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Poetry Events

By John Burns,

Everything's coming up poetry here in the enchanted literary garden. Tonight (June 9), Chris Hutchinson and Matt Rader relaunch their new books, Unfamiliar Weather (J. Gordon Shillingford, $14.95) and Miraculous Hours (Nightwood Editions, $16.95), respectively, at Our Town Café (245 East Broadway) at 8 p.m. Relaunch? "Since we're really excited about them we thought they deserved two parties each!" the two write. "And to top things off, Billeh Nickerson will be hosting, which is an event unto itself!" Rader is also one of the many, many versifiers who will take part in the West Coast Poetry Festival from July 7 to 10. For details, visit wcpf.ca/program.html. Finally, Pablo Neruda turns 101 on July 11 (or would; he died in 1973), and an event at Library Square (350 West Georgia Street) that evening celebrates the Chilean Nobel Prize winner. You can send in your own poem for or about Neruda to ariadnes@uniserve.com to hang on the "Nerudean Living Verse Wall".