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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

What's better than a brilliant chapbook? Two brilliant chapbooks: Annick McAskill's "Verfondre | Wormmelt" and John Barton's "Labyrinth" both from Baseline Press.

A light cream rectangular chapbook on top of a large shale fossil fern. Verfondre | Wormmelt is centered at the top. Annick McAskill is centered under it. Below both is a reverse image of foliage including a fern. The background of the image is midnight blue.

A rectangular cream coloured chapbook lies flat slightly angled to the right. Labyrinth is centered at the top with John Barton centered below. A loosely drawn green spiral is centered on the bottom half of the cover. A brown and cream spiral shell faces outward overlapping the bottom right cover of the chapbook. The spiral on the shell echoes the spiral on the cover.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 01/03/2026

Two small ones. The first from "Verfondre | Wormmelt," Annick MacAskill’s new chapbook with Baseline Press, the second my little ditty for the day. #smallpoemsunday @tomsnarsky.bsky.social

Where is the star?

Hail winter’s roses

On the earth, rays white

The black knot of cloud

Traduction fondue: Les quatre vents de l’espirit, Victor Hugo.

I bought daffodils

for St. David’s Day

membranes white and sheer

wrapping round the stalks

like leeks before leaves

and buds break free.

I bought daffodils

for St. David’s Day,

today, no Welsh in me.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

I received my contributor's copy of the winter issue of "The Fiddlehead." An honour to be included in such an incredible issue. Thank you to the editors.

The winter issue of "The Fiddlehead" resting on the seat of a rocking chair. The seat is covered in black and white pillow ticking. The journal cover shows a vague figure of a person standing in a bus shelter. It appears to be a winter night with snow on the ground and the roof of the shelter.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 18/01/2026

Check out Baseline's 2026 lineup!

A poster announcing Baseline Press' 2026 poets. Photos of the five poets are posted top to bottom along the left side of the poster. Their names are posted on the left: Annick MacAskill, John Barton, Jaeyun Yoo, Susan Gillis, Sophia Cirignano.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 22/10/2025

Michael Goodfellow's chapbook Cleft is gorgeous.

The front of a beige, tall rectangular chapbook on a dark wood background. The left side features an etching of a snakemouth orchid. The title, Cleft, and the author's name, Michael Goodfellow, are printed in the upper left hand corner.

The back of a beige, tall rectangular chapbook on a dark wood background. The right side features an etching of a snakemouth orchid.

The title page of a chapbook. A mirrored image of a snakemouth orchid is printed in dark ink on the top of a beige sheet of paper. The title, Cleft, is printed, also in dark ink, in block letters underneath, and under that the author's name, Michael Goodfellow, in italics. The author has initialled the bottom.

One page of a long poem printed on beige paper. Three text reads:

Cleft stone, then the eel
then the room within water
it happened before
then he used another name
a stream bed, stone heaved
it happened by rivers
places I would never see
bog fern, granite, pebbles, dark soil
below also meant inside

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 31/08/2025

Two poems for #smallpoemsunday, one by Charles Simic (the master!) and one from my Baseline Press chapbook. @tomsnarsky.bsky.social

A poem by Charles Simic titled Poem:

Every morning I forget how it is.
I watch smoke mount
In great strides above the city.
I belong to no one.

Then, I remember my shoes,
How I have to put them on,
How bending over to tie then up
I will look into the earth.

A poem by me titled 6:00 A M

The cat mewls
outside the bedroom. A robin--

or is it a cardinal?--won't stop
calling. You once asked your mother

if life had a purpose. The cat's paw
darts under the door.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 27/08/2025

Come help Dagne Forrest and me celebrate our Baseline Press chapbooks along with special guest @nancyhuggett.bsky.social. Saturday, September 20, 2:00 p.m. at the Sunnyside Library, 1049 Bank St., Ottawa.

A poster announcing a Baseline Press chapbook launch on Saturday, September 20, 2:00 p.m. at the Sunnyside Library, 1049 Bank St., Ottawa. The top third of the poster contains the location and time information in white letters against a teal field. The bottom third contains headshots of the authors arranged in horizontal row: Dagne Forrest first, then guest reader Nancy Huggett, and Susan Robertson. The authors’ names are printed above their photos.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 08/07/2025

Love this by Steven Heighton from the preface to his “Selected Poems 1893-2020.”

From the start, the part of my mind that conceives real poems (as opposed to the ego that forces fakes) seems to have worked to subvert my tendency to overthink and over-explain the world. It has recruited me into the role of stenographer to my nightmind; it has nudged me towards difficult, hence usefully estranging, languages and the act of translation—which, like dreams, demotes the bossy, noisy ego, since translators must submit and apprentice themselves to the source text and labour in service to it.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 01/07/2025

Baseline Press has sold out of my chapbook but I still have a few copies. Let me know if you want one.

A capture of a Baseline Press web page of a tall, narrow, blue-grey chapbook. So I Go is centered near the top in black block letters. Susan Robertson is printed underneath and under that an image of three swallows in flight. This chapbook rests on top of two other copies which are opened, one to the front flyleaf, the other to a poem. Sold Out is printed block white letters against black in the top right corner.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

I’ll be at the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair this Saturday with my Baseline Press chapbook & free Baseline bookmarks. If I get my act together, there will also be cookies. And you can preorder Baseline’s summer titles now. Saturday, June 21 Tom Brown Arena 141 Bayview Station Rd Noon-5:00 p.m.

Six Baseline press bookmarks in shades of tan and gray fanned out on a white surface. They read “Everything goes better with poetry,” “Get the door, it’s poetry,” Poetry…unless you hate fun,” When the going gets though, the tough get poetry,” “Have you had your poetry today,” and “Poetry happens here!”

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 24/01/2025

I’ve been to Perfect Books’ 20% off sale. Have you?

A photo of a hand holding a book with the cover facing forward. The top two thirds of the book is beige with bronze circles of different sizes. The larger ones are just outlined and these overlap slightly. A free smaller circles are filled in. The lower third of the cover is black and has the words “The Penguin Book of Spiritual Verse 110 Poets on the Divine, edited by Kaveh Akbar.” One of the larger outlined circles from the top of the cover spills over into this section which also includes three of the smaller solid circles.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

Vertebrata, @mreid.bsky.social's Turret House chapbook, is an astonishing tour of the human vertebrae describing how they support our bodies and sometimes don't.

A picture of the cover Monty Reid's chapbook Vertebrata. A black and white drawing of three vertebrae covers most of the page. The word "vertebrata" runs vertically down the left side. The author's name, Monty Reid, is printed at the bottom.

A picture of two poems included in the chapbook.

CV3

Articulates at the Luschka joints.
Little Germanic teeth
subject to degeneration.

And the foramen
little Latinate windows
gradually closing themselves.
And the nerves die
twitching with their languages.
Their little languages.

CV4

Severe stenosis
as per the MRI

This is a poem about the failure
of form.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 07/01/2025

Gobsmacked, honoured and thrilled to have a Baseline chapbook coming in the spring.

Author photos of five people announcing the 2025 Baseline Press lineup. The authors are Susan Robertson, Dagne Forrest, Jasmine Gui, Salma Husain, and Steve McOrmond.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 25/11/2024

Grateful to @puneetdutt.bsky.social and @ex-puritan.bsky.social for making room for my poem among so many fine writers in the Schism issue.

FOUR TEASPOONS TO ONE QUART

I was taught God made us in His image.
Let’s mix the bleach—
I’m cleaning cupboards.

Four teaspoons bleach to one quart water.
Many of Gaza’s Medical Workers Have Been Detained or Killed.
I was taught God made us in His image.

I spritz the outside of a door, circle the sponge.
Israeli Strike Kills Dozens at Gaza Shelter.
I’m cleaning cupboards.

Rinse the sponge, swab the inside; the hinges squeak.
‘They Are Burned Alive’: A Doctor Captures the Toll of War
on Gaza’s Children
I was taught God made us in His image.

The paper lining the shelves should be replaced.
At Least 30 Are Reported Killed in Khan Younis in 24 Hours
I’m cleaning cupboards.

Seven cabinets above, eight below.
U.S. Will Allow Delivery of 500-Pound Bombs to Israel,
an Official Says.
I was taught God made me in His image.
I’m cleaning cupboards.

Words in italics are all headlines which appeared on The New York Times website during the one-month period from July 11 through August 10, 2024.

In order of appearance the links to headlines are:

Sankar, Anjana. 2024 August 2. “Many of Gaza’s Medical Workers Have Been Detained or Killed.” The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/02/world/middleeast/gaza-doctors-medical-workers-israel.html

Video by Storyful and Reuters. 2024 August 4. “Israeli Strike Kills Dozens at Gaza Shelter.”
The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/middleeast/100000009610600/israel-strike-gaza-city-shelter.html

El-Naggar, Mona and Kerr, Sarah. 2024 August 10. “‘They Are Burned Alive’: A Doctor Captures the Toll of War on Gaza’s Children.” The New York Times.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/10/world/middleeast/gaza-al-aqsa-hospital-children.html

Sankar, Anjana. 2024 July 24. “At Least 30 Are Reported Killed in Khan Younis in 24 Hours.” The New York Times.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/25/world/middleeast/israeli-forces-press-forward-in-khan-younis-at-least-30-people-are-reported-killed-in-24-hours.html

Boxerman, Aaron. 2024 July 11. “U.S. Will Allow Delivery of 500-Pound Bombs to Israel, an Official Says.” The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/11/world/middleeast/us-israel-bombs.html

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

Thank you Ottawa Public Library!

A picture of two poetry books: Mosab Abu Toha’s “Forest of Noise” and Danez Smith’s “Bluff.”

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Thrilled to have a cento in the current issue of Contemporary Verse II.

The cover of the fall issue of Contemporary Verse II featuring a photo of display with an installation. A large painting in shades of beige rests against a wall on the left. On the right is a shelving unit made of thick dowels of blond wood. Under it is a miniature yellow table and two yellow chairs.

The first lines of a poem:

Kohelet Tells Us There Is Nothing New under the Sun; A Wiser Poet than I Disagrees

The Mississippi River empties into the gulf.

The lilies break open over the dark water.

There are 7,000 living languages.

There is wind, there are matches.

A ghost sings, a door opens.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 07/09/2024

Twins! (I love this and the whole series!)

Long, narrow, yellow Opaat Press leaflet titled “Tired, Saturday” by Fawn Parker held by one hand.

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 04/06/2024

They’re so cute! I love them too!

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 26/04/2024

The trout lilies are popping in the woods

A trout lily, a yellow spring wildflower with curled star like petals and brown spotted green leaves surrounded by dried fall leaves

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 24/01/2024

I’m ready for the ice storm.

A white cat sleeping in a lap completely covering it. A single human hand behind it holds a copy of Kaveh Akbar’s “Martyr!”

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 02/10/2023

I said it on the other place, I’ll say it here. I love @textcurious.bsky.social ’s “missing matrilineal!” (Can’t post a picture of the cover because it gets labeled “sensitive content.”)

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Susan Robertson @snullr.bsky.social · 30/08/2023

“It doesn’t have to make sense now; it can make sense later on.” Sound advice from Something about John Coltrane in Roger Reeve’s astonishing “Best Barbarian.” It encouraged me to edit out a line I’d edited in for clarity. It can make sense later on.

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