Welcome!

Welcome to Pig Squash Press! You have arrived at the cyber-home, alter ego, publishing imprint and creative conduit connecting me – Kim Goldberg – to the rest of the planet (and possibly beyond).  My latest books are:

RED ZONE, a graffiti-strewn poem diary of homelessness in Nanaimo, BC, where I live. RED ZONE has been taught in literature courses at Vancouver Island University and elsewhere. Critics have compared it to the writings of Allen Ginsberg, Marge Piercy and John Steinbeck.

and Ride Backwards on Dragon: a poet’s journey through Liuhebafa – finalist for Canada’s Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. A collection of 66 linked poems following the 66-move sequence of the ancient martial art of Liuhebafa on a mythic quest for internal alchemy and immortality. Visit my Liuhebafagirl blog for deets on the book as well as my Pen & Dragon: Kung Fu for Writers workshops combining martial arts with creative writing exercises.

Make yourself comfy, have a boo at my blog postings about upcoming literary happenings and other current events, leave a comment, walk your dog, follow me on Twitter @KimPigSquash

May the metaphors be with you!

Kim Goldberg
goldberg@ncf.ca

Black Wave: The Legacy of the Exxon Valdez

Free public screening in Nanaimo of the award-winning, Canadian-made documentary Black Wave: The Legacy of the Exxon Valdez, produced and directed by Robert Cornellier. Sunday, June 3rd, 3:00 pm at Vancouver Island University – Bldg 200, Rm 203.

Film screening will be followed by a discussion with Sierra Club BC’s, Caitlyn Vernon, who will speak about the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway twin pipelines, and the planned expansion of the existing Kinder Morgan pipeline, and the accompanying supertanker traffic in coastal BC waters.

Demonstration in Cordova, Alaska as fishers recall Exxon’s promises

These pipelines and the increase in super-tanker traffic pose a serious threat to Vancouver Island’s beaches and waters as well as to BC’s Great Bear Rainforest, home of the Kermode ‘Spirit’ bear. This rainforest represents 25 per cent of the earth’s remaining ancient coastal temperate rainforests. An oil spill in BC waters would change our coast forever and alter BC’s economy and lifestyle.

Black Wave: The Legacy of the Exxon Valdez examines the aftermath of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil tanker spill in Alaska. Over two decades later, the oil is still there, lingering just below the surface. People and

Marine biologist Riki Ott digs at a beach on Knight Inlet displaying Exxon Valdez oil 18 years later.

wildlife are suffering from life-threatening illnesses, and the fishing industry has still not recovered.

This is also the kick-off event forming a local Sierra Club BC group in Nanaimo. Whether you are interested in joining a group or not, come and learn how an oil spill on our coast would impact you and your family.

Refreshments and discussion will follow the screening.

More info at: http://www.sierraclub.bc.ca/events/black-wave-the-legacy-of-the-exxon-valdez

BC NDP Betraying Voters on Smart Meters

Apparently British Columbians can’t count on a future NDP government to respect democratic process and the will of the people where smart meters are concerned. And Una St. Clair of Citizens for Safe Technology is doing something about that.

Earlier this month, in a long interview with Bill Good on CKNW radio, BC NDP leader Adrian Dix told Good: We’re likely stuck with smart meters, largely because about a billion dollars has been spent on the initiative. (See North Shore News article for full story on the Dix interview.)

Unacceptable, says Una St. Clair – the Executive Director of Citizens for Safe Technology. St. Clair says the NDP will lose the support of tens of thousands of voters if the party won’t commit to implementing a full moratorium on smart meters, a full public hearing on the smart meter program (bypassed by the BC Liberals), and a guaranteed opt-out system with no additional fees for customers and regions choosing to opt out.

Earlier this week, St. Clair fired off the following letter to Dix and NDP Energy Critic John Horgan. (As you may recall, Horgan is the New Democrat MLA who, back in November, presented a ‘No Smart Meters’ petition to Legislature with 15,000 signatures.)

UNA ST. CLAIR’S LETTER (May 8, 2012):

Dear Mr. Dix and Mr. Horgan:

I represent 40,000 individuals on petition and 41 municipalities across BC, including Vancouver, Surrey, Langley and Victoria, who are all personally and collectively asking for a full moratorium, or at the very least NO FEE OPT OUT for Smart Meters.

Mr. Dix – your comment [on CKNW radio] clearly showed you have no intention of returning BC to a place of democracy and freedom, with true respect for civil, democratic and human rights. I am at the point of advising our membership that your leadership will result in the same travesties with regard to the Smart Meter Program as are being suffered under the rogue Liberals, and therefore, we must absolutely remove all support for the NDP leadership campaign.

If there is some confusion here, and the NDP is willing to commit to the words John Horgan has spoken time and again, implementing a full moratorium, a full public hearing, and guaranteed NO FEE OPT OUTS for individuals and regions that choose, please advise me at the earliest opportunity. Win or lose, our membership will not stand behind any political party that supports the smart meter program.

If we hear nothing from you, we will take the news report below at face value and advise our membership accordingly. We are willing to meet with you personally and discuss this matter further.

Sincerely,

Una St.Clair

Executive Director

Citizens for Safe Technology Society

www.citizensforsafetechnology.org

~

Empowering the public to protect children & nature from unsafe wireless technologies

News report referenced in Letter:

http://www.nsnews.com/news/take+easy+pony+ride+power/6564449/story.html

Death of Earth

There are flood and drouth

Over the eyes and in the mouth,

Dead water and dead sand

Contending for the upper hand.

The parched eviscerate soil

Gapes at the vanity of toil,

Laughs without mirth.

         This is the death of earth.

~ 

T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets (“Little Gidding”, 1942)

In the Drift of Stars

The dance along the artery

The circulation of the lymph

Are figured in the drift of stars

~

T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets (“Burnt Norton”)

Don’t miss this phenomenal fusion of science and the arts on Sunday, May 6th (2012) at 7:30 pm at Yoga Weyr in South Wellington (1990 Frey Road, south of Nanaimo).

Experience a star talk and slide show with astronomer Dr. Bill Weller, followed by an astro-poetry presentation by poet Kim Goldberg, and concluding with a chance to embody the movement of the stars with dance artist Holly Bright. Then have an opportunity to create your own star-script with poetry or dance or both before we journey out into the night together.

Admission is by donation. If you are able to donate the full ticket price of $35, then please do. If not, please come anyway and pay whatever you can. We want you there!

This event is part of the Crimson Coast Dance Society‘s celebration of T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. More event listings here.

Wait Without Hope

 

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope

For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,

For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith

But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.

Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:

So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.

~ 

T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets (“East Coker”)

Lantzville’s Compassion Farm Continues to Be Harassed

This is the latest update on the ongoing multi-year harassment by local government of an organic farm in Lantzville, BC on Vancouver Island, just north of Nanaimo. Compassion Farm grows healthy, uncontaminated food for hundreds of families in the mid-Island region, including my own.

Media release from Compassion Farm:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, April 30, 2012, Lantzville, British Columbia

~

Last week Dirk Becker and Nicole Shaw of Compassion Farm in Lantzville, founders of the Bowen Road Farmers Market, received another letter from the District of Lantzville (D.O.L.).

This letter states they are contravening the DOL small business bylaw by selling rain barrels.

In January of this year, Becker and Shaw met with the new mayor and signed an agreement to discontinue the importation of any manure onto their property. They were given to understand that this agreement would appease council and were told it would appease their neighbor, Jim Brash, whose campaigning against their use of horse manure is on-going.

This April they were informed that council wants to ‘reinspect’ their property. Ensuing communication revealed that Council is unwilling to disclose what they are looking for. Therefore, Becker and Shaw responded that they see no point in yet another inspection since nothing of significance has changed since the last inspections–by various levels of government: Regional District of Nanaimo Bylaw Enforcement, the Vancouver Island Health Authority, the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Agriculture.

Further, no manure has been brought to the property in question since the above-mentioned agreement was signed.

On April 24th they received a letter informing them that council has a problem with their rain barrels.

In the same week, a friend who has donated grass clippings for 10 years shared a letter received from the RDN, threatening legal action if he continues to bring grass clippings to Compassion Farm.

“There doesn’t seem to be an end in sight,” says Becker. “The District of Lantzvile has moved the goal posts several times. Urban Farming is a global movement and is moving past being ‘allowed’ or ‘permitted’ to being supported, encouraged and protected”.

Contact: Dirk Becker, 250-390-5199

Also see: http://www.compassionfarm.jigsy.com/

~

Previous Chronology beginning 19 months ago

• September, 2010, a letter instructing Becker and Shaw  to “remove the piles of soil from the property”.

• a second letter arrived by courier on November 2nd, 2010, telling them “to cease all agricultural activity”. This letter stated that they were in contravention of the zoning bylaw and that home based businesses must be carried out within the dwelling unit or accessory building.

• DOL hired a lawyer and threatened the aspiring farmers with legal action.

• Supporters of the couple wrote several hundred letters, filled a petition with over 5,000 signatures and raised over $5,000.00 toward their legal bills.

• Becker and Shaw were banned from Lantzville’s 2011 annual family fair “Minetown Day” (having been the only agricultural booth over the last number of years).

• Becker and Shaw attended many public meetings in their attempts to resolve the issue.

• In the 2011 civic election Lantzville voter turnout jumped from from 22% to 44% and the mayor and the two councilors who were the most vocal against Becker/Shaw lost the election.

~

Salient points

• There are about 100 horses in Lantzville.

• for years D.O.L. workers delivered grass clippings from all of Lantzville’s parks to Compassion Farm.

• for several years, the Regional District of Nanaimo had Becker give rain barrel/water conservation workshops in the mid island area.

• the combined pressures of urbanization and industrial farming for export have squeezed local farmers to the point that more and more are giving up.

• Urban agriculture is recognised by the UNO as a growing necessity.

• 96% of Vancouver Island food is imported

• Less than 3% of land on Vancouver Island is arable

Green Fuse / Red Fuse – Double Chapbook Launch

2 Cool Kims… 2 Hot Chapbooks! Launching this Saturday at 11:30 am at Maffeo Sutton Park in Nanaimo (right after my free Qigong lesson there at 10:00 am).

Kim Goldberg & Kim Clark – doin’ it right! (or at least doin’ it rhymed) on the wrong side of the seagulls.

Watch the 2 Kims go mano-a-mano (in a literary sort of way). Free cookies will prevail throughout.

From Kim Goldberg’s corner: 

Igniting the Green Fuse – A chapbook anthology of eco-poetry (ecologically themed poetry) by four BC women poets: Kim Goldberg, Kate Braid, Catherine Owen, and Heidi Greco. The book was produced for the inaugural Cascadia Poetry Festival held March 2012 in Seattle. The four poets featured in Igniting the Green Fuse traveled to the festival to offer a workshop and panel discussion on eco-poetry, and to launch their chapbook. The limited edition chapbook is a collector’s item with only 100 copies in existence. Each copy is hand-sewn, numbered, and signed by all four authors.

Price: $10. Available from goldberg@ncf.ca  Limited edition of 100.

From Kim Clark’s corner: 

Disease and Desire - A manuscript of the body’s domain and the spirit’s will to fight the disease’s abduction of the body. Through determination, rage and the embrace of every moment, Kim Clark shows us she is not the victim of the disease, which is Multiple Sclerosis, and not the survivor, but master of the art of living regardless of the pain that interrupts her will. This manuscript is not for the glossy catalogues of platitudes that glaze over raw emotion.  Nor is it for the museum of documented sufferings.  This is the literary vivisection of a particular life displayed without pity.  As you read each page you will laugh and cry and be thankful for getting to know Kim through her unapologetic disclosures.

Price: $10 Available at kim@kimclarkwriter.com  Limited edition of 75.