Available Now

Conversations with Gravel

Available Now, Poetry Collections, Sarah Thursday

Full-length poetry collection, Conversations with Gravel by Sarah Thursday. 110-pages, perfect bound, with cover and interior art by Jennifer Takahashi. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“In Conversations with Gravel, Sarah Thursday dissects love affairs gone wrong with surgical precision. These remarkable poems spare no one. Thursday and her lovers each bear the responsibility and the sorrow. How to win while losing at love? With exquisite imagery and unflinching honesty, these poems show us how.” —Alexis Rhone Fancher, poetry editor, Cultural Weekly

“Sarah Thursday’s Conversations with Gravel are also conversations with conflict (‘you want me bath-soaked, / I need you tree-hollow’), grief, eroticism, self-discovery and courage (‘Keep kicking through splintered wood and twisted metal’). Her voice is fluid, honest, not afraid of vulnerability, not afraid of showing her strength: ‘my name is not prey'”. — Mariano Zaro, Author of Tres Letras and The House at Mae Rim

“The poems in Sarah Thursday’s Conversations with Gravel do not spare our feelings or soften the hammer-blows to the heart of love gone wrong. Sit back, take a deep breath, read. Such poetry allows us to grieve and rejoice together, making the world a more hospitable, less fearsome place.” —Donna Hilbert, Author of Gravity: New and Selected Poems

Seventeen Poems Not About a Lover

Available Now, Poetry Chapbooks, Sarah Thursday

Seventeen Poems Not About a Lover, by founder of Sadie Girl Press, Sarah Thursday, published by Arroyo Seco Press is a 38 page, perfect-bound chapbook. It includes paper-cut illustrations for each poem by Alyssandra Nighswonger. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

Seventeen Poems Not About a Lover is a collaboration between poet, Sarah Thursday, and artist, Alyssandra Nighswonger. After six years of friendship and artistic crushing, this dream project came to life. Though the poems intentionally avoid the topic of romantic love, they deal with love and loss from family and inner personal struggle. Each of the seventeen poems has a custom papercut illustration, hand-cut and photographed for a 3-D effect.

Alyssandra Nighswonger is a multi-media artist and adventure-lover from Long Beach, CA. This project was a swan dive into the heart and a journey in itself. The thing that Alyssandra admires the most about her friend Sarah is the way she takes her own personal challenges and creates an alchemy of the heart with her raw and fearlessly beautiful poetry. For Alyssandra, who can be a lot more timid with exposing the darker side of her emotions in her music and art and tends to hide meaning behind whimsy on the regular, this collaboration was a thematic challenge. It led to creating deeper layers in the illustrations, opening them up to being cut apart, and exposing that even the cutest wolf has a shadow, which developed this work into a papercut escapade. You can explore several of her musical projects and adventures at talesofalyssandra.com or follow her instagram @alyssssandra.

Incandescent Mind: Selfish Work

Art and Poetry Anthologies

Incandescent Mind: Selfish Work is a full-color, 8.5 x 11″ journal of poetry, prose, art, and photography addressed to the self. 78 authors and artists contribute to this 90 page collection. Layout, design, and editing by Sarah Thursday with additional editing and selection by Terry Ann Wright, G. Murray Thomas, Marianne Stewart, Keayva Mitchell, and Alyssa Matuchniak.

Much like popular “selfies”, contributors turn the focus of their work on themselves. Beyond the sake of vanity, these selfies are intimate snapshots of a contributor’s personhood. They address the self of the present, past, future, alternate versions, or physical parts in letters, postcards, warnings, reminders, lists, and loving tributes. Available at the Sadie Girl Bookstore.

Selfish Work includes contributions from: Alex Diffin, Alexis Rhone Fancher, Allegra Forman, Alyssa J Wynne, Amanda Martin, Amanda Mathews, Amy Bassin,  Ana Jovanovska, Angela Topping, Anney Ryan, Armine Iknadossian, Ashley Elizabeth, Avalon Graves, Bailey Share Aizic, Boris Ingles, Brenda Matea, Carolyn Agee, Christine Stoddard, Cindy Rinne, Clifton Snider, D S Chapman, Daniel McGinn, Daniela Voicu, Danielle Mitchell, Don Kingfisher Campbell, Donna Hilbert, E R Zhang, Ed Baines, Edward Distor, Erika Ayon, Fernando Gallegos, G. Murray Thomas, Jenni Belotserkovsky, Jennifer Takahashi, Jettie Krantz, jill emery, Jim Coke, JL Martindale, Jonathan Yungkans, Joy Shannon, Kelsey Bryan-Zwick, Kimberly Cobian, Kimberly Esslinger, Kimmy Alan, Kit Courter, LaLa Deville, Larry Colker, LeAnne Hunt, Linda Singer, Mahssa Hosseini, Marc Cid, Marcela Marquez, Marianne Peel, Matt Rouse, Michael  Cantin, Michele Vavonese, Nancy Lynee Woo, Natalie Hirt, Nicole Connolly, Odilia Galván Rodríguez, Rachel Kann, RaeAnn Crunk Yinger, Raundi Moore Kondo, Ricki Mandeville, Robin Axworthy, Sarah Thursday, Sharon Elliott, Shelby Pendergast, Stephanie Harper, Steve Ramirez, Steven Lossing, Sukyi Naing, Tamara Hattis, Taylor Xavier, Terri Niccum, Tobi Alfier, Victor Ladd, and Wynne Henry.

body of water

Chestina Craig, Poetry Chapbooks

body of water by Chestina Craig. 36-page, perfect bound chapbook of poetry and photography. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“When you are a girl, you are born with a heavy that manifests in your arms and legs, in the hole in your stomach, and in the swells of your tongue. Craig gives a name to these manifestations. All these poems were born in the ocean or were born in her heart; sometimes I think both of these are the same. She counts the heavy, knows it, faces it, loves it in all the forms in comes into a woman’s body and somehow gives them words.” ~Farah Billah, author of Wrong Turns Lead Here

“In her poems, Chestina guides the reader through personal narrative with a sharp imagination that both shocks & surprises at every turn. I find myself discovering something new on every page—about the natural world, about love on one’s own terms, & about the celebration of self. Her poems are vulnerable & massive at the same time as she unpacks what it means to live & stay alive. She is unafraid to affirm her own right to take up space & she does so with a “knife-in-boot confidence” that is entirely her own.” ~Brandon Melendez, Berkeley Grand Slam Champion

“Chestina is a nuanced voice in the burgeoning poetry renaissance in Long Beach, California. Her work serves as a backdrop of landscapes natural and cerebral with the most intrinsic f-words laced intentionally throughout. She’s dope, read her words.” ~Antonio Cortez Appling, founder of The Long Beach Poetry Slam

Incandescent Mind: Issue Two

Art and Poetry Anthologies, Daniel McGinn, Esmeralda Villalobos, JL Martindale, Kelsey Bryan-Zwick, Larry Duncan, Nancy Lynée Woo, Raquel Reyes-Lopez, Sarah Thursday, Terry Ann Wright

Incandescent Mind: Issue Two, Winter 2017 is a full-color, 8.5 x 11″ journal of poetry, prose, and art focused on mental and emotional health. From mental illness, physical ailments, death, and loss, to PTSD, body image issues, family dysfunction, and more, 64 authors and artists share their light on what fuels their internal fires. Edited by Sarah Thursday and with additional editorial support from Raquel Reyes-Lopez, Robin Axworthy, Jeri Thompson, Frank Kearns, Clifton Snider, Terry Wright, and Karie McNeley. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“Incandescent Mind: Issue Two, Winter 2017 explores the beauty and grit of the human psyche and what it takes to deal with adversity, to survive, to sometimes admit defeat, to thrive, to heal. This is a collection of joy, sorrow, confusion, and love, but most importantly it is a collection of life, the persistence to exist, and express brightly in a world that often tries to keep the lights dim.” —Karie McNeley, editor of Bank Heavy Press

“Here, deftly chronicled in poetry, prose, photography, and art, is a stunningly self-aware exposition of our humanity—our fears and failings, broken places, lost loves. Memory and regret. Fragility, and the strength that is its counterpoint. How we feel when life crashes into us, opens its mouth and swallows our dreams. The things we cannot bear, but do. There is commonality and comfort in these pages, the universal balm of shared experience. Hold their insights like a mirror to your life. Open them and find light breaking through.” —Ricki Mandeville, author of A Thin Strand of Lights

“There is beauty in strength, in fragility, in having the courage to face one’s darkest fears and speak them aloud. Even as thoughts plague us, we construct a paper-thin veneer of normalcy that occasionally catches fire when the mind, furiously incandescent, burns too brightly. Those of us who have felt those flames, those who have fanned or ignited them, realize how precious it is when everything burns away, leaving nothing but truth. This second volume of Incandescent Mind fuses art with words which, together, burn more brightly.” —Sander Roscoe Wolff, author of Musings of a Dunderhead

Authors and Artists include: Adrian Ernesto Cepeda, Alex Diffin, Alexis Rhone Fancher, Alise Brillault, Amanda Mathews, Betsy Mars, Boris Ingles, Brandon Dumais, Chestina Craig, Daniel McGinn, Donald Illich, Donna Hilbert, Donny Jackson, E. Amato, Elder Zamora, Ellen Stone, Eric Morago, Esmeralda Villalobos, Faith Gobeli, Fernando Gallegos, George Hammons, HERFJERF, Jackie Joice, Jeffrey Alfier, Jeri Thompson, JL Martindale, Karina Lutz, Keayva Mitchell, Kelsey Bryan-Zwick, Kevin Ridgeway, Kim Sharp, Larry Duncan, Lauri Langston, LeAnne Hunt, Linda Singer, Lynn Azali, Lynne Viti, Mariano Zaro, Mark Smith-Soto, Michele Rene, Michele Vavonese, Mick Victor, Nancy Correro, Nancy Lynée Woo, Natalie Morales, Raquel Reyes-Lopez, Ricardo Vidana, Robert Hoffman, Robin Dawn Hudecheck, Robin Steere Axworthy, Rose Mary Neff, Sarah Lim, Sarah Thursday, Sharon Elliott, Stephanie Barbé Hammer, Steven Hendrix, Tami Hattis, Terri Niccum, Tiffany Dawn Hasse, Tony Gloeggler, Torrin A. Greathouse, Valentina Thompson, Victor Gulvan, and Yeggi Kaela Watts.

Doe Eyed Venus

Available Now, Elmast Kozloyan, Poetry Chapbooks

Debut chapbook, Doe Eyed Venus, by Elmast Kozloyan. 18 pages, perfect bound with cover “Rorschach Test” art. 2nd edition printing in collaboration with Inside Lantern Press. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“Elmast Kozloyan’s poetry is a feast of enchantment—her grasp for language, evidence she is not from this world entirely, but from a place of pure magic where words crowned her their queen.  Thankfully she has stepped away from that realm and into this one to share with us, Doe Eyed Venus.  This fine collection of poems explores the alchemy of a hungry youth into an empowered adult, one who is unafraid to find strength in her desires and learns to rule over them with grace.  And while I may be under her spell, I am of right mind when I say: Elmast is a poet to keep an eye on.” ~Eric Morago, Author of What We Ache For and Here For The Friction

Incandescent Mind: Issue One, Summer 2016

Art and Poetry Anthologies, Available Now, Raquel Reyes-Lopez, Sarah Thursday
Cover art by Ricardo Vidana

Cover art by Ricardo Vidana

Incandescent Mind: Issue One, Summer 2016 is a full-color, 8.5 x 11″ journal of poetry, prose, and art focused on mental and emotional health. From mental illness, physical ailments, death, and loss, to PTSD, body image issues, family dysfunction, and more, 48 authors and 23 artists share their light on what fuels their internal fires. Edited by Sarah Thursday and co-edited by Raquel Reyes-Lopez, with additional support from Robin Axworthy, Jeri Thompson, Frank Kearns, Clifton Snider, and Keri McNeley. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

Authors and artists included in Issue One: A. Riding, Adrian Cepeda, Aja Beech, Alexis Rhone Fancher, Amanda Martin, Amanda Mathews, Andrew Brown, Anna Szilagyi, Boris Ingles, Brandi Conder, Brandon Dumais, Cat Brendel, Daniel McGinn, Darcy Smith, Donald Illich, E. Laura Golberg, E. Amato, Ed Baines, Elder Zamora, Ellen Stone, Erika Ayón, Garrett Hoffman, Jackie Joice, Jane Roe, John Guzlowski, Joy Shannon, K. Andrew Turner, Kara Dennison, Ken Oddist Jones, Kerfe Roig, Kevin Ridgeway, Kim Sharp, Kit Couter, Kristina England, Laura Saint Martin, Lauri Langston, Leah Mueller, Lynn Azali, Lynne Viti, Mariano Zaro, Mark Smith-Soto, Mary McCarthy, Michael Cantin, Michele Rene, Nancy Correro, Natalie Hirt, Natalie Morales, Nina Bannett, Nina Johnson, Ola Faleti, Ricardo Vidana, Robert Hoffman, Robin Axworthy, Roopa Dudley, Sander Wolff, Sarah Davis, Sarah Lim, Serena Solin, Sharon Elliott, Stephanie Barbe Hammer, Stephen Linsteadt, Steve Lossing, Susan Solomon, Taylor Flynn, TC Boyd, Tim Perez, Tobi Alfier, Tony Gloeggler, Torrin Greathouse, Victoria Griffin, and Yeggi Kaela Watts.

How to Unexist

Poetry Chapbooks, Poetry Recordings, Sarah Thursday

Limited edition poetry with CD and chapbook, How to Unexist, by Sarah Thursday with music by BobKat. 12-track album, recorded and mixed by Blacksheep Music, with 20-page, full color, mini-chapbook. Art by Lynn Azali. Available online at the Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“How to Unexist is no easy listen. Drawing from intensely personal reflections, the 24-minute album is a raw, articulate journey through Thursday’s psyche amid pain, heartbreak, self-acceptance and cognizance. Her cutting delivery doesn’t pander or add flair; the poet’s voice is truthful and clear. Juxtaposed with BobKat’s ambient soundscapes—largely improvisational layers of rhythmic acoustic guitar riffs, fiery violin melodies as well as some horn, bass synths and mandolin—her words sink with impact.” Esther Kang, Long Beach Post

Drunk on Ophelia

Ken Oddist Jones, Larry Duncan, Poetry Chapbooks

Chapbook, Drunk on Ophelia, by Larry Duncan with digital art by Ken Oddist Jones. 42 pages, perfect bound. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“With Drunk on Ophelia, a work both delicate and bold, Larry Duncan has crafted a narrative written in the hot neon and rain splattered city streets—a place that lives in the haunted eyes of its inhabitants. This is the city split open, writhing, the fist through the wall, the gentle call of a lover through a door. Duncan is a master at naming all the unnameable things—always returning us to the body of experience. What you’re left with is the negative space—the here and not here, seen and unseen, the loved and the unloved. Drunk on Ophelia takes you so far down into humanity’s loneliness and heart break that when you emerge on the other side, blinking in the new light, you find yourself eerily whole.” Ally Malinenko, author of How To Be An American

“Drunk on Ophelia is a black and white movie projected onto the graffiti’d walls of an alleyway for nighthawks to enjoy after hours at diners still alive in obscurity, where sincere and visionary poets like Larry Duncan capture each and every midnight movie frame on cocktail napkins next to girl’s numbers written in stranger’s lipstick, poems that bleed with “the feel” of timeless lost souls who lurk in the last private corners not hit by the indifference of a California sunrise, where these poems make passionate, barroom sink love to an endangered muse dressed to the nines in perfect authenticity.  Duncan leaves you jealous that you’re not out there past midnight alongside him, but he’s generous enough to let us all tag along for a little while in this sensual collection of masterful, honest poetry.” Kevin Ridgeway, author of Contents Under Pressure (Crisis Chronicles Press)

Nature Studies

Available Now, Poetry Chapbooks, Terry Ann Wright

Debut chapbook, Nature Studies by Terry Ann Wright. 45 pages, perfect bound, 6×6 inches. Illustrated with Victorian style scientific drawings to compliment her biting poems. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“Each poem in these “Nature Studies” is a precise scalpel of human relationships. We could say that this book is an anatomy/botany/cartography of attraction and rejection, of desire and oblivion. The poems are complex, vocative (many of them built in the “you” voice), rich in sound, piercing. The author exercises a sort of contemporary, Victorian contention to fully explore passion, disorder. It is in this movement between exposure and form where the pages of this book breathe, come to life. The reader hears echoes of William Blake (“The Sick Rose”) and Emily Dickinson (“Started Early-Took My Dog”) but most of all, we hear the distinctive voice of Terry Ann Wright–daring, unapologetic.” ~Mariano Zaro, author of Tres letras/Three Letters