Candace R. Curran- Poet Talk with Ellen Miller-Mack 8/22/2025

 

Audio only from the WMUA Podcast (also available on Spotify). Candace R. Curran's newest poetry collection, The Sound of Her Good Name, published by Slate Roof Press, is available here . Captions are available with the video (auto-generated). Photo by Doug Anderson

Miscellaneous Works

https://slateroofpress.com/books/the-sound-of-her-good-name.html 

 

https://masspoetry.org/getting-to-know-candace-curran/  

 

Six Feet Between and Under by Candace R. Curran – Straw Dog Writers Guild

 

Eagle Reserve / Candace Curran — Writing the Land   

 

Have You Ever Won/What is This About: Two Poems | The Typescript 

 

 

  >New Book- The Sound of Her Good Name 

Winner of the Elyse Wolf Prize/ Slate Roof Press Chapbook Contest!

 Order here- https://www.slateroofpress.com/books/the-sound-of-her-good-name.html

Close Call

How we find each other in a good dinner
down back streets with the music of Fruit Bats
and drive&listen a choreography of liquored
romancing and kitchendancing until enough
is enough of this happyhorseshit and you turn
the switch     the we never know when we’ll wake
dreamscape     the place where snap and dinner’s over
in the streets of Saigon     Paris on motorbikes
the symphony of full bodied reds     Cowboy Junkies
and kitchen dances when I am sent home because
you’ve had enough of this    each in the other’s
arms    where you could lose yourself if not careful

 

Unbuttoned Presents Series!

June 9, 2023- Slate Roof Press poets Candace R. Curran and Janet MacFadyen definitely rocked the boat at Luthier's last night in Easthampton, MA, as part of the Unbuttoned Presents Series!

 

Speak Easy - Open Mic

You are invited to Speak Easy, a poetry open mic featuring local poets, Jody Stewart & Candace Curran at the Buckland Public Library. Friday, October 28th from 6 to 7 pm. Sign up for 5 minute slots at 5:45 pm.

The Winner of the 2022 Elyse Wolf Prize/ Slate Roof Press Annual Chapbook Contest!

Congratulations to Candace R. Curran,  winner of the 2022 Elyse Wolf Prize/ Slate Roof Press Annual Chapbook Contest!

We have the honor to announce the selection of The Sound of Her Good Name, by Candace R. Curran of Shelburne Falls, MA, as the winner of our 2022 chapbook contest. Candace becomes the newest member of Slate Roof Press, and receives the $500 Elyse Wolf Prize and publication of her chapbook in an art-quality edition. This year we focused on poets from our home territory in western Massachusetts. Finalists: Sarah Levine of Easthampton, MA, for Each Knuckle with Sugar Annie G. Rogers of Amherst, MA, for Becoming Bird We thank everyone who participated for their considerable time, work, and heart in preparing and submitting a manuscript. The selection process was difficult; we received many excellent manuscripts representing a broad spectrum of poetic styles and concerns, and each one was carefully considered. Our selection process was blind. About the winning author and manuscript   Candace R. Curran is the author of Playing in Wrecks, and a co-author of the collaboration, Bone Cages (with John Hodgen, Doug Anderson, and others), both published by Haley’s Press. Her poems have been published in Meat For Tea, Silkworm, RAWNerVZ, and elsewhere; and anthologized in Writing the Land, Honoring Nature, WTL: Northeast, Poet’s Seat Poetry Silver Anniversary, Compass Roads, and Poems in the Time of Covid. She has won the Poets Seat Contest twice. Candace has organized and participated in word and image collaborations including Four On The Floor, Three On a Tree, INTERFACE I-I0, and Exploded View. She has also served children and adults for many years in both public and school libraries. Candace's partner is a librarian, and books are an important part of their world. We at Slate Roof were drawn to The Sound of Her Good Name for its truth telling, piercing perceptions of human behavior, and fierce momentum. It is an open-eyed, heart-felt manuscript that handles the most difficult material with grace and craft. Here is an excerpt: Daisy Ring He sets about stringing a necklace if she'll have it      taking up her wrists placing them around his own neck he believes he loves her     she loves him not     and most likely he can’t make her sing but     what won’t she do to skirt that sting    so he collars her     welding as fast as petals fall    weaving her to his thin wishbone    on vines he hopes will take

 

Upper Downtown Looks/Feels Like Another Country