Official site of poet James Schwartz, author of The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America
Alien Buddha Zine #75 Now Available!
ALIEN BUDDHA ZINE #75 — The Milestone Edition is HERE.
Read an EXCERPT.
This 210-page landmark issue features over 40 writers from Alien Buddha Press’ 9-year history, with new work and previews from Meredith Brown, Jon Wesick, and Julian Thumm.
Inside you'll find voices like:
Heath Brougher, Juleigh Howard-Hobson, Kaci Skiles Laws, Kelsie Stark, Whitnee Coy, Beth Gulley, Alise Versella, Tanya Rakh, Amy Solo, Yuan Changming, Donny Winter, Alex Carrigan, A. R. Tivadar, Tom Folske, M. Kelly Peach, Linda M. Crate, Collin J. Rae, James Dorr, J.I.B., Swetha Amit, Taylor Dibbert, Thasia Anne, Grace Daly, Aishwariya Laxmi, Samantha Slaven, Andrew K. Arnett, Ryan Derby, Ashwini Gangal, Richard LeDue, John Stickney, James Benger, James Schwartz, Adele Evershed, Joseph Cassis, Benjamin Drevlow, Melissa Anne Tolentino, Scott Thomas Outlar, Jared Morningstar, aviva lilith, Madi Huffman, and Gretchen Filart.
Grab your copy now.
Amish Road Trip by James Schwartz
A double feature from Alien Buddha Press: SUMMER SUCKS!!!
In "Amish Road Trip" by James Schwartz — a glitter-soaked city stripper takes a detour into the corn-fed closet of his past, then gets road head and regret in equal measure.
Then in John A. DeLaughter’s "The Specters Beyond the Surf" — a town’s buried biotech horrors bubble back to the surface.
Both are featured in this 261-page collection packed with 26 short stories and 10 poems spanning horror, drama, and comedy.
Pop-up Poetry Reading!
Pop-up poetry reading tonight at Lightshow Bobs aka The Shop! I love all the talent and creativity in Detroit, thank you for a wonderful evening!
Pride Poetry June 1st! 🏳️🌈
Hey blog readers, thanks for visiting! I just checked the blog stats - wow! A lot of visitors from around the world! A few 2025 updates on my books:
Congrats to The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America (Kindle 2011) for recently charting on Amazon's Gay Poetry Top 100 Bestseller list! I'll be dropping Pride poetry June 1st, stay tuned!
My short story Amish Road Trip is now available via the new Alien Buddha Press anthology Summer Sucks!
A year ago Alien Buddha Press published my "greatest hits" collection Some Are and Most Aren't and It's Always Been Like That: Selected Poems 2004-2024 which was a trip down memory lane! My new book Big Island Beatnik is another look back, to my Hawaii era through poetics and photography:
"The writings in Big Island Beatnik depict intoxicating vistas of discovery as Schwartz explores his surroundings through a lens of psychogeography, its influence on his search for spiritual context to his experiences. I am left with a feeling of haunting elegy, and yet Schwartz speaks not only of elegiac loss but of re-birth, replenishment and continuation, with exhilarating portrayals of volcanoes and skies and seas that are themselves living entities."
- u.v.ray, Author of Speed Trials 94.
Lastly, you can find my Detroit themed poetry and photography in Alien Buddha Zine #75 coming soon!
Big Island Beatnik Book Club 🌋 📚
Aloha from Detroit! Check out my Big Island Beatnik Book Club, full reading list via Fevers of the Mind!
Big Island Beatnik: Poetry & Photography from the Lower East Rift Zone (Alien Buddha Press) by James Schwartz
Summer Sucks!!!
My short story AMISH ROAD TRIP is included in Alien Buddha Press' anthology Summer Sucks!!! now available!
A collection of short stories and poetry exploring the dark side of summertime.
On a sweltering Arizona drive to scatter her late husband’s ashes at her brother’s roadside memorial, a grieving woman finds the angel statue commemorating him destroyed. At a rundown summer camp for troubled teens, three ex-cons working as cleaners battle exhaustion, drug use, and brutal heat, until a terrifying vision in the outhouse suggests something sinister festers beneath the camp’s filthy surface. On the morning of their tenth anniversary, a man’s wife leaves him and their dog dies from a caffeine overdose, leaving him spiraling. A disabled teen escapes his oppressive religious upbringing, stumbles through addiction, abuse, and moral failure, and accidentally becomes a viral hero—then a serial killer—after beating a violent maniac with a brass Buddha statue. After a grisly cycling accident outside a Colorado convenience store, a strung-out former EMT fixates on the smear of brains.
Content Warning: Oppressive heat, relentless dread, and the kind of discomfort that lingers long after the sun sets. Some stories may scorch a little too deep. Tread carefully. Summer Sucks!!!
26 short stories and 10 poems, spanning 261 pages of horror, drama, and comedy.
Read a preview here!
"Big Island Beatnik" Now Available! 🌋
Happy pub day to Big Island Beatnik: Poetry & Photography from the Lower East Rift Zone (Alien Buddha Press), now available via Amazon!
Read an excerpt here.
"The sweetest winds play
On this rugged coastline
Preserved in time today
As I offer my prayers here too…"
James Schwartz returns to Alien Buddha Press with Big Island Beatnik, his fifth release following Motor City Mix (2022), Sunset in Rome (2022), Long Lost Friend (2023), and Some Are and Most Aren't and It's Always Been Like That: Selected Poems 2004-2024 (2024). This collection drifts between poetry and photography, capturing the Lower East Rift Zone in all its burning, blooming, ever-shifting beauty.
Schwartz is a poet of movement—across landscapes, through memory, into transformation. Volcanoes churn, dolphins rise, crystal bowls ring. In sacred spaces and humid diners, in ash-covered beaches and moonlit bodies, he finds divinity, always. The rhythm is hypnotic, the vision uncontainable. Sit with these pages. Breathe. The Pacific is impossibly azure. The lava still flows.
FOREWORD by Rev. Dr. Raymont Anderson - Founding Minister and Spiritual Director of The Center for Spiritually Integrated Arts
Poetry by James Schwartz
An updated listing of online poetry by James Schwartz
UNBUTTON THE SHIRT SLOWLY / RIVERS
AMISH CHRISTMAS TREE / COFFEE SOUP
GAIA (DUET POEM WITH SETH SPEAKS)
AFTER MAKING LOVE TO EMMANUEL MACRON IN A QUARANTINED PARIS
BRICK/MORTAR / RIVERS / KALAPANA MEDITATION
REVOLUTION & RUST (BOB DYLAN TRIBUTE)
LAST NIGHT A DRAG QUEEN SAVED MY LIFE
MIDWEST AESTHETICS (DUET POEM WITH DAVID L. O'NAN)
THE GREAT AMERICAN AMISH POWER TRIP
WALKING WITH THE ANCESTORS IN DETROIT
IN EVERY DOORWAY / CLUBBING / CABARET DAYS / MIDNIGHT / AFTER HOURS
POGUE (DUET POEM WITH JOSHUA MERCHANT)
LOVE POEM FOR A LOST NIGHT WITH KD LANG ON THE JUKEBOX
NIGHT PORTRAIT OF THE FISHER BUILDING
DARK ACADEMIA (CHARLES BAUDELAIRE CHALLENGE)
ALPINE AIRE / EVERY MORNING / SPIRITUAL TRIPPING IN HAMTRAMCK
DESSERT MENU (PAIRED WITH A POET)
THE GREAT AMERICAN GAY EX-AMISH NOVEL / INDIANA 2 AM / COLORS IN A CABARET
Michigan Volcano
Counting down to the May 2 release of my new book Big Island Beatnik!
As a thank you to my readers I'm posting a previously unpublished non-fic poem (Michigan Volcano) here! Happy National Poetry Month!
MICHIGAN VOLCANO
On Michigan's Upper Peninsula
The view from Summit Peak once was
Of molten rivers & steaming fissures
Before time gave formation
To glaciers & Great Lakes
Waterfalls & red sandstone
Sea caves & cliffs
Evidence of volcanic eruptions
The Midcontinent Rift revealed
In water wonderlands, hidden landscapes
Of Pictured Rocks Lakeshore
Porcupine Mountains Wilderness
& the ancient lava flows on
The Keweenaw Peninsula
Still visible in the roadcuts.
Source: "How to explore a billion-year-old volcanic mystery along Lake Superior" by Jacqueline Kehoe
MLive: National Geographic Names Michigan's Upper Peninsula a Volcanic Tourism Destination
#NationalPoetryMonth
My last copy of Some Are and Most Aren't and It's Always Been Like That: Selected Poems 2004-2024 (Alien Buddha Press) at Hazel Perk Cafe!
Silver Birch Press: "Dessert Menu (Paired with a Paperback)"
Poetry Month continues...
"Charming" - Silver Birch Press
I am delighted my new poem Dessert Menu (Paired with a Paperback) has been published via Silver Birch Press blog My Favorite Things series!
"Big Island Beatnik" Press Kit 🌋
"James has a way of bringing words that marry both Amish and the later experiences in life as a non-practicing Amish together. He marries the two off in a unique way that display his own heritage and culture as well as assimilation into dominant culture."
- Mary Byler, Author of Jezebel's Justice: Poetry and prayers for rebellious and disobedient folks
Check back for updates and more reviews
FEVERS OF THE MIND: BIG ISLAND BEATNIK
"Big Island Beatnik: Poetry & Photography from the Lower East Rift Zone" BOOK REVIEWS
James’ poetry spins through time and space like liquid gold, moving you on a dizzying journey of lush dreams and spare realities. They show you places that you’ve never imagined even as they let you open to your own creations. Seeing the world through his eyes, and his emotions has always been a pleasure, as well as an education. So plan to be amazed and amused as you embark on his new work, you will be richly rewarded!
- Sharna Eberlein, Author of Pele's Tears
Dank new Alien Buddha Press chapbooks include Big Island Beatnik by James Schwartz. This is a book with themes of healing and spirituality in paradise. The haiku sequence "The Infinite Laboratory" is a tribute to Ernest Holmes, 'Telephone of the Wind" has a nostalgic effect. "Sleepcast Poem" is a poetic guided meditation. The photographs are beautiful even stunning. My favorite parts were the haiku sequence and poems on Kilauea volcano.
- READER REVIEW
The writings in Big Island Beatnik depict intoxicating vistas of discovery as Schwartz explores his surroundings through a lens of psychogeography, its influence on his search for spiritual context to his experiences. I am left with a feeling of haunting elegy, and yet Schwartz speaks not only of elegiac loss but of re-birth, replenishment and continuation, with exhilarating portrayals of volcanoes and skies and seas that are themselves living entities.
u.v.ray (x.com/uvray_deceased)
Happy National Poetry Month!
I'm attending Detroit’s Poet Laureate Jessica Care Moore's inaugural address titled “The G.O.A.T City: How Love, Resilience & 17 Syllables Can Amplify the Heart of Our City" to launch National Poetry Month!
Alien Buddha 7in5
I'm happy to have new and recent poetry and photography in Alien Buddha Zine #75 (Milestone Edition) - The 7in5 will drop in June!
"Amish Road Trip"
My 2014 short story AMISH ROAD TRIP will be featured in the forthcoming Alien Buddha Press SUMMER SUCKS! anthology dropping in May!
Alien Buddha's Big Backpack Full of Soup Cans anthology
Now available! - Alien Buddha's Big Backpack Full of Soup Cans anthology! Includes my recent collab with poet Joshua Merchant!
“And then they have cans of soup. Soup. And they throw the cans of soup. That’s better than a brick because you can’t throw a brick; it’s too heavy. But a can of soup, you can really put some power into that, right? [...] And then, when they get caught, they say, “No, this is soup for my family.” They’re so innocent. “This is soup for my family.” It’s incredible. And you have people coming over with bags of soup — big bags of soup. And they lay it on the ground, and the anarchists take it and they start throwing it at our cops, at our police. And if it hits you, that’s worse than a brick because that’s got force. It’s the perfect size. It’s, like, made perfect.”
-- tRump
The Alien Buddha's Big Backpack Full of Soup Cans: Soup For Our Families (Malcontent Poems)
Alien Buddha Press exhibits a fearless collection of poetry that amplifies voices of the displaced, the rebellious, and the grieving. The Alien Buddha’s Big Backpack Full of Soup Cans (Soup for Our Families): Malcontent Poems is an anthology of resistance, sorrow, and persistence, featuring 34 poets from across this burning planet, challenging the cruelties of the world we live in with turbulent honesty.
This collection is a scream against injustice, a meditation on the sacred and the profane, a remembrance of those we’ve lost, and a witness to the strength of those who survived.
Happy 2025! 🥂
Blessing up a Little Free Library with my book! Out with the old, in with the new! Happy (almost) NYE 2025!
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas! The decorations in Detroit are beautiful and oh look the former house of Mark Twain's daughter where he stayed at and even wrote!
Christmas Poetry Podcast!
Happy Holidays! Join me for a special Christmas poetry reading 12.22 at Eat the Storms podcast!
2024 Highlight
#libraryappreciationmonth 📚
Dear Readers,
Happy autumn! Thank you to everyone who purchased a copy of my book Selected Poems 2004-2024 and came out for my Detroit readings this past summer - I'm truly grateful and honored by your support.
October is #libraryappreciationmonth so I would like to thank Detroit library for housing a copy of my book which can be checked out via the interlibrary loan by any Michigan branch, FYI.
Some Are and Most Aren't and It's Always Been Like That: Selected Poems 2004-2024 (Alien Buddha Press)
Eccentric Orbits 5 anthology (Dimensionfold Publishing)
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"The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America" Book Reviews + Media Highlights
THE LITERARY PARTY: GROWING UP GAY AND AMISH IN AMERICA (EBOOK) BOOK REVIEWS: As a country boy in Kentucky, I’m acquainted with the Ami...
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ALIEN BUDDHA ZINE #75 — The Milestone Edition is HERE . Read an EXCERPT . This 210-page landmark issue features over 40 writers from Alien... -
Aloha from Detroit! Check out my Big Island Beatnik Book Club, full reading list via Fevers of the Mind ! Big Island Beatnik: Poetry &... -
SUNSET IN ROME AMAZON LINK by James Schwartz (author of "The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America", "Motor C...
