Nov 13
2011

My time has finally arrived!!!

My time has finally arrived!!! This morning I received a phone call from Deerbrook Editions saying they are about to mail me a publishing contract for my full-length poetry manuscript, No Passing Zone. It will be published sometime during the next two years.

And…, as often happens in life, my chapbook, “Certain,” has hit Finishinglinepress.com ’s website for preorders. We go through years of thinking we’re onto something as we create, but aren’t sure anyone else thinks so and then, poof, we’re recognized all at once. At least, that is the hope. I’ve waited a long time and am grateful for whatever comes my way. So here’s the scoop, Finishing Line Press doesn’t have a lot of funds and will determine my pressrun by the amount of books I pre-sell.
If you would like to purchase a copy of “Certain,” please go to Finishinglinepress.com and click on “Preorder Forthcoming Titles,” and scroll down to “Certain,” then click on the blue tab that says “Buy Now.” Thank you so much.

Here’s a preview of my endorsements:

A collection to savor, Donna Reis’s spirited, tender, droll, and haunted lyric poems spin an inverted fairy tale where lovers are middle-aged and battle-tough, but also burnished to a sheen reflecting compassion, tolerance, and a dry, enduring humor. Old enough to know life seldom unfolds as we expect–they have learned to love the unexpected and their compatible quirks; his “melancholy nostalgia,” her eye-rolling. They have learned to entertain and embrace ghosts, and to rescue each other with a mature, certain love. –April Ossmann, author of Anxious Music

Perhaps my favorite Donna, of the many wonderful Donnas in this new collection, writes: “There’s no use in stopping,” and makes it the first line of the collection. Or “There’s crazy Kate down / in the ruins forever building walls, / flying her blue-blooded flag / like a Keep Out sign, hoarding / matches, storing cans of gasoline,….” Or deftly structures a prose poem solely from the names of her beloved musician’s bands, called (what else?) “Tom’s Bands.” Tender, tough, funny, innocent, old soul, original: Donna Reis can’t help being good company. BE CERTAIN OF IT!
–Estha Weiner, author of Transfiguration Begins at Home

Thanks again for your friendship and support.

Nov 3
2011

Killer Verse poems of murder and mayhem

Book Launch Reading

Killer Verse poems of murder and mayhem

published by Knopf in their Everyman’s Library Series

on Friday, November 11th

at 6:00 pm

The Cornelia Street Cafe

29 Cornelia Street

(in the West Village)

New York, New York   10014

(212) 989 - 9319

(They have a wonderful website with good directions)

Poets Reading: Ryan Black, Philip Dacey, Mark Doty, Cornelius Eady, Melissa Fadul, Rigoberto Gonzalez, Audrey Gritsman, Kimiko Hahn, Jan Heller-Levi, Marie Howe, Donna Reis, Caitlin Thompson, Michael Waters, & Estha Weiner.

Mar 16
2011

KILLER VERSE Book Launch at Cornelia Street Café

November 11, 2011

6 PM

Harold Schechter presiding

Readers:

  1. Ryan Black

  2. Philip Dacey

  3. Mark Doty •

  4. Cornelius Eady •

  5. Melissa Fadul

  6. Rigoberto Gonzalez

  7. Andrey Gritsman

  8. Kimiko Hahn

  9. Jan Heller-Levi

  10. Marie Howe •

  11. Donna Reis

  12. Caitlin Thompson

  13. Michael Waters

  14. Estha Weiner

Jun 3
2010

Tuxedo Park School Alumni Newsletter - Spring 2010 (Exerpt)

Tuxedo Park School Newsletter (Spring 2010) - Exerpt

Tuxedo Park School Newsletter (Spring 2010) - Exerpt

Apr 10
2010

It’s National Poetry Month!!!

I will be taking part in an assembly
on Friday, April 16th at 2:20 pm
at Tuxedo Park School
Mountain Farm Road
Tuxedo Park, NY 10987
For info contact
fduffy@tuxedoparkschool.org
Benefit for Pet Med Fund
Sunday, May 16th from 3:00 ~ 5:00 pm
Poets, Dancers, Puppets, Silent Auction,
50/50 Raffle and Refreshments at Black Dirt Dance Center
198 Glenwood Road
Pine Island, NY For info contact:
Gaia Dance Collective / EGG & Dancers
(845) 355-9051
Nov 4
2009

A letter from Tuxedo Park Elementry School

Tuxedo Park School
Mountain Farm Road
Tuxedo Park, NY 10987

Dear Ms. Reis,

I have just finished reading “Blairhame,” from your chapbook, Incantations and am moved to write and ask for your permission to print, frame and hang this beautiful poem in our school. Every year the English Department has a week-long poetry celebration. We would be so honored if you would pay us a visit during that time. You would be so inspiring to our budding poets.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,

Fiona Duffy, Alumni Associate

Nov 4
2009

Warwick Valley Poets’

Warwick Valley Poets’

presents

Donna Reis

When: Sat. November 21st
4 - 6 pm

Where: Baby Grand Books
7 West Street, Warwick, NY 10990
(845) 986 - 6165
www.babygrandbooks.com

Aug 24
2009

Upcoming Reading - A Haunting Reading of Ghost Stories

Thursday, October 29th, 2009 @ 7:00
A Haunting Reading of Ghost Stories
from “Seeking Ghosts in the Warwick Valley”
GVG Creations
3 Winkler Place
Chester, NY 10918
(845) 469 - 6683

Aug 23
2009

Tom’s Bands

Tom’s Bands

The Man-Childs, The Wormwood Scrubs,
The Counts, Pure Space, The Happy Fish
and Chicken Band, The Man-Childs II, Blue
Goose, Quarry Road, Larry and the Shoes,
The Rockabilly Shufflers, Cabin Fever, The
Secrets, Katie and The Meadow Muffins,
Gramolini, Angel Train, The Blue Hill
Kickers, The Sourmash Boys, Somebody’s
Sister, Armadillo, Celtic Clan, Sunday’s
Well, Inchicore, The Dublin City Ramblers,
The Luck of the Draw, The Urban Legends,
The Unreliable Narrators, Mister Cranky.

Donna Reis

Aug 8
2009

Toro Hill

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.
… for a while I could not enter, for the way was
barred to me. ~Daphne DuMaurier

Your dead aunt’s chimney stands
like a blacksmith’s forge as you crest
the drive, your home surrounded
by a cemetery of stone foundations,
tumbling tenant houses and trees as old
as fairy tales about to topple. A staircase
rises to the brambled sky. Your grandfather’s
mansion turned hotel now lies charred
from a jilted piano player
who murdered his lover,
then shot himself in a sea of blinking
ancestors. There are dead horses in the
paddock, remnants of the pool,
tennis courts and gardens even the deer
have long forgotten. Taxes that would kill
anyone, parched water pipes that clang,
“Go away.” Crazy Kate in the gardener’s
cottage forever building walls,
flying her blue blooded flag
like a keep-out sign, hoarding
matches, storing cans of gasoline.

-Donna Reis

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