Cascadia Poetics LAB
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Mission Statement
Mission: Empowering people to practice poetry & deepen connections to place, self & the present moment.
About This Cause
We believe that poetry is the nexus at which self-knowledge, bioregionalism and expansive creativity converge. Cascadia Poetics Lab is a vibrant community whose workshops, festivals, and opportunities for connection can open the door to transformative experiences. Our Poetry Postcard Fest, Cascadia Poetry Festival, Cascadian Prophets podcast and historic audio archives and our publishing work are all ways in which we have put that mission into practice since 1993. History Cascadia Poetics LAB was founded December 14, 1993 (with a different name) in Auburn, WA, by Paul E Nelson, with the mission of creating a weekly, syndicated radio public affairs interview program that aired, at the height of syndication, on 18 stations weekly, including KING-FM, KMTT-FM, the Mountain, KZOK, KJR AM & FM, and stations in Bellingham, Portland & Victoria, BC. We’ve created over 700 hours of interview programming, much of which is online at https://.CascadianProphets.org. Main Programs The Poetry Postcard Fest founded in 2007 is an annual 56 day experiment in spontaneity and community-building where registered participants send postcard poems to other poets on their list. The Cascadia Poetry Festival is a gathering of poets and bioregionalists to consider how prioritizing natural and cultural boundaries, rather than arbitrary political ones, is a potent approach to addressing Anthropogenic Climate Disorder. A key theme in the work of Gary Snyder, we believe that bioregionalism is an inherently political act to focus energy locally and thus the effort to connect with poets and writers from Cascadia, the bioregion in which we live. Our historic audio interview archive with audio taken from over 700 interviews conducted since 1993 and the Cascadian Prophets podcast. Publishing, such as anthologies like Make it True: Poetry from Cascadia and Cascadian Zen via our imprint Watershed Press.Watershed Press logo on Mclosky Map Online (& in person) workshops such as Poetics as Cosmology. Our archives were donated to the White River Valley Museum in Auburn in 2018. The book “American Prophets” was published for our 25th anniversary. It features interviews conducted by Founding Director Paul E Nelson, with: Thinkers/Activists: Gloria DeGaetano; Rupert Sheldrake; Jean Houston and Larry Dossey, Poets: Jerome Rothenberg; Allen Ginsberg; Anne Waldman; Sam Hamill; Michael McClure; Wanda Coleman; Brenda Hillman and Nathaniel Mackey and Technicians of the Sacred: Phyllis Curott; Bhagavan Das; E. Richard Atleo and Beaver Chief. The SPLAB literary project was launched in 1996 in Auburn in an old livery stable at 14 S. Division and lasted until 2004. SPLAB at that time was known as the SPokenword LAB – hence SPLAB. In 2009 we moved to Seattle, pivoted to a total literary arts focus and opened a space in Columbia City (2010-2012.) In 2012 SPLAB produced the first Cascadia Poetry Festival & started a 20 year bioregional cultural investigation of Cascadia. We produced Cascadia Poetry Festivals in 2014 and 2016 in Seattle, 2015 with Wordstorm in Nanaimo, BC, 2017 in Tacoma and 2019 in Anacortes. In 2007 we created the Poetry Postcard Fest. 2021 marked the 15th year of a project (which in 2024) involved over 608 poets from all over the world sending original poems on postcards to other poets. The anthology 56 Days of August: Poetry Postcards was published in 2017. CPL also conceived of & helped create other anthologies including 2025's Winter in America (Again: Poets Respond to 2025 Election, Cascadian Prophets Vol. I & II (2023, 2024), 2015’s Make It True: Poetry From Cascadia, 2019’s Samthology: A Tribute to Sam Hamill and 2019’s Make it True meets Medusario a bilingual poetry anthology featuring Cascadia poets and poets of the Latin American neobarroco school. Paul E Nelson is a poet/interviewer who serves as Literary Executor for the late Sam Hamill, poet, translator, editor and Founder of Copper Canyon Press. 9.6.2021