The gorgeous Issue 2 of Prelude magazine is out! Prelude is one of the most exciting poetry magazines out there, in my unqualified opinion. I'm pleased to have one of my Paris poems included in the company of so many fantastic poets. Check it out here.
Kindest thanks to Stu Watson and Rob Crawford for accepting the piece.
It's November in the city and almost 70 degrees. Autumn is lovely.
The new issue of DIALOGIST, an online magazine of poetry and art, is now live. I'm thrilled to have a new poem called "Birthday" in it. You can even listen to a recording of me reading the piece: http://dialogist.org/v3i1-maja-lukic
Thanks to Michael Loruss and DIALOGIST for picking up the poem!
I’m pleased to announce that my poem “Nantes” is being published in a limited-edition chapbook this fall. The 2Horatio Chapbook was conceived in, and is a celebration of, my teacher Elaine Sexton’s fantastic and illuminating private poetry workshops. It includes poems from the many writers who have passed through or are still a part of Elaine’s workshop group or who have somehow mentored the writers in the group. Elaine has also contributed a poem, and her beautiful new poetry collection Prospect/Refuge is out now from Sheep Meadow Press so, shameless promotion.
To celebrate the publication, there’s a launch reading tomorrow night, Oct. 21, at the NYPL, Jefferson Market Branch, 425 6th Avenue. The reading is from 6 to 8 pm. Show up early to talk to a bunch of poets. Disclosure: it’s a marathon reading with 20+ poets, but I will keep my pieces short.
There will be copies of the chapbook for sale at the reading, but for anyone unable to attend or purchase, below is the text of my poem. I wrote it en route to Nantes, France this past spring, obviously. Hope to see you tomorrow night.
Nantes
thousands of miles
& three hours of sleep
later, distance arrives
first & beautiful
waiting at a loud station,
Atlantic ice lucid, thick
Air France coffee keeping
me a marionette unwound
something sank into the
ocean on the way over,
love scaled the altitude,
shimmered in the turbulence
& the hours ran ahead
of me to wait at the
Charles de Gaulle gates--
fencing with questions
from friends, how
to explain that trains
are never lost in their
crawl across geography
the twilight in Nantes is
riddled with quiet, a lattice-
work of telephone wires
with strange birds on them
& no one is as real
as the knots & nests
tangled in branches
cutting the nude lilac sky
when the red brick
rooftops layer into
an impasto of sleep,
I am left thinking among
yellow mimosa sprays
& pink paper roses,
that alone arrives
last & beautiful
I'm thrilled to announce that two new poems ("Expats" and "For Zeus, In Summer") are out now in the summer 2015 issue of the beautiful Chiron Review, which you can order here in print or ebook format: http://www.chironreview.com/current-issue/ Kindest thanks to the editors at Chiron Review for including my work in their journal, which has a long and varied history of publishing both large and unknown names in poetry. You can guess where I fall on that continuum.
"Expats," in particular, plays with threads of pathos and raw memory. The piece is about my family leaving Croatia in the early 1990s before war broke out in the region. Good to see it in print.
I have a new poem called "A Neon Height" in the Summer 2015 issue of Rust + Moth, written after Adam Zagajewski's gorgeous and quiet poem "At Midnight." This was one of those workshop exercises that extended into an altogether different way of thinking about and structuring the content of a piece. Thank you to the Rust + Moth editors for publishing the piece!
In other news, I will be doing a reading with some fantastic poets next Monday, May 11 at 6:45 p.m at the Bowery Poetry Club, 308 Bowery. It's a Prelude magazine event and their readings are never not fun. I was fortunate enough to have a poem in Prelude a few months back and am thrilled to be reading with some of the other contributors. Stop by if you're free.
Prelude, a fresh and exciting new poetry and criticism magazine (and one of my favorite websites), published my poem "Alphabet City" today. A sincere thanks to Rob Crawford and Prelude for accepting the piece. Read the whole thing here and then lose the rest of the afternoon browsing other strange and beautiful poems on their site by John Ashberry, Adam Fitzgerald, and the like.
An entirely seasonal poem of mine was published on The Brooklyn Quarterly this morning. It's called "We Drank Winter." Enjoy the read & stay warm.
I answered some questions for letters editor Dariel Suarez at the lovely Middle Gray Magazine a few months ago. We talked about rejection and my love of Charles Simic. The interview is up this week and you can read it here.
My poem “Jazz” is up on the Poydras Review blog this morning.
In other, larger news, the legendary poet Mark Strand passed away last week. It’s awful and sad but I’m honored that I was able to hear him read a few weeks ago at his 80th birthday tribute at the New School. Easing into this Monday morning by Googling some of his collages, which are as dark and brilliantly luminous as his poetry. His capacity to create melancholy beauty across multiple art forms was staggering. In honor of Mr. Strand, here is an interview he did in 2012 for Guernica magazine.
Thrilled to announce that my story "Golden Rectangles" appears in the new print issue of Prick of the Spindle! You can pick up a copy of Issue 7 here: http://www.prickofthespindle.com/pages/pots_print.htm.
Copies will also (eventually) be available through Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
I wrote the story after a Leonard Cohen biography binge. Before you read it, you may wish to review the lyrics to "Suzanne."
A sincere thank you to Prick of the Spindle for selecting the piece and to Cynthia Reeser for her brilliant efforts in bringing the issue together.
Please check out the new Middle Gray Magazine issue -- I have a poem in it.
"Rail Station Bohemia" is about Serbia, in many ways, but that is all I feel qualified to say about it. My mother claims it's her favorite of my pieces, if that sways you at all. Take a look at the rest of this awesome issue, too.
A special thank you to Middle Gray Magazine for publishing the piece.
My poem "Atheos" was published on The Brooklyn Quarterly today. Thrilled to be working with TBQ again--many thanks to them for picking up the piece. Go check it out.
"Postcards From St. Petersburg," a short story I wrote last summer, is now up on The Brooklyn Quarterly website. And while you're there, check out their fantastic and important new issue on cultural translation.
Many thanks to The Brooklyn Quarterly for publishing the piece!