If you hurry right now to Urbana, Illinois, you can still catch the last few sessions of the University of Illinois College of Law’s inaugural Law and Poetry Conference, “Opening Arguments: Poetry and the Law.” Billed as “the first conference in the United States to explore and celebrate the relationship of law and poetry,” the Feb. 15 – 16 confab is sponsored by UICL, the University of Illinois MFA Creative Writing Program, and Richard Powers, the author of “The Echo Maker,” a recent National Book Award winner. [And see, Urbana Gazette, “Urbana attorney loves poetry … and the law,” Feb. 11, 2007, featuring lawyer-poet Carl Reisman and discussing the conference.]
As Robert Ambrogi noted at Legal Blog Watch (Feb. 12, 2007): Among the topics on the agenda: “In Search of the Lawyer Poets,” “Does the Practice of Law Kill Passion?” and “Law and Poetry as Spiritual Paths.” A featured speaker will be West Virginia College of Law professor James R. Elkins, who collects information on lawyer/poets at his Web site, Strangers to Us All: Lawyers and Poetry.
Of course, f/k/a is built on the premise that lawyers and poetry (at least, the one-breath variety) are an excellent mix (see, Yes, Lawyers and Haiku, for example). We have frequently celebrated the efforts of Prof. Elkins at his Strangers website and his Legal Studies Forum, which has published perhaps a thousand pages of poetry by modern lawyers over the past couple of years. (see Every Law Library Needs this Volume)
In just the past two weeks, three major haiku journals — Bottle Rockets (Vol. 8:2, #16), Frogpond (XXX:1, Winter 2007) and Simply Haiku (Vol. 5:1, Spring 2007) — have included the work of lawyer poets:
in my soup
the dampness
of winter rain
last train
a can rolls the length
of the quiet car
. . . by Roberta Beary, Bottle Rockets #16 (Spring 2007)
a light in the boathouse
the long room
for the sculls
South Philly in spring —
the hoagie shop’s signed picture
of Stallone
. . . by Barry George, Frogpond (Winter 2007)
first date–
the little pile
of anchovies
. . . by Roberta Beary, Frogpond (Winter 2007), 1st Place,
Haiku Society of America’s 2006 Gerald Brady Senryu Contest
curtain time:
the stage crew as silent
as the props
orig.
april storm —
borrowing the neighbor’s
rock salt
a foot of snow 
orig.
a month too soon
candles for nightlights
. . . haiga by Arthur Giacalone (photos) & David Giacalone (poetry);
Simply Haiku Journal, Vol. 5 no. 1 (Spring 2007)
– click on the link next to each picture to see the full version,
and go here, for access to three more Giacalone haiga
p.s. On a related topic, see “Cases to Canvas: ART CLASSES TURN A LAWYER INTO A PAINTER,” Washington Post, Feb. 15, 2007, featuring lawyer-painter Shahrzad Heyat Jalinous (via Elefant at LegalBlogWatch)