Todd Boss, poet

January 3, 2012

All Things to All People

I’m in love with a theater company that presents great theater to non-traditional audiences (in shelters, prisons, and the like). Now, I know what you’re thinking: They’re probably no good. Why else would they troop to prisons? Why else would they have no flashy permanent home to perform in?

Actually, Ten Thousand Things Theater Company (named for the Zen idea that the universe is made up of ten thousand things) is consistently ranked “best” of the Twin Cities by the major critics. The work is heart-stoppingly good. The actors are the best in town. The director, Michelle Hensley, is hands-down one of the city’s most talented. If you have a chance to be in one of their public audiences, I can’t encourage it enough. Read the rest of this entry »

Aside | October 14, 2011

Have screening. Will travel.

Last night I drove three hours north from the Twin Cities to the tiny log cabin library in Cable, Wisconsin, where 15 people had come out of the woods on a Thursday night to hear me read my poetry and show a few motionpoems. I’ve read my poetry and screened Motionpoems’ films for groups of hundreds, but I love doing events like these where I can get to know individual audience members and get their feedback on the work. Read the rest of this entry »

4 comments

September 16, 2011

Moving poems. Moving.

On October 25th, I’ll be joined by Motionpoems co-founder Angella Kassube and Best American Poetry series editor David Lehman to present a collaborative series of 12 poetry films inspired by poems in BAP’s 2011 volume.

Read the rest of this entry »

September 13, 2011

I’ve been broadsided.

This poem, to be published in POETRY in November, is now available as a hand-penciled broadside by calligrapher Emily Snyder (“Queen Quills“). Groovy, ain’t it?
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2 comments

September 13, 2011

Flipping cool.

Animated poetry in a hand-held device!

Designer / animator Angella Kassube has turned my short poem “God Flips” into a bound paper flip book! How flipping cool is that? Angella’s my co-directing partner at Motionpoems, she’s a typeface junkie like me, and she loves making things move.

It’s old-school animation… in a mobile device! Read the rest of this entry »

July 20, 2011

I’m covered.

Here’s the cover of my second poetry collection, PITCH, due out in February 2012 from W. W. Norton & Company.

It was a shock to see it, at first. PITCH is a collection of poems that spiral from a specific event: the time that my father lost the family piano off the back of his pickup truck when I was 12. The accident took place at the very rural, heavily forested corner of County Highway NL and State Highway 27, just east of Fall Creek, Wisconsin.

But this piano, in this picture? This here’s a city piano. I doubt it’s ever seen a field or woods. Read the rest of this entry »

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July 1, 2011

Commission me.

Some things are just plain hard to express. It doesn’t matter if you’re a poet or not: When something happens that touches the poetry part of our brains, we don’t always know how to access or explain it. But we know it has value; we feel it like a weight or an urge or a pressure. We ask ourselves, “What does it mean?” and “Why is it important?”

I like to work with people to discover the hidden meanings in their lives, and to use poetry to pinpoint and articulate those hidden meanings.

I can be hired to write a poem for you. Read the rest of this entry »

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Aside | October 14, 2011

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