RODRIGO DELA PENA, JR. (i)

A September Postcard from Rodrigo Dela Pena, Jr.

I'm so grateful that the very talented poet Rodrigo sent me a postcard from Singapore since he was thoughtful enough to contextualize Singapore as Jose Rizal's "first stop on his way to Spain in his first trip abroad." I didn't know that factoid about "the 'little red dot' where [Rodrigo's] been based for the past 14 years." Lovely to know! Thanks Rodrigo!

Here are some links to Rodrigo's wonderful poems:

Sixfold: https://old.sixfold.org/PoSummer20/DelaPena.html

Rattle: https://rattle.com/self-portrait-by-rodrigo-dela-pena-jr/

SCOTT MACLEOD (i)

 September Postcard from Scott MacLeod:

I’m delighted to receive this card from Scott MacLeod whose projects I really love… including his new book, TWO SMOALTERS, a book of email correspondence over two years between him and Jim Leftwich. I consider the book’s text to be perfect for someone wanting to do a major erasure poetry project. It's not because any of the text warrants erasure. It's because every sentence, phrase, word are so high-energy one wants to lift samples for epigraphic fuel to move to a more divine state of consciousness. The effect is even more impressive as the email texts are collapsed into a single narrative without breaks that, say, could have been provided by each email's date. The writing, thus, stands on itself and it's charismatic. Example: "all life is suicide" which is not exactly a downer so much as a philosophical if not medical reality. Erasure also is an approach that befits what the two back cover blurbers say, especially Alison Knowles: "If I can open soya beans into a tray, it opens the possibility for anyone to make their own array of sounds. It's not necessary to organize them into a symphony." Yes, Reader, the symphony is yours to make!

 

I show the book against "S.S. Kevin Killian" that Scott made and generously gave to me (bless you, Kevin, I miss you). I also recommend—for the first time ever as I more likely counsel against the practice to focus on the writing themselves!—reading the bios. There's a bit of performance art going on in there (gotta admit, Scott had me until the point of his 64,000-acre ranch.) Finally and paradoxically, I recommend reading this book in one sitting. This book is so enjoyable on many levels.

ANONYMOUS

 September Postcard from Anonymous (in Austin, Texas, based on postmark):

While the sender didn't reveal their identity, I appreciate this card for how it powerfully combines image with an intriguing question. Thank you, Anonymous!

YVETTE PANTILLA-CARPIO

 September Postcard from Yvette Pantilla-Carpio:

I'm delighted to receive my second international postcard, this from the Philippines and evoking Japan's lovely cherry blossoms. Thanks, Yvette! I'm always glad to meet another writer! More information about Yvette and her short story collection A Lesser Fear of Water is HERE.

JAIME ROBLES (i)

September Postcard from Jaime Robles:

Poets and artists who walk through the world and pluck out random, even mundane, elements to turn into art are special. Jaime Robles does this with this marked-up photograph she created from her encounters with a dancer with whom she once shared ballet classes in Los Angeles. Jaime would give her lifts to their classes and, each time, the dancer gave her two quarters wrapped in two bills tied with a rubber band—the same amount as bus fare. Jaime’s writing of “Y A S !” in red glittery ink is what opens up the image in the same manner as an open-ended poem. Why “Y A S !”? Answering integrates the viewer into the image and the lack of a definitive answer to the question creates a viewer relationship with the image through imagination. This exemplifies the wonder that can be the artistic / poetic brain. Thanks for sharing, Jaime!

 

BARBARA JANE REYES and OSCAR BERMEO

 Barbara Jane Reyes and Oscar Bermeo are among the poets who’ve been helping me rebuild my post-wildfire library (Go HERE and see the March 2, 2025 entry). They are also among the most talented poets today so it makes sense that their books are wonderful for me to have, and I am grateful. Slipped among said books was a postcard from The Sandman graphic novels. The image is of Morpheus, Dream of the Endless.

Here is an image of one of their several groups of books that they've generously given:

Salamat and Gracias, Barbara and Oscar!

 

CATALINA CARIAGA

 August 2025 Postcard from Catalina Cariaga: 

Catalina Cariaga wields the typewriter to create art and poetry. So I was quite honored to receive a postcard that displays the typewriter’s marks. I’m also amused that she typed up Ilokano phrases, like

 

“Ayayatanka! for “I love you!”

“susmaryjosep!!!” which is a derivation of the common expression “susmaryosep” that’s a conflation of Jesus [and his human parents], Mary, Joseph

“Ay Nako!!!” which is another common expression (whose other variation had been used to name my poetic invention “hay(na)ku”

“Wen, Kabagis” for “Yes, Sister”

 

These phrases are all integrated into an original collage that Catalina created on a postcard-sized backing. Agyamanac unay, Kabagis (Thank you very much, Sister)! Ayayatanka met!

 

RICHARD LOPEZ

 August 2025 Postcard from Richard Lopez:

One of the sweetest human beings in the world is a poet, and I'm glad that Richard sent me a card that shows summer at its sweetest. Thank you, Richard! May the sun, ocean, and sand always treat you and your family with much love!

JOEL VEGA

 August 2025 Postcard from Joel Vega

Joel Vega is a well-rounded artist and poet who also sends my first international or non-U.S. postcard as he writes in from Arnhem, The Netherlands! If you click on the above link attached to his name, you’ll see a stupendous ekphrastic poem that melds his interests/expertise in both art and poetry! On his postcard, he writes:

 

“The front [of the postcard] is Dutch for ‘And We Live happily ever after.’ Don’t we look for fairytales in the fast routine and rush of life?”

His words resonate for me, as someone who writes fairytales as novels. That is, I insist on depicting happy endings despite presenting the travails of peoples living within authoritarian contexts. In fact, in a wonderful synchronicity with his postcard message, my first novel DOVELION has the subtitle of A Fairy Tale for Our Times and about 95% of its sections begin with that phrase associated with fairy tales, “Once upon a time…”. 

Bedankt, Joel! It’s wonderful to hear from you!

ULYSSES DUTERTE

 August 2025 Postcard from Ulysses Duterte:

Ulysses Duterte sends a postcard that’s marvelous for several reasons! First, it presents one of his accomplished drawings that reveal him to be a superrealist master. Second, he recycles another postcard (from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum) as backing. Third, he integrates on his drawing what I’ve come to consider his trademark vertical line (see the red-orange line in the bottom right corner of drawing) that, while seemingly non-related to the drawn figure serves to deepen the space while introducing a surrealistic opening to a parallel universe (or so this art critic feels 😊 ). You can see other works with his vertical lines at his online exhibition "No Timer, No Countdown." Thanks for this thoughtful postcard, Ulysses!

ALEX GILZEN (ii)

 August 2025 Postcard from Alex Gildzen:

Renaissance Man Alex Gildzen bestows treasures--see below. I can only be grateful, Alex! I hope to write more about collections and your mother! Thank you!

A DISCUSSION ON ONE OF THE ITEMS RE. HELEN KOVACH GILDZEN:

There can be an art to collecting that goes beyond mere acquisition. As I’d hoped, my Postcard Exchange Project, despite being in its early stages, is proving to be generative of interesting experiences through the act of exchanging postcards. I’ve traded books, artwork, poems, and pleasurable messages through the conceit of trading postcards.

 

My most recent postcard exchange even generated a treasure trove of archival material that includes the exhibition catalog of another kindred spirit who knows how collecting can be doorway into other fruitful experiences. At age 94 when she passed, Helen Kovach Gilden left her autograph collection to Kent State Universities Libraries, with the acquisition help of her son, poet-artist Alex Gildzen. I show images from an exhibition catalog (I somehow doubt that Richard Nixon ever knew to appreciate her forgiveness, but who knows?). Just check out that list of people who wrote her!!

 

Anyway, it’s still early days for my Postcard Exchange Project. But I look forward to more of its generated experiences that I know I otherwise might not have were it not for this simple impetus to share cards.  Thanks to all who’ve sent me cards so far, including Alex Gildzen and, through him, Helen Kovach Gildzen.

 

BARBARA AND HARRY LEE

 August Postcard from Barbara and Harry Lee:

What a delight to have long-time family members who live too far away from us use this project to share resonant moments from our pasts, specifically our vacation in the wonderful Ucluelet island of Canada! Much love to Harry and Barbara!

MEREDITH CALIMAN

 July 2025 Postcards from Meredith Caliman:

I hold Kauai in my memory as the most beautiful spot I've ever visited on Earth. So I'm delighted to receive these postcards from Meredith as she vacationed there. Gorgeous views, of course, which make me recall another image from my Kauai trip years ago--an image that's actually found its way into my poetry: a waterfall against the edge of a cliff that glinted like a sterling silver necklace (the simile that I've used). Thanks, Meredith, for reminding me of Beauty!

MARIANNE VILLANUEVA

 July 2025 Postcard from Marianne Villanueva:

 

Marianne’s postcard certainly makes sense with its “THANK YOU FOR YOUR READERSHIP” stamp since it came with her brand new book, the short story collection Residents of the Deep (Unsolicited Press, 2025). I’m very excited to read her latest short story collection—I’ve long anticipated it since Marianne is a stellar fictionist. Her first book and short story collection Ginseng and Other Tales From Manila was one of my introductory reads to Filipino literature.

I’ve since had the chance to read the first story in Residents of the Deep, “Dumaguete,” and it doesn’t disappoint. Marianne is a master of restraint—her insinuations and evocations become more than real as their effects become visceral. At one point of reading the story, I sensed my heartbeat quicken, all from the power of my emotional response to what the story was setting in play, in this case, dread. My continuous wondering of "what is happening?” paradoxically made the story more muscular and powerful. I’ll be writing a more full-blown review in the future, but suffice it to say that Marianne’s strong resonant writing creates a nuanced universe from narrative pebbles.

On the back of her postcard, Marianne writes me a “Congrats on your new book!” It’s very sweet of her to note my novel The Balikbayan Artist and I respond to her postcard and kind thoughts with HERE(scroll down).

Meanwhile, do check out her marvelous short stories in Residents of the Deep. HERE is her publisher’s page at its distributor, Asterism. 

ALEX GILDZEN

 July 2025 Postcard from Alex Gildzen:

I do love hearing from poet and artist Alex Gildzen because he’s so mischievous. His postcard is hilarious, combining an image of the Union Terminal Tower in Cleveland with what looks to be an excerpt from his work “All in the Eye”:

 

maybe it’s the boy in me

 

whose skin tingled

 

seeing

 

Terminal Tower

 

No doubt my amused reaction also reflects my dirty mind. In any event, I love it!

Thanks, Alex!!

 

MICHAEL LEONG

July 2025 Postcard from Michael Leong: 

I love the title of Michael Leong’s 2025 poetry and poetics prose collection: Dear Vase Already Shattered Against the Fragile Floor. Each individual piece in the book—whether a poem or an essay—might be considered shards of the whole “Vase” as the book. It seems apt, therefore, that Michael’s postcard presents “variations beginning with a phrase from ‘Disorientations’,” a poem that I replicate below. When a vase shatters on the floor, and if it’s of a material like glass or porcelain, it can be impossible to round up every fragment that occurred from the break. In this sense, I feel like the words on the postcard are tiny pieces that did not make it into the book before it was published. If we consider the book a vase, we could consider it a Kintsugi-repaired vase to create a whole object (book) but without including all the parts of, or sources which initially made up, the object. As such, I—as the recipient of Michael’s postcard—can only be honored by this postcard. What a gift! Thank you, Michael.

As background, here is the poem referenced by the postcard:

But I recommend his entire book and suggest you check it out! It's the latest froma poet who’s also one of the brightest thinkers in the contemporary arena. We know this, too, by the identity of his publisher: the much respected Black Square Editions. Here is the link to Dear Vase Already Shattered Against the Fragile Floor (Black Square Editions, 2025).