Sitting at a desk in his office in the old cannon foundry on the grounds of an abandoned military fort, Sam Hamill can view his life’s work to date — a floor-to-ceiling wall of shelves holding 300 titles of poetry and essays published by Copper Canyon Press, which he founded 30 years ago.
All are beautifully printed and bound.
But it is the poems in a plain black book on his desk that made Hamill a leading literary voice in the opposition to the war in Iraq.
Hamill is the founder of Poets Against the War, an anti-war movement that started as a Web site and is now an international organization.
“We’ve had a really serious discussion about what poetry is and the purpose it serves,” Hamill said.
Now back in Port Townsend, Hamill is balancing a backload of editing work at Copper Canyon at Fort Worden State Park, directing this weekend’s Writers Conference for Centrum, and planning further appearances to promote the book, also called Poets Against the War.
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The rest of the story is in the Sunday Peninsula Daily News.