Printed Matter Vancouver

SoulFood Poetry Night Featuring Christopher Luna & Toni Lumbrazo Luna at SoulFood Coffee House in Redmond, WA June 20, 2019

May 26, 2019

SoulFood Poetry Night
Featuring Christopher Luna and Toni Partington

Thursday, June 20, 2019, 7:00 p.m.
SoulFood Coffee House
15748 Redmond Way
Redmond, WA 98052

20 June 2019 (1)

Series Description from host Michael Dylan Welch: On the third Thursday of every month, SoulFood Coffee House in Redmond, Washington, is home to SoulFood Poetry Night, an evening of engaged and engaging poetry. Our performance stage features professional sound and lighting systems in an inviting gallery and café setting in SoulFood Coffee House. Performances are streamed live to the Internet.

SoulFood Poetry Night is curated by Michael Dylan Welch, and has been running monthly since July of 2006 (we held our 100th reading in October of 2014). For more than a decade, we asked one featured reader to select someone else to read with him or her. This process echoed the sense of community and connection that is central to SoulFood Coffee House. This serendipity brought in new voices, and helped to create harmony or contrast in our reading series. Starting in 2016, though, we switched to primarily featuring groups or organizations. Featured readers start shortly after 7:00 p.m. Our featured readers are mostly from the greater Seattle area, but we welcome poets from farther afield as well.

After we have a break to enjoy the bookstore, its art gallery, and especially its café, we have an open-mic reading where we invite you to share your poetry. Just sign up when you arrive and be prepared to read for about three or four minutes each (depending on the number of readers). And the occasional song is welcome, too.

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic Featuring Emmett Wheatfall at Angst Gallery June 13, 2019

May 12, 2019

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic Flyer June 13 2019

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic
Hosted by Christopher Luna and Toni Lumbrazo Luna of Printed Matter Vancouver
Featuring Emmett Wheatfall

7 pm
Thursday, June 13
Open mic sign up begins at 6:30 and closes at 7
FREE

Angst Gallery
1015 Main Street
Vancouver, WA 98660
angstgallery.com

Food and libation provided by Niche Wine Bar, 1013 Main Street
Sound provided by Briz Loan & Guitar: http://briz.us/
LGBTQ+ FRIENDLY, ALL AGES, AND UNCENSORED SINCE 2004

Emmett cropped

Emmett Wheatfall is a published poet, playwright and recording artist. Emmett is the author of six books of poetry and a play titled Under the Red Robin, and has released five poetry CDs. In May 2018 Fernwood Press (an imprint of Barclay Press) published Emmett’s sixth poetry collection entitled As Clean as a Bone. For more information, visit http://emmettwheatfall.com

as clean as a bone cover

Boxed-In

I saw a man with no teeth,
he smiled at me.

I bumped into a woman who had no feet,
she crawled to me.

I hugged a child with no arms; we
laughed until I cried.

A blind man called to me. Why
couldn’t I see where he was coming from?

A homeless man cursed at me,
afterward, he and I shared his beer.

A street-walker propositioned me, I
replied, thank you, but no thank you,

then named that street after her.

Some people are boxed-in. Life is like that
for some.

Life is like that.

Emmett Wheatfall, 2018

WRITING YOUR LIFE STORY: A new creative writing workshop with Christopher Luna begins May 2, 2019

April 26, 2019

christopher by alisha jucevic — Christopher Luna by Alisha Jucevic for the Columbian

Beginning in May 2019, Printed Matter Vancouver co-founder Christopher Luna will offer a new eight-week workshop called Writing Your Life Story at Angst Gallery on Thursdays from 10:30am – 1:00pm.

WRITING YOUR LIFE STORY

Who: Open to all skill levels. The class will be limited to ten (10) participants.

Where: Angst Gallery, 1015 Main St., Vancouver, WA 98660

When: 10:30a – 1p Thursday, May 2 – Thursday, June 27, 2019 (Note: no class June 20)

What: Document your memories for your family or for possible future publication. Complete short timed writings as well as weekly take-home assignments. Give and receive feedback in a safe, informal environment.

Cost: $225 (cash, check, card)

REGISTER AT ANGST: WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24 12 – 3:30pm, OR
WEDNESDAY, MAY 1 12 – 3:30pm

2019 Dates

May 2 – June 27
July 11 – August 29
Oct 3 – Nov 21

Overview: Christopher Luna will introduce the participants to the techniques of creative nonfiction storytelling which uses the content of one’s life as the foundation for narrative. He will introduce current examples in popular nonfiction and memoir to assist the process. Participants will be encouraged to share their writing in a safe environment (no one will be required to share their stories) with the option of receiving feedback from the facilitator and other students. We will work to achieve the following goals:

1) learn the key elements of successful storytelling in written form,
2) create a living document for yourself, your family, or others,
3) delve into or build upon your written skills.

Bring your ideas, notes, paper, and pen/pencil (no books required).

Your Facilitator: Christopher Luna

With an MFA in Creative Writing and over 25 years of experience as a creative writing teacher, published author, workshop leader, editor, and writing coach, Christopher Luna will lead you through skill-building techniques, content reflection, supporting examples, and constructive feedback. Originally from Long Island, New York, Christopher has made Vancouver, Washington his home since 2003. Since then he has taught a variety of English classes at Clark College, led poetry and memoir writing workshops, and served as the first Clark County Poet Laureate (2013-2017).

For questions contact Christopher Luna at printedmattervancouver@gmail.com or 360-910-1066.

“The highest purpose of art is to inspire.” –Bob Dylan

Christopher Luna, Toni Lumbrazo Luna, & Claudia F. Savage read at Another Read Through April 25, 2019

March 30, 2019

Poetry Reading with
Christopher Luna, Toni Lumbrazo Luna, & Claudia F. Savage

7-8 pm
Thursday, April 25, 2019

Another Read Through
3932 N Mississippi Ave
Portland, Oregon 97227

Christopher Luna and Toni Lumbrazo Luna (formerly Partington) co-host Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic, the LGBTQ+ friendly, all ages and uncensored Vancouver, WA reading series Luna founded in 2004. Luna and Partington are also the co-founders of Printed Matter Vancouver, a small press and editing/coaching service serving Northwest writers. Printed Matter Vancouver has published two anthologies from the Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic as well as debut books of poetry by Clark County, WA poets Tiffany Burba, Matthew Eiford-Schroeder, and Jenney Pauer.

Wind Wing Cover

Toni Lumbrazo Luna is the author of Wind Wing and the chapbook Jesus is a Gas.

Message_FrontCover_sm — Message from the Vessel in a Dream (Flowstone Press, 2018) featuring poetry and collage art by Christopher Luna

Christopher Luna is the author of Message from the Vessel in a Dream (Flowstone Press, 2018) and the chapbooks GHOST TOWN, USA and Brutal Glints of Moonlight.

Savage headshot August

Claudia F. Saleeby Savage is part of the performance duo Thick in the Throat, Honey and co-runs a parent-artist podcast of the same name. Her most recent book of poetry is Bruising Continents. Other recent work appears in BOMB, Denver Quarterly, Columbia, Nimrod, Water-Stone Review, and Anomaly (the interview series “Witness the Hour: Arab American Poets Across the Diaspora”). She is a 2018-2021 Black Earth Institute Fellow, a progressive think tank. Her collaboration, reductions, about motherhood and ephemerality with visual artist Jacklyn Brickman, is forthcoming in 2020. She teaches privately and as a Writer in the Schools and lives with her husband and daughter in Portland.

Painter/Poet Scott Carstensen Honors Christopher Luna, Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic, Angst Gallery and the Vancouver Arts District at Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic Featuring Nastashia Minto March 14, 2019

March 19, 2019

Ghost Town Angst Luna Tribute Painting by Scotty Carstensen — Painting by Scott Carstensen

We were very honored to receive this tribute painting from our dear friend and Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic regular Scott Carstensen. Scott explained that he was inspired by “magic taken seriously,” a poem which appears in reading series founder Christopher Luna’s Message from the Vessel in a Dream (Flowstone Press, 2018). The painting features a few lines from the poem as well as meanings Scott found for “Luna.” It also pays tribute to Angst Gallery, Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic, co-host Toni Lumbrazo Luna, and the downtown Vancouver arts scene. Scott even threw in a nod to Christopher’s love for the Wu-Tang Clan.

Thank you, Scott.

Printed Matter Vancouver would also like to thank everyone who attended the event, those who shared their beautiful poems with us, and especially featured reader Nastashia Minto, who blew us away with her powerful set featuring poems from her brand new book, Naked: The Rhythm and Groove of It. The Depth and Length to It..

Please join us next month when our featured reader will be Washington State Poet Laureate Claudia Castro Luna. Please note special time and location.

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic co-host Toni Lumbrazo Luna

Toni Lumbrazo Luna

Nastashia Minto

Scott Carstensen presents his tribute painting.

Scott Carstensen’s photo of Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic featured reader Nastashia Minto.

Christopher Luna Reading/Book Signing at Final Vancouver Independent Artists Group Show on March 1, 2019

February 21, 2019

VIA final show March 1 20919

Vancouver Independent Artists
March Group Show
Final Event

5-10pm
Friday, March 1
North Bank Artists Gallery
1005 Main Street
Vancouver, WA

From event organizer Chris Stevens (Pop Octopus): Please join us for this final event in the North Bank gallery space. We will be showcasing a variety of local artists and saying goodbye to a Vancouver landmark. We’re opening up the back studio and hallway for the first time and will have some wonderful spoken word poetry and book signing from Christopher Luna. Please join us in saying farewell to this landmark of the Vancouver art community.

Artist Lineup:

Lindsey Butler
Bill Ferguson
John Burkett
Mike Lindberg
Lee Sekaquaptewa
Nickolas Barnes
Melissa Koren
Renee Bryant
Drew Taylor
Jacob Herring
Cory Crouchley
Kerry Scribner
Kelly Schrock
Patrick Flynn
Chris Stevens

Spoken word and book signing by Christopher Luna

Christopher Luna will be reading from and signing his new book, Message from the Vessel in a Dream.

Flowstone Press announces the release of Message from the Vessel in a Dream by Christopher Luna, Clark County, WA’s first poet laureate and the founder of Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic. Luna’s first full-length volume of poetry spans 20 years, and favors prose poetry and collage poems assembled and arranged using found materials. The book is dedicated to Carlos Santana, the guitar virtuoso and eponymous “vessel” who gifted Luna with the only line of poetry he has ever received from a dream.

Paperback: 140 pages
Publisher: Flowstone Press (November 13, 2018)
ISBN-10: 1945824220
ISBN-13: 978-1945824227

Order Message from the Vessel in a Dream

How many Christopher Lunas are there? The bard, the community dynamo, the scholar, the compassionate one, the jazz quartet, the father & lover, the world of a man: all and more are speaking in this book. So many perspectives to experience here, so much to learn about literature, attitude, action and beauty. The maestro of Ghost Town has created a bustling, radiant and necessary environment. — Dan Raphael

Christopher Luna served as Clark County, WA’s first Poet Laureate from 2013-2017. He has an MFA from the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, and is the co-founder, with Toni Lumbrazo Luna, of Printed Matter Vancouver, an editing service and small press for Northwest writers. He and Lumbrazo Luna co-host Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic, the popular Vancouver, WA reading series he founded in 2004. Luna’s books include Brutal Glints of Moonlight, GHOST TOWN, USA and The Flame Is Ours: The Letters of Stan Brakhage and Michael McClure 1961-1978.

“Message from a teeming mind” by Scott Hewitt for the Columbian, December 8, 2018.

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic Featuring Nastashia Minto at Angst Gallery March 14, 2019

February 16, 2019

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic Flyer March 14 2019

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic
Hosted by Christopher Luna and Toni Lumbrazo Luna
of Printed Matter Vancouver

Featuring Nastashia Minto

7 pm
Thursday, March 14, 2019
Open mic sign up begins at 6:30 and closes at 7
FREE

Angst Gallery
1015 Main Street
Vancouver, WA 98660

Food and libation provided by Niche Wine Bar, 1013 Main Street
Sound provided by Briz Loan & Guitar

LGBTQ+ FRIENDLY, ALL AGES, AND UNCENSORED SINCE 2004

Nastashia Minto Head Shot

A Georgia native who currently lives in Portland, OR, Nastashia Minto has performed at the Unchaste Readers Series, Neon Dream, Incite and various other reading series in the metro area. She has also appeared on KBOO Radio’s Talking Earth. Her writing has been published in SUSAN and in the forthcoming Unchaste Anthology Volume III. Nastashia’s first book, Naked, was published by Eldredge Books in February 2019.

Note: Nastashia and Eldredge Books will launch Naked with a reading at Another Read Through (3932 N Mississippi Ave. Portland, OR 97227) on February 28.

Nastashia Minto Naked Cover

Ask Me …

Ask me of the mistakes I’ve made, and let me pull back the layers to my truth. Many false narratives, but I’m the original carbon proof. DNA soaked in cocaine and booze — don’t know how my genes survived, but ask me of the mistakes I’ve made. I still hold her truths, although she tells many lies. I cry, we cry, she cried, but she said we were all a mistake. Maybe after one, but after three, take responsibility for their place, your place, our place in this world. Forgiveness seems to fall off trees like leaves in the fall, but even in some regions the leaves will stay on the trees, so I guess forgiveness will never fall. Ask me of the mistakes I’ve made. I’ll be the first in line, raised hands to account for all the shit I’ve put you through. Ask me of the mistakes I’ve made. You preached forgiveness but forgot I came from you

Nastashia Minto

Photos from Matthew Eiford-Schroeder and Christopher Luna’s Reading at Vintage Books in Vancouver on February 2, 2019

February 14, 2019

Matthew Eiford-Schroeder and Christopher Luna would like to thank everyone who attended our reading on February 2. We are very grateful to Candace and the rest of the staff at Vintage Books for being so hospitable. Both Matthew and Christopher have additional readings lined up for this year. Please visit our Events page for more information.

Matthew Eiford-Schroeder reads from Consistently East

Christopher Luna reads from Message from the Vessel in a Dream

Christopher Luna Interviewed by People of Vancouver, WA

February 5, 2019

Printed Matter Vancouver co-founder Christopher Luna was recently featured on People of Vancouver, WA:

Instagram
YouTube

Christopher would like to thank Steve and Emily for this wonderful video. He is also grateful to Leah Jackson for her many years of support for The Work and Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic. Finally, a hearty shout out to those who attended the workshop at Niche that afternoon (and appear briefly in the video): Stella Guillory, Diane Corson, Denise Campbell, Suzanne LaGrande, Robert Syverson, Paula John, Cathie Padgett, Sonja Gellerson, and Bruce Hall.

THE WORK Ginsberg and Stein

Here is the text which accompanies the video on the People of Vancouver WA YouTube Channel:

Christopher Luna is a poet, teacher, editor and was the first Poet Laureate for Clark County. He has been hosting Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic, since 2004, and we caught up with him at his writing workshop, also known as The Work, which is held on the second Saturday of every month at Niche Wine Bar on Main St.

“The name for the workshop comes from a couple of lines in a poem by Allen Ginsberg called Memory Gardens, where he says ‘What is the work? To ease the pain of living. Everything else, drunken dumbshow.’ I interpret that as let’s, as poets, in a culture where our work is not always completely understood or respected, let’s take it seriously enough to look at it as work. I think there are some people, even other writers, who don’t see poetry as work because they tend to be shorter than novels. I want to encourage poets in the workshop to own being a poet. To have fun, but to take the work seriously.”

Ginsberg himself co-founded the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics in Boulder, Colorado, where Luna earned an MFA in Writing and Poetics. It was there that Luna learned about outreach, developing writing workshops and going out into the community to teach. After becoming Clark County’s first Poet Laureate, he launched the Poets in the Schools Program, which continues sends writers into local educational settings to lead poetry workshops to this day.

For more information about Christopher Luna’s coaching and editing services, Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic, or The Work, visit https://printedmattervancouver.com/

Music: Bass Walker – Film Noir by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/&#8230😉
Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-…
Artist: http://incompetech.com/

Printed Matter Vancouver is Accepting New Clients

January 13, 2019

Are you ready to take control of your writing goals? Do you have a manuscript that needs polishing before being submitted for publication? Printed Matter Vancouver can help. We are accepting new clients now.

2018 was a great year for Printed Matter Vancouver. We had the privilege of working with an impressive group of creative individuals at various stages in their writing journey. We are humbled by their grace, talent, and perseverance. They entrusted us with their precious poems, essays, stories, fiction, articles, and commentary. We provided guidance, editing, formatting assistance, critique, and revision. Witnessing the growth and commitment of these writers is incredibly satisfying. To say this year has been astounding would be an understatement. We are grateful to those who have put their trust in us. These inspiring individuals have an unflinching determination to do the work that is necessary to grow and improve as a writer.

christopher and toni at sam and kelly wedding by julian nelson — Printed Matter Vancouver Co-founders Christopher Luna and Toni Lumbrazo Luna at Sam Mackenzie and Kelly Keigwin’s wedding. Photo by Julian Nelson.

If you are considering working with an editor, compiling a chapbook, or further developing your writing skills, contact us for an initial consultation at no cost to you. We can be reached via printedmattervancouver@gmail.com. Let’s explore your writing together!

With sincere appreciation to all for a great year,
Christopher Luna and Toni Lumbrazo Luna

Here are a few of the projects we worked on during 2018:

• Editing and formatting a debut book of poetry.
• Editing of a historical memoir.
• Critique, review, and editing of a significant collection of poetry.
• Editing Book #1 of a fiction series.
• Editing a full-length book of haiku.
• Coaching a poet mining decades of journals to create a series of chapbooks.

we write because we must

Tag: Printed Matter Vancouver