Nils Peterson:  

At Evergreen Grammar School œOh thou sublime, sweet evening star, we sang in Miss Nelson'™s seventh grade music class the year I fell from melody. I sang alto, then, leapt the clef chasm, to tenor, then, to the low line where I stood beneath the sway of the other voices sustaining like the floor of the sea. Joyful we greet thee from afar. We sang our Wagner with thin voices, yet something of how the spirit reaches, yearns, and is comforted came to us. Wordrunner eChapbooks announces publication of Talk in the Reading Room, a Memoir by Nils Peterson Talk in the Reading Room. Memoir by Nils Peterson. The voice and memories of a poet. Peterson's narratives are lyrical and compassionate, edged with irony and longing. Wordrunner eChapbooks takes great pride and pleasure in announcing publication of our winter 2014 echapbook: Talk in the Reading Room by Nils Peterson. The first poet laureate of Silicon Valley meditates on the meaning and mystery of memory, looking back on his childhood as the son of a chauffeur in New York and his college days in Eastern Kentucky. This is an insightful and often funny memoir from a member of the last generation to grow up without TV or coed dormitories. Hyperlinks to photos, videos and background articles have been added to enhance and deepen the reading. You may also download a pdf version to print and read at your leisure. Let us know what you think about it. Visit the Wordrunner eChapbook Facebook page to comment on any of these narratives. Life Nils Peterson taught in the English and Humanities Departments at San Jose State University from 1963 to 1999. He was Coordinator of the Creative Writing Emphasis for more than 20 years, and served as Coordinator of the Creative Arts and Chair of the Humanities Department. He was chosen as Professor of the Year by the Student Honor Society. He has published poems in many journals, has written science fiction, as well as articles on subjects as varying as golf and Shakespeare. A chapbook of poems entitled Here Is No Ordinary Rejoicing was published by No Deadlines Press, a collection of poems entitled The Comedy of Desire with an introduction by Robert Bly was published by the Blue Sofa Press and a collection of poems entitled Driving a Herd of Moose to Durango appeared in 2005. He was poetry consultant for San Jose State Studies and was an editor for Discover America, a collection of poems celebrating the bicentennial anniversary of the USA, and contributing editor to The Blue Sofa Review and Americas Review. He was nominated for a 2005 Pushcart Prize. In 2009, he was chosen to be Poet Laureate of Santa Clara County [ Silicon Valley]. In 2011, another collection of poems called A Walk to the Center of Things was published by Poetry Center San Jose. Walking to Evergreen Grammar School Autumn, and, I, not an especially triumphant  boy, walked in triumph down a street lined with torches, fiery yellows, shiny oranges, fierce reds lit up ...Expand for more