ditch,

ditch, the poetry that matters

ditch, n., where you are when you are not on the main road.

ditch, is a Canadian online poetry magazine celebrating the innovative, the non-conforming, the radical, the alternative, the surreal, the avant-garde, the non-linear, the abstract, the experimental.

(click on the highlighted poets' names to read their work) 

Our featured poet is: Maxine Gadd

Trisia Eddy is a writer, editor and publisher of red nettle press, based in Edmonton, Alberta.  Her work has appeared in a variety of literary journals, including CV2, ::stonestone::, Misunderstandings Magazine, and Wicked Alice.  Current obsessions include Victorian-era taxidermists, abandoned psychiatric hospitals, and printmaking.

Melissa Bull 's writing has appeared in such publications as Matrix, Headlight, Carte Blanche, Pistol, Swamp, Snafu and Maisonneuve. Her chapbook, Eating Out, was published last year by WithWords. She lives in Montreal, where she works as a magazine editor.

Marianne Perron is a graduate of the Concordia English Literature and Creative Writing program. She has published a collection of poetry with Montreal’s With Words Press. Her work has appeared numerous times in Soliloquies Anthology, and she has several poems slated to appear in upcoming issues of PRECIPICe, Crannog, and Headlight.
 
Marianne is the Editor-in-Chief of the Grasshopper Reads online book review, dedicated to contemporary Canadian literature. She has been known to review films, bars, and poetry, and has a column for the film website Sound on Sight in the works. Her screenplay, La Bonne Soeur, was a finalist in SODEC’s Cours Ecrit Ton Court, and her latest collaboration, Footsies, is scheduled for production in 2010.

Camille Martin, a Toronto poet, is the author of Sonnets (Shearsman Books, forthcoming in 2010) and Codes of Public Sleep (BookThug, 2007). Her work has been widely published in journals in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Her current work in progress is a collection of double sonnets. She is also engaged in a project funded by the Ontario Arts Council: a long poem (working title: “The Evangeline Papers”) based on her Cajun/Acadian heritage and her recent visit to Nova Scotia to participate in an archaeological dig at Beaubassin and to research Acadian and Mik’maq history and culture. She earned an MFA in Poetry at the University of New Orleans and a Ph.D. in English at Louisiana State University. Currently she teaches writing and literature at Ryerson University. Her website is http://www.camillemartin.ca and her blog is http://rogueembryo.wordpress.com

JC Bouchard is a writer of poetry and fiction residing in Sudbury, Ontario. His works have been featured or are forthcoming in magazines such as What If?, Haggard and Halloos, Breadcrumb Scabs, Thieves Jargon, and Right Hand Pointing. He has self-published one book of poetry, what remembering says not to, and is completing his first novel, buses.

Paulette C Turcotte has been involved with the arts community for more than 40 years as a painter and writer. In 1985, she cofounded a small publishing press, Split Quotation with Jorge Etcheverry in Ottawa.

Paulette’s work has appeared in a variety of Canadian magazines and periodicals such as Quarry, Anthos, Vox Feminarum, Room of One’s Own, Synchronicity, Waves and a Tree Anthology edited by Heather Ferguson, Ottawa, including her book of experimental prose poetry, The Book of Marecha. She has been assistant editor of Vox Feminarum and has been one of the organizers of the Pacific Festival of the Book since its inception. Paulette is the featured poet in the winter edition of The Tower Journal, 2009/10. Her long poem, The Mysterium of Godde will appear in Omega 8 in 2010.

Paulette has done numerous readings over the years including Salmon Arm Gallery, Tree and Orion in Ottawa and VAC and others in Victoria. In 2005-06, Paulette was “House Poet” for Serious Coffee House weekly open stage with James Kasper MC, Cadboro Bay Rd.

Paulette lives on Vancouver Island where she writes, paints, teaches dreamwork and spends time by the ocean.

Chris Turnbull lives in Kemptville, Ontario. This is a selection from continua, a book length series that interweaves voice and image as a combined visual text and multi-voice performance piece. Some of this current selection has been previously published in spud, and How2.

Maggie Clark was born in Toronto, Ontario, but her adult years have all been spent in Waterloo, where she recently completed a degree in Political Science and English Literature, and in Victoria, BC. Her poetry has appeared in RATTLE and The Pedestal; her fiction at The Danforth Review. In 2009 she won a 24-hour playwright competition with Pat the Dog Playwright Centre.

Jesse Patrick Ferguson ’s poems and reviews have been published in nine countries, in both print and online formats. Recently, his writing has appeared in Canadian Literature, The New Quarterly, Prairie Fire, Grain, Poetry Ireland Review, Poetry and Harper’s. His work has also been anthologized in Best Canadian Poetry in English 2009, edited by A.F. Moritz. Jesse is a poetry editor for The Fiddlehead, and in fall 2009 he published his first full-length poetry collection, Harmonics (Freehand Books). When he isn’t writing, he sings and plays several musical instruments.

M. Jay Smith is a Toronto-based but Canadian-hinterland-raised writer. After studying experimental poetry and aesthetic theory in graduate school (at the University of Alberta and York University), she has enjoyed a varied publishing history with work in various genres appearing in more than fifty different publications throughout North America, from the micro-runs of obscure literary journals (eg. Four Corners Feminist Review and Fait Accomplit, both based in Edmonton, the latter of which granted her several "best submission" prizes) to CanWest newspapers (especially the Edmonton Journal) as well as the Los Angeles Times (a creative non-fiction piece) and magazines like Alberta Views and Adbusters. M. Jay Smith has also worked as a columnist for both of Edmonton's arts weeklies and regularly reviews books. Presently, she is working on a novel, a book of poems, and trying to decide whether and how to hold down a day job.

Joe Bishop lives in St. John's, Newfoundland & Labrador. His work has appeared in The New Quarterly, Twig and With an Image of Grace.

Nick Surges is a student and writer from Ottawa, Ontario. His previous publishing credits include Carleton U's In/Words and WhatIf? Magazine. He is currently pursuing studies in musical theatre.

Jude Dillon is a graduate of Queen's University in English. He has studied painting at the Alberta College of Art. He has published poems in, iota, The Delinquent, Numinous Sprititual Magazine, Gloom Cupboard, Wascana Review, On Spec, Purple Patch and others.

He is a photographer and Contributing Editor of the ezine Gloom Cupboard based in England. Jude lives in Calgary.

John Tzikas is a Toronto based poet. His work has appeared in Canada in Authors, Quills, Poetry Super Highway, Long Story Short, Word Catalyst, and Midwest Literary Magazine.

Daniela Elza lives in Vancouver, BC, and is currently working on her first full length poetry manuscript and contemplating her doctoral thesis in Philosophy of Education at SFU. This year her work appeared in Verse Map of Vancouver, Press 1, Vallum, Matrix, qarrtsiluni, Poetic Inquiry (Sense Publishers, 2009), 4poets (Mother Tongue Publishing, 2009) and is forthcoming in educational insights, The Trumpeter, and The New Orphic Review. Her website is: http://strangeplaces.livingcode.org/

Kim Goldberg is a poet, journalist and author of six books. Her poems have appeared in The Capilano Review, Geist, Prairie Fire, Rampike, Tesseracts, Istanbul Literary Review and elsewhere. Her first poetry collection, Ride Backwards on Dragon (Leaf Press, 2007), was short-listed for Canada’s Lampert Memorial Award for poetry. Her latest collection, RED ZONE (Pig Squash Press, 2009), is a verse map of Nanaimo’s homeless population. The book has been adopted as a literature course text at Vancouver Island University. Kim lives in Nanaimo, BC, where approximately 300 people sleep on the streets each night. Visit: http://pigsquash.wordpress.com/

Paul Barclay is an ex-pat Canadian now living permanently in Korea.  He studied literature at the University of Manitoba and the University of Toronto.  He published a chapbook Creole (Pachyderm Press, Winnipeg, 1993) and has edited and published a variety of poetry zines.

Joel Shea was born in Victoria, B.C. and currently lives in London, UK. He is also a musician.

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Emily Sullivan Sanford spent her formative years on Long Island and in Upstate New York. She now lives in Berlin where she works as an English teacher, writer, and translator.

Emily Sullivan Sanford's poetry has been published in Poetry Motel and Chantarelle’s Notebook. She is a contributing essayist to the book Surgically Shaping Children (2006, Johns Hopkins University Press).

Ryan Finnigan is from Sheffield, UK.

Gary Sloboda is a writer living in San Francisco.  His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from such publications as Rattle, Drunken Boat, Glitter Pony, Puppyflowers, Horse Less Review and Filling Station.  In 2008, he published a small collection of poems entitled "Pine" from Finishing Line Press.

Mark Cunningham lives in Missouri, in the US. He has three books out: Body Language from Tarpaulin Sky, 80 Beetles from Otoliths, and 71 Leaves, an ebook from BlazeVOX. A chapbook of sentences made from three phrases has been posted by Beard of Bees under the title Nachträglichkeit.

M.J. Golias has a BFA from Emerson College (Boston, Massachusetts) and an MFA in poetry from the University of Memphis, Tennessee.  After graduate school, she moved to New York City.  Recent work has appeared, or is forthcoming in journals, including The Aurorean, Colere, Rhythm, Fiddlehead, The Fieldstone Review, and in an anthology, Pomegranate Seeds: An Anthology of Greek-American Poetry.

Megan Boatright is from Northwest Florida, currently a PhD student in comparative literature at the University of Chicago. She was awarded honorable mention for the Academy of American Poets prize at Emory University. Her academic work is mostly in critical animal studies, with an emphasis on taxidermy.

Tim Keane is from The Bronx, NY, and currently lives in Manhattan. Poems from Tim's first book Alphabets of Elsewhere (Cinnamon Press, 2007), as well as poems for his next collection, tentatively titled Rockaway Flowers, have appeared in print and online magazines in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, and Singapore, including such venues as the art magazine Modern Painters, the American journals Denver Quarterly, Evergreen Review, International Poetry Review, South Carolina Review and Shenandoah. His translations from French poetry are in Drunken Boat, Parthenon West Review, Silk Road, Cipher, Pusteblume, Interim and Cerise Press. www.timkeane.com

J. Michael Wahlgren is author of Credo coming from The Greying Ghost Press.

Special Feature

English Poems by Icelanders

curated by a.rawlings
poems were written during Impromptu Writing Workshops in Reykjavík, Iceland facilitated by a.rawlings

Featuring:
Ásgeir H Ingólfsson, Kristín Kamban, Hjörvar Pétursson, Silja Hrund Barkardóttir Hansen,
Jón Bjarki Magnússon, Jón Örn Loðmfjörð, Bragi Páll Sigurðarson, Bjargey Ólafsdóttir.   

Megan Kaminski is the author of the chapbook Across Soft Ruins (Scantily Clad Press, 2009). Her poetry has been published in Coconut, Denver Quarterly, Phoebe, 6x6, Third Coast, and other fine journals. She lives in Lawrence, KS, where she teaches creative writing and literature at the University of Kansas.  She spent much of her early life in Virginia, and lived in Casablanca, Los Angeles, Paris, and Portland, before moving to Kansas.

Janice D. Soderling is widely published in print and online with work at The Pedestal, Blue Unicorn, New Verse News, Soundzine, Concise Delight, Literary Mama, Left Hand Waving, Loch Raven Review, Lucid Rhythms, Unsplendid, Anon, Lyric Poetry Magazine, The Centrifugal Eye, Horizon Review, Borealis, The Flea, The Chimaera, and the recently released Best of Our Stories anthology. Her poetry was nominated by Shit Creek Review in 2009 for Dzanc Best of the Web, Sundance Best of the Net, and Pushcart. She lives in a small Swedish village.

James D. Autio is a visual artist and poet in Minneapolis, MN. James' writing has been accepted by Drunken Boat, North American Review, Venereal Kittens, Naugatuck River Review, Thieves Jargon, and other fine journals. James is the proud recipient of a Vermont Studio Center fellowship and numerous awards for his plays, poems and essays.

James Mc Laughlin is from Dumbarton, Scotland. His work has appeared in Stride, Otolith, Blazevox, Greatworks, NthPosition, Blackbox Manifold, gistsandpiths, Poetry Scotland, Poetry Now, TLS, the beat.

Sarah Ahmad lives in Pakistan. Her first chapbook is forthcoming from New Polish Beat Press and a second chap from Artistically Declined Press.

Jenny Enochsson lives in Uppsala, Sweden. She has an MA in Ethnology and Folklore and, at the moment, is studying to become a Swedish-English translator. Work is forthcoming in Spring issue of The Meadowland Review. Jenny Encochsson maintains a blog at Cinnamon and a collaborative poetry blog at Flowers of Sulfur

Claudette Cohen is from a leviathan corporation that moved her family every two years. Her work has appeared in: Lyric Poetry Review, Mississippi Review, Oklahoma Review, Squaw Valley Review, The Southern Anthology, Owen Wister Review, Fireweed, Mainstreet Rag, Earth's Daughters, and UWYO Magazine. Honors and awards include: Writer's residency, Ucross Foundation; Elsie Rohrbough Scholarship, U of Utah; Chesterfield Writer's Film Project, Semifinalist;  Scholarship, Squaw Valley Workshop, Poetry; Outstanding Thesis Award, Fiction, UNCW;  Heekin Group Finalist, Fiction;  Charles A. Shull Award, Poetry;  Thomas H. McDill Award, Poetry. More at http://claudelimogeswhat.blogspot.com/

Ayat Ghanem is a writer of poetry and fiction. Of Algerian origin, she was born in France and educated in the UK. Poems have been published in The Battered Suitcase, Sentinel Quaterly, Mastodon Dentist, Lynx Poetry and Poetry Super Highway.

Jean Jones, originally from Bandung, Indonesia, received a BA in English in 1986 from UNC-Wilmington, and an MFA in Creative Writing: Poetry in 1988 from Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio. Jean currently teaches Basic Skills at Cape Fear Community College in Wilmington, North Carolina. He has had two books of poetry published by St. Andrews Press from St Andrews College, North Carolina; the most recent, "Birds of Djakarta," was released in 2008. In addition, Jean Jones has a new book of poems entitled "Tornado" published by "Shaking Outta My Heart Press" from Wilmington, North Carolina.

Daniel Romo teaches high school creative writing, and lives in Long Beach, CA.  He has most recently been published in poeticdiversity, Monkeybicycle, and The Northville Review.  He is an MFA candidate at Antioch University Los Angeles.  More of his writing can be found here-   
http://danielromo.wordpress.com/   (Peyote Soliloquies)

Maggie Wack is a writer from Waltham, Massachusetts.

john patrick ayson lives in san diego where he makes various texts, visuals, & audios. He is the author of THE NONPAREIL(S), a trove of hybrid texts & literary constructs and holds a MFA in innovative writing. He has texts & visuals in the recent issues of LITnIMAGE & streetcake magazine, among others, & was a contributor to & coeditor of Fiction International.

explore more Canadian and International poets in the ditch, archive

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