A Letter from Charles Flowers:
Please Help From the Fishouse
Update:
February 10, 2011
You did it!: Thanks to you, our generous listeners, we made our year-end goal! We raised $5,000 that triggered a $5,000 matching gift, securing 50% of our annual budget.
With this support, we can work on improving our website, getting more audio online, organizing more readings and events, and so much more.
Thank you from all of us at Fishouse and the poets on this site.
Charles
Update:
January 15, 2011
This is the last day of our matching gift challenge and thanks to our generous poets and their audience, we’re only a few hundred dollars shy from our $5,000 goal and taking full advantage of the match!
Please encourage your friends and fellow poetry lovers to make a gift today!
With thanks,
Charles
Note: Please scroll down for a list of donors to date
Update:
January 6, 2011
Dear Fishouse Poets and Friends of Fishouse,
With your incredible generosity, in just 9 days, we have raised $2,310 – almost 50% of our goal of $5,000 by January 15!
We have 10 days left to raise the remainder, and remember: every dollar you donate is doubled by our matching challenge – a gift of $20 is actually worth $40. Help us make the most of this opportunity!
Thank you for helping Fishouse start 2011 with some money in the bank, and the wonderful support of your emails. I look forward to meeting and seeing as many of you as possible at AWP, Washington, D.C.
Here’s to a creative and generous 2011!
Best wishes,
Charles
Note: Please scroll down for a list of donors to date
December 26, 2010
Dear Friend of Fishouse,
When I wrote to subscribers at this time last year, asking for support for From the Fishouse, the response was incredible – we raised $4,200 in just 2 weeks. That infusion of cash provided nearly 1/3 of our annual budget, and we were, and remain, very grateful.
As one close to poetry, you know how cool the Fishouse website is, how needed it is in classrooms, and how emerging poets need the support and exposure the site provides all year long.
In 2010 we added over 200 audio files from dozens of new poets to the site, hosted six live readings – including a packed and rocking event at AWP in Denver – and saw the Fishouse anthology adopted in poetry classrooms around the country and head toward its second printing.
One of the best things we did was meet, as the board of directors, for a strategic planning session in Maine in the middle of January (talk about dedication!).We fleshed out some immediate goals, some mid-range goals, and some very ambitious dream goals for the next 5 years.
The overall goal is growth – we want to add tons of poets, we want to add more international poets – and our primary obstacle to growth is time – time to process recordings, time to organize readings, time to rebuild our website – and the key to more time is more money.
We have set two major goals for 2011:
To rebuild the website, which, despite its great wealth of resources, is falling behind technologically
To hire a part-time worker to free up our talented director’s time to curate and expand the rich library of poets and poetry we are building.
And we have a special opportunity for you to help us reach those goals: a donor with a true passion not only for poetry, but for From the Fishouse, has offered to match whatever we raise between December 26 and January 15 – dollar for dollar – up to $5,000.
This means that your $20 automatically becomes $40; your $50 becomes $100, and so on. Any gift of any size can make a difference. Honestly.
If we can reach the match, we will raise $10,000 and enter 2011 with incredible momentum to accomplish two major parts of our mission: creating more exposure for emerging poets, and introducing more amazing poetry to classrooms across the country.
If you don’t have any capacity for a gift this year – and some of us probably won’t – you might know folks who do. So if you have a Facebook page or a website, please send a note to your friends and family reminding them about the site, and ask them to support it.
Last year, I encouraged you to tell your family, “Keep the sweater; write a check for Fishouse!” And many did. So I repeat my wish: tell your loved ones to give the gift of diverse and dynamic poetry to all of us. Their gifts, too, will be doubled, and that will feel good.
Like other small literary nonprofits, we make the biggest splash we can with our very modest boat.Help us build a bigger boat in 2011 with a gift by January 5!
Or you can mail a check to:
From the Fishouse
87 Stage Road
Pittston, ME 04345
Thank you for listening, and here’s to a creative & abundant 2011 – for you, for me, for From the Fishouse!
Best wishes,
Charles Flowers
Special Thanks to The Following Whose Gifts & Pledges Have Been Received:
- Dan Albergotti
- Justin and Rachael Alfond
- Hari Alluri
- Lucy Anderton
- Chelsea Baker
- Catherine Barnett
- Rick Barot
- Curtis Bauer
- Kathleen Baum
- Margo Berdeshevsky
- Lorna Blake
- Sally Bliumis-Dunn
- Joshua Bodwell
- Sarah Bradshaw
- Traci Brimhall
- Stacey Brown
- David Bruzina
- Patricia Burdick
- David Cappella
- Robert Cording
- Nina Corwin
- Oliver de la Paz
- Thomas Dillingham
- Camille Dungy
- Robert Farnsworth
- Gibson Fay-LeBlanc
- Annie Finch
- Charles Flowers
- Rachel Flynn
- Francesca Forrest
- Rebecca Foust
- Gabriel Fried
- Todd and Mattine Gallentine
- Sarah Gambito
- Rigoberto González
- Kimberly Grey
- Jennifer Habel
- Patricia Hagge
- Colby Halloran
- Yona Harvey
- Luke Johnson
- Sophia Kartsonis
- Peter Kirn
- Andrew Kozma
- Joseph Legaspi
- Jill Leininger
- Amanda Lichtenberg
- Reb Livingston
- Marie-Elizabeth Mali
- Djelloul Marbrook
- Adrian Matejka
- Joe Mattos
- Leslie McGrath
- Carmen-Oliva Menéndez
- Seth Mercier
- Elizabeth Moe
- Michael Morse
- John Murillo
- Aimee Nezhukumatathil
- Abby Norling
- Matt O’Donnell
- Tim and Cheryl O’Donnell
- Vivian O’Donnell
- Huw Osborne
- Molly Peacock
- Laura Perez
- Khadijah Queen
- Alice Quinn
- Dean Rader
- David Roderick
- Carey Salerno
- Zach Schwartz
- Elaine Sexton
- Ravi Shankar
- Evie Shockley
- Sean Singer
- Lytton Smith
- Gerald Stern
- Cindy Stocks
- Laura-Gray Street
- Tess Taylor
- Jeffrey Thomson
- Valerie Vogrin
- Connie Voisine
- Emily Warn
- Paul Welch
- Gabriel Welsch
- Helen Wickes
- Nicholas Wickes
- Phillip Williams
- Jim and Karen Wissler
- Doug Woodsum
Please Note: If you’ve made a gift or pledge, and your name doesn’t appear above, apologies in advance! Please let Matt know the date and amount of your gift/pledge, and we’ll correct the list as soon as possible. Thanks for helping us keep our donation records in shape!