Here’s the link to REX YBAÑEZ’s guest column

Hi everyone,

Many of you saw REX YBAÑEZ’s column in print yesterday in Springfield News-Leader and other papers. Here is the link to the online feature of the column, which appeared this morning in News-Leader. Please don’t forget to share it with others you know who will also enjoy it.

https://www.news-leader.com/story/entertainment/2024/06/02/poetry-from-daily-life-let-simplicity-spontaneity-be-your-guide/73899409007/

I also want to share with you today part of a note I received this week from ROBERTA L. KOBBE, Publisher and Editor of Cunningham Courier News in Cunningham, Kansas. Roberta recently attended funeral services for a former resident of Cunningham and subscriber to the paper. While there she met a friend of the deceased, also a subscriber, “who told me how very pleased she was that I included a poetry column now. She has written poetry for years (she’s not very good, she said, but it is something she enjoys) and the column has been an inspiration for her. I told her I would let you know how much she enjoys this bit of sunshine that comes to her every week. Thank you.“

My thanks again to WYATT TOWNLEY, Kansas Poet Laureate emeritus. It was her contact with the Cunningham Courier News in Kansas that led to this connection.

In Springfield I am frequently told by people I meet that they are following and enjoying Poetry from Daily Life. I take heart from that and assume that there are many others who follow us too. At this time the column goes out to a total circulation of 65,000 people each week. Only a fraction of that number read the column, but that still adds up to a lot of readers. I’m very grateful.

Rex Ybañez coming to Poetry from Daily Life

Hi everyone,

It’s my pleasure to introduce my guest columnist on this weekend’s Poetry from Daily Life — Rex Ybañez, who lives in Springfield, Missouri, where he is the University Writer/Editor at Drury University. Rex first discovered writing when he was eight years old. He writes professionally but his favorite genre is poetry. A project that he has especially enjoyed working on since 2017 is poetry outreach in the local arts community of Springfield, MO. One unique fact about Rex Ybañez is that he grew up in choir all throughout grade school and didn’t start singing publicly until joining two local bands in Springfield — Death Jackets and Unessential Jane.  ~ David L Harrison

Rex Ybañez is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, 2020 Moon City Press Poetry Award finalist, and 2021 Steel Toe Books Poetry Contest longlist mention, his work is found in Half Mystic, Noctua Review, Prism Review, Doubly Mad, Interim, AAWW’s The Margins, and more. You are in for a treat tomorrow when Rex’s guest column appears in print in Springfield News-Leader and other papers in Missouri, Kansas, and South Dakota. On Sunday, the column will be featured in News-Leader’s online edition and I will post the link to it so everyone everywhere can read what he has to tell us. Thank you, Rex Ybañez!