftPoetry(TM) is faster, more spirited, encourages group participation, allows for deep self-awareness but it is also gratifying and at times even lighthearted - and fun. Poetry Without Pants began as a companion piece to Volume One - ShiftPoetry(TM) in the Time of COVID-19 An Anthology of Healing Poems and a Workbook to Help You Write Yourself Well. In Volume II people write more lightheartedly, even "absurdly" about life behind masks, with social distancing, and Zoom meetings (from classes to meet-ups) largely viewing other people "from the waist up". What lurks below the Zoom screen? Pajama bottoms? Scanty underwear? Crazy shoes and sox? Alter ego gear? And what lurks from within one's spirit and soul? And, what has being generated and lived through "when nobody's looking?" ShiftPoets, like a good portion of society, were being quarantined, sequestered, either alone or with a "pod" of only one or a few other folks. Alone time brought out creativity and craziness - all reflected in poems in Volume Two. Very different from the work in Volume One. Poetry Without Pants is presented in three parts. Part One resembles Volume I - in that it offers prompts, inviting pages on which to create, and sample poems from 28 authors written in response to thoughtful and provocative prompts. Authors wrote "Boxers or Briefs" and many other poems addressing "Zoom Wardrobe", including a poem by that name. "What Do I Write When No One is Looking?" reflected on secrets and unique thoughts that bubble up in sad, singular, insecure times. Other entertaining, triggering and stimulating poems include "Maskinista" - about our new fashionista way of life behind masks, and the self-explanatory "Alone is Fine With a Good Bottle of Wine". Part Two features diverse work from 14 highlighted ShiftPoets including not only pandemic poetry but other work generated by folks who have adopted a ShiftPoetry approach to solving problems in their lives across the board. Part Three introduces a new kind of over the top ShiftPoetry we have anointed SchtickPoetry - Satire, Spoof, and Parody. Poems reflect on the madness of these times including a teacher's lament in "Zoom Teaching", some traveler's laments, "Flying First Class During a Pandemic" and "Outer Space is Looking Good" - and other reflections including "Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah" and "How Come I Have To Wear Pants". There are a few political statements including a tiny zany play "Civility Presidential Style 2020". And so much more. For more information check out www.ShiftPoetry.com

Poetry Without Pants: Written When Nobody's Looking

Ligeti, Barbara

Kern, Howard

"Stephen Fife, who completed his 10,000 hours decades ago, is a life-wisened, hopelessly romantic, funny sonuvabitch." - Stephen Adly Guirgis 
"A terrific selection of work ... often about sex, and how it can be a wonder of the world." - Michael Lindsay-Hogg\nCourbet's Blue Parrot is a collection of 46 poems - both heady and sexy - about Love and Sex that span 50 years of Stephen Fife's poetry, from his youthful worship of feminine enchantments to feelings of pain and bitterness following his divorce and other breakups. In his earliest poem, One, Fife writes that "There is no me, there is no you, / There is not even us - there is only/ Love, a place where we can always run/ To find each other." The ensuing poems explore the mysteries, ecstasies and conflicts to be found in this country of "Love" - a place that everyone visits, and where many of us have had our deepest and most enduring experiences.\nFife, whose examinations of desire date back to 1970, started writing a new series of poems during the lockdown in 2020. These poems are longer, more explicit, more confessional and multi-dimensional than anything he has attempted before. His purpose is to explore the nature of love and lust, from heartfelt romance to possessiveness, from the deadly serious to the farcically comic, from rose-tinged dreams and fantasies to violence, rage and disappointment. His point is that we can only move forward in discussions of gender and power dynamics by respecting ALL voices, and that understanding can only happen when the truth is seen in all its beauty and ugliness. Or, to put it more simply, Fife is attempting to "bring sexy back" to the male poetic POV, working in the tradition of Ovid, Petrarch, Andrew Marvell, and the best of Bukowski.\nThis is Fife's 12th book, and his third poetry collection, after Dreaming in the Maze of Love-Grief-Madness (2014) and Twisted Hipster (2015), both published by Cune Press who also published Fife's two memoirs, Best Revenge: How the Theatre Changed My Life and Has Been Killing Me Ever SinceandThe 13th Boy: A Memoir of Education and Abuse - an Amazon bestseller, which was featured in The Huffington Post and People Magazine.\nFife's novel Angel's Glance (2019), which Kirkus Reviews called, "A haunting and keenly observed meditation on relationships, parenthood, and the vagaries of celebrity and fame," will be re-issued in 2022 under the title Loving Holly.\nFife came back to his first literary love, poetry, through ShiftPoetry(TM) workshops and ShiftPoetry Press is publishing COURBET'S BLUE PARROT as the first in a series of poetry volumes by Fife.\nA graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and Columbia School of the Arts, Fife has written several stage plays, screenplays and streaming projects. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Village Voice and New Republic. He is the recipient of a Federal Poetry Grant.\n"Drawing inspiration from such poets as D.H. Lawrence and Charles Bukowski, Fife encourages us to awaken the part of ourselves we want to be again. This book is about what the world has forgotten: that poetry saves our ass." - Wendy Oxenhorn

Courbet's Blue Parrot: Poems about Love and Sex

Stephen Fife

Relationships

Emergence - A Woman's Life through Poetry and Motion is a graphic memoir that tells the author's life story from her early years into her 80s. Poems range from charming ditties about a beloved rag doll and the skillset for a trapeze artist, to sad stories of the death of a child, and the author's own cancer. Through colorful and compelling photographs, the reader is treated to a bit of Americana that gets lost in this age of technology. You won't find Digital Nomads, but you will encounter generations of people living their lives in joy and creativity.\nNo matter your age, whether you wish to revisit earlier days, are curious about your own future or that of your friends and family, Emergence has something to offer everyone. The party never has to end, though sometimes tears do flow. Join the author and celebrate your own life "through Poetry and Motion."

Emergence: A Woman's Life through Poetry and Motion

Literature & Fiction

Cambigue Tracey, Susan

Poetry

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