July 12 Lecture: Jimmy Santiago Baca

Summer Sunset Lecture: Saturday, July 12, 7 pm, UNM Student Union Ballroom A

The Power of Poetry in My Life

"A long time ago, back in early `72, when I went to prison, I was lucky enough to be put in the basement of a maximum security prison for disciplinary reasons. I did not get along with the prison administration, nor with the prisoner culture of violence. There was another answer to shape my life, to make sense of my past, to give me hope that I would not end up in this dreary forsaken hell as a repeat convict. One day when one of the guys on death row sent me a book and I opened it up and started reading, I found the voice that would lift me to the highest and give me the strength to fight for the life I wanted-- that voice belonged to Pablo Neruda. And then came other voices; Lorca, Jimenez, Hernandez, Vallejos, Cardenal, and so forth. I read voraciously, with an appetite that could never be satisfied. My soul was renewed, my mind ablaze, my heart passionately committed to poetry after reading these great voices.

Today, I continue to be influenced by Latin American poetry, fiction and painting-- so much so that I find myself running around Latin America interviewing poets from every country and their works continue to lift me, inspire me, and hold me steady in the storms that assail our dangerous reality today." -Jimmy Santiago Baca

(From NM Culture announcement list)

Introducing Moonday Writers

According to Dale, (when asked about Moonday Writers (truth be told, more minimalist than hoped for/ expected), it's a PWP tradition to invite a writing group, at least for the past few years anyway. Whether or not done intentionally to highlight writing groups per se, Dale did not say, but if so, an excellent policy. If not, then serendipity. Either way a piece on writing groups seems in order.

Bio for the Moonday Writers group from Rachelle Woods, individual bios and poems from Rachelle, Elizabeth and Debby (thank you all kindly). Others collected from web. Poems posted separately - I am trying (not always successfully) for less lengthy posts.

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Moonday Writers began meeting 6 years ago. We are an evolving group of improvisers getting together for tea, chocolate, cheese, wine, celebration, inspiration and writing. Our poems can be found in journals and anthologies published in NM and beyond. We perform, teach, host events, win awards, pass the news. You can hear Mary McGinnis, Elizabeth Raby, Debbi Brody, Rachelle Woods, Zoe Dwyer, and Ann Hunkins and her didjeridu at the Poets and Writers Picnic.

[Ed note: formerly Wild Women of Santa Fe, appearing at PWP 2006, "a group of poets who meet every other week to share poems, exchange new and strange words, and write, write, write! In their various styles, the seven poets support and complement one another as their works weave and mingle into verbal tapestries!"]

Elizabeth Raby has lived in Santa Fe since 2001. She was a Poet in the Schools for the Pennsylvania Council of the Arts, the New Jersey Council of the Arts, and the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation. She taught poetry writing at Muhlenberg College. Ms. Raby is a fellow of the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. In 2006 and 2007 she represented the Teachers for Tomorrow program as an English teacher in Deva, Romania. She has written articles on teaching poetry for Teachers and Writers Collaborative. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals including Sin Fronteras, Santa Fe Literary Review, Manzanita Quarterly, Mad Poets Review, U.S. 1, Journal of New Jersey Poets, and Yarrow. She is the author of three chapbooks, "The Hard Scent of Peonies," "Camphorwood," and "Ten Degrees Above Zero." She is a co-author along with Patricia Goodrich and Casandra Ioan of "Bone, Flesh & Fur" - "Oase, Carne & Blana," a chapbook in both English and Romanian.

From Virtual Artists Collective: In 2006 and 2007 Ms. Raby represented the Teachers for Tomorrow program as an English teacher in Deva, Romania.

Debbi Brody conducts poetry workshops and readings at festivals and other venues through out the Southwest to writers aged twelve through eighty-five. She publishes frequently in regional and national literary journals. Her work has appeared in the Santa Fe Literary Review, Broomweed Journal, Poetica, Sin Fronteras and many others magazines and books of note including numerous anthologies. Her latest book, Portraits in Poetry, (Village Books Press, Oklahoma, 2006), as well as her chapbook, FreeForm are available through artqueen58@aol.com. Debbi lives in Santa Fe where she has co-owned Canyon Road Contemporary Art, Inc. with her husband Bob since 1994.

Mary McGinnis

Mary McGinnis has made her home in New Mexico since 1972. The beauty and fragility of the desert have obviously influenced her writing and her world view. Her most recent book of poetry, Listening for Cactus (Sherman-Asher Press), is available in book and audio cassette forms from the publisher (1-800-474-1543), and in Braille from the author (151 H1 Calle Ojo Feliz, Santa Fe, NM 87505). readings. Her poems are also available on line at Santa Fe Poetry Broadside. Mary is currently a student in the Documentary Studies program at the College of Santa Fe and will travel to Brazil later this year as part of her studies

Zoe Dwyer is an award-winning poet and the co-host of two monthly poetry events in Santa Fe: CCA's Open Poetry series and Poets for Peace
.

Ann Hunkins

Ann Hunkins is a poet, translator and a photographer. Nepali into English translations include a novel, Dr. Banira Giri's The Prison and a book of poetry. For her poetry, she has been awarded the James Hearst Poetry Prize (North American Review), Celeste Turner Wright poetry Prize, and the Sacramento Poetry Center Award and was honored for her photography with the Willard Van Dyke Memorial Grant. FYI: Wicked Sticks: Comprehensive Web Site about the Aboriginal Didjeridu (wind instrument)

Introducing Gary Brower

Gary L. Brower, Placitas NM, possibly most familiar to us as a Duende Poetry Series organizer, will be reading a long poem at PWP, "Gunslinger in New Mexico," which he describes as

a riff on the 200-page poem of Ed Dorn, "Gunslinger," the great surrealistic anti-epic of the 60s [Ed note: audio files at Penn Sound]. I knew Ed when he & I taught at the Univ. of Kansas many years ago. Dorn, of course, if you don't know his work, is one of the Black Mountain Poets along with Robert Creeley, Robt. Duncan, Denise Levertov, Chas. Olson.

Gary Brower Reads, CD with "Gunslinger in NM," is available through Vox Audio (Bruce Holsapple), PO Box 594, Magdalena, NM 87825. Gary's books are available from Destructible Heart Press. Look for Gary's CD and books at PWP.

Gary, born in Kansas City, Mo. but now living in Placitas, NM, has a Ph.D. in Romance Languages & Literatures from the University of Missouri at Columbia, has taught at US universities and directed academic programs in Barcelona, Madrid and Guadalajara. A specialist in Hispanic literature, especially Latin America, he has published numerous essays in Spanish and English on Latin American writers in academic journals. He has also written two books on the impact of Japanese haiku on western poetry, translated poetry, worked as a journalist in Los Angeles and with the southern Oregon Mexican migrant worker community (which included extensive ESL outreach).

Gary's poetry and translations have been widely published in numerous poetry magazines. Currently one of the Duende Poetry Series of Placitas organizers, his chapbooks, Planting Trees in Terra Incognita and The Book of Knots, both published by Destructible Heart Press, appeared in 2006 and 2007, respectively. A broadside photo-poem, CDs and readings (often accompanied by guitarist El Nino David and dancer Susannah Garrett) at venues that include the National Hispanic Cultural Center, Sunflower Festival, Duende Poetry Series and on CDs round out an already ample list.

(All from the far more detailed bio, Gary Brower, a Portrait, at Outlaw Poetry)

Picnic & Workshop Flyer

Click image to view larger version for printing. Or you can download it in document format.

The Workshop brochure is about ready for prime too.

July 6 reading at the Filling Station, Barelas

A note from Gary Brower (pwp reader from waaaay back, whose bio will be appearing soon) sends this intriguing notice & invitation ...

By the way, I understand I'm to read on July 6 with some members of the NMSO at the Sunday morning Church of Beethoven at the Filling Station in Barelas (10:30-11:30AM), on 4th St., across from Out
ch'Yonda. Come on down, they'll do Ravel's Bolero among other works. But it's very popular, you have to get there early.

Ed Note - PS don't miss the links - they really flesh out a densely packed but tantalizingly minimalist notice

Gallery Talk for "Written In Sand"

Our Gallery Talk for Written in Sand is this Friday, June 20th, 6:30 pm, upstairs at the Harwood in the North Gallery. This is a good opportunity to see the art show if you haven't already. Canyon Road gallery owner Debbi Brody, artist & traveler Inara Cedrins, naturalist & poet Lou Liberty, and petroglyph preservation activist Charles Usmar are special guest participants.

The conversation will be lively, come add your voice to theirs! Master flute maker Ingrid Burg will be playing her bamboo flutes. Following the Gallery Talk, artist Peggy Dobbins will give a "dwelling in tents" performance. We are documenting the evening in a film to send to China next month for the 16th World Anthropology & Ethnology Conference.

Thanks, hope to see you Friday! Dale

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Written in Sand, Art show at Harwood - June 5-26

For more information, contact Dale Harris, poetdale@yahoo.com, or visit www.peggydobbins.net

Introducing Miriam Sagan

I wrote participating PWP readers for bio and more to introduce them on the blog. Eventually I hope to post an intro + links/sample poems for all our pwp readers. Miriam kindly sent me this:

Hi, as far as I know, I'm reading & also teaching at the festival. I'll be doing a workshop on The Land/An Art Site. I've been working with The Land for about a year. Here is a bit about my project, and also a poem I wrote about the sky over the Land. My husband Rich and I made a special trip to see it. Enjoy!
Miriam Sagan

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In August, 2007, I received a residency grant to work on The Land/An Art Site--an innovative project in Mountainair, New Mexico .(http://www.landartsite.org). The Land hosts artists internationally to create nonimpact land based art. Usually residences are a week or more, but I decided to visit frequently over a year’s period. It is also unusual for a poet to work with The Land.

As a result, I have written an eight section poetry cycle, which deals with themes ranging from Western landscape art to actual pieces on the land to the role of dream and memory. On April 19th, 2008 I presented my work, including a notebook of documentation, at the opening of The Land’s new Albuquerque gallery on Granite Street

I am now working on installing the piece. The sculpture will be a weathered ranch style clothesline, with part of the poem hanging from it on gauze sheets. The poem is composed of out take lines from all the sections, and exists only as an ephemeral synthesis.

When the sculpture is installed, it will be videotaped. In August I will participate in the Mountainair poetry festival, read the entire poem, and teach a writing workshop on The Land. I expect to also design and produce a pamphlet of the work for distribution through the gallery.

Obviously this has been an incredible opportunity for me--to work in a completely new way as a poet, to engage in different communities locally, to work as a visual artists, and to collaborate with crafts people. Aesthetically, I have been exploring new terrain--work in which there is an emphasis on boundaries in time and space and most crucially, between the suburban and the wild, a zone earthworks artist Robert Smithson calls “the sund.”

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Nightsky

Antelope, jack rabbits, dusk
Comes on
Civil twilight, then nautical
As if light were a little ship
Slipping over the horizon
Sirius, dog star brightest
at this latitude
Contrails like speedboat wake
Give way to velveteen sky
Saturn, whose rings we can’t see
Without the binoculars
We left on the shelf at home,
Castor and Pollux
Shining on either side.
And gradually, like invisible ink
The constellations you point out
Begin to define themselves
Dipper, Orion, the city of Albuquerque faint glow to the north.
Stars come out in nightsky, cryptobiotic
Mark direction
As clearly as in the planetarium.
Planes above us headed somewhere else
I’d like to know
Where
And how each passenger
Is doing, reading, dozing,
Worrying about the past
As ice clinks in plastic cups.
Try painting all this
With whiteout
On carbon paper.
On earth
The flying star weed called
Datura.
I’m cold, now, ready
To go
You say--”you do the Cliff Notes
Of altered states.”
Aldeberon, Betelgeuse, Procyon
And smoke from the Manzanos
Burning all night
Highway flashing sign
FIRE ACTIVITY AHEAD.
These stars
Like the ceiling
Of the Shaffer Hotel:
Lion’s head, masked dancers, backwards swastikas of migration
Thunderbird, lightning zigzag, a narrative of relocation.
These stars
By dawn
Will unfold their wings
And fly away again
Like mourning doves in the yard below us.
more - links to poems & books by Miriam from the SF Broadside

Poetry Idea Engine

When inspiration flees and all else fails

Poetry on the Bus

Call for Poets of All Ages

ABQ RIDE is sponsoring a new program to provide a more pleasurable and enlightening experience for bus riders by displaying poems on interior bus panels. 

Eligibility: All residents of Albuquerque and surrounding communities.  There is no age limit on poets.

Guidelines: Poems must be 50 words or less, not counting the title, must be authored by the applicant and not previously published.

Deadline: June 30

Display Dates: Poetry will be on display from August 1-October 31. Display will include a 30-word bio of the poet.

More Info and Entry Form: Email Del Chavez.

Reader introduction: Connie Rossignol

Connie [ Rossignol], a 2008 PWP readers writes:
 

Dale told me to send you some info for the upcoming event so here goes:

I write "cowboy poetry" but it might better be described as "rural rhyme"since I'm not now nor have I ever been a cowboy![ I have neither the skill nor the "sand" for that job!  LOL] I come from a rural backround and currently live in Tome' NM  with my husband of 37 years [ my 2 grown children and my granddaughter live in Albuquerque] We grow a little hay and  keep a small herd of donkeys that we ride and drive. In the past I've had a part time job wrangling horses for a dude outfit but have primarily made a living as an OB/GYN nurse practitioner  - - currently semi retired.

My poems have been published in The Horsemen's Voice, The Brayer [Journal of the American Donkey and Mule Society] and the UNM literary magazine, Concepts Southwest. I had an article published in Mules and More Magazine. A poem, "In Defense of Donkeys," was included in an anthology called The Big Roundup which won 2002 Best Cowboy Poetry Book of the Year/ Buck Ramsey Award from the Academy of Western Artists and the Will Rogers Medallion Award.

I've performed poetry at Rancho De Las Golondrinas [I will be there June 28th and 29th] and some years back I read at a gallery in Taos called "Pure" [don't know if it's still around or not.]

That's pretty much it - -except unbeknownst to me a friend established a web site about me

http://members.aol.com/broncmagnet - there are some poems there along with a "resume ". I'm sure this is more than you ever wanted to know - and the truth is none of it is anything to "write home about"! LOL

Thanks for including me in your program. Everyone was so nice last year and I had so much fun.

If I can answer any questions just drop me a note!

Connie [ Rossignol]

Ed note: Thanks Connie - fun is definitely the way to go. Maybe we can educate fellow readers and visitors about Cowboy poetry - and longears.

June 7-13, 39th Poetry International Festival

In partnership with the 39th Poetry International Festival, the Poetry International Website will provide in-depth festival coverage from at Rotterdam each day with live broadcasts, interviews with the poets and specially-recorded Poetry Clips. Audio and video footage will be made available on the site after each event.

The theme of this year's festival is CITY AND COUNTRY. In 2008, for the first time in history, the majority of the world’s human population will live in urban areas rather than in the country. By 2030, this is expected to rise to over 60%. This irreversible urbanisation will fundamentally change the relationship between the city and the country, and have implications on both individuals and society.

This Poetry International Festival focuses on poetry from the city and the countryside. Throughout the week there will be programmes, lectures, interviews and debates dedicated to the subject. Naturally, what this turning point could mean for poetry will also be part of the programme.

Programme:
This year’s festival features an event on Dutch poet Gerard Reve, and related to the theme of the festival – City and Country – a special event on T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land. The audience will be able to listen to the integral version of this 434-line poem and Paul Claes (Flemish author, and translator of a yet to be published translation of The Waste Land) will give a talk on his interpretation of the poem and his translation of it.

In different locations in and around the festival, tent installations by Dutch Visual artist, Dre Wapenaar, will be exhibited and made use of.

Poets:
Confirmed poets are: H.H. ter Balkt (Netherlands), Maria Barnas (Netherlands), Linda Maria Baros (France / Romania), Philippe Beck (France), Remco Campert (Netherlands), William Cliff (Belgium), Mangalesh Dabral (India), Jean-Michel Espitallier (France), James Fenton (United Kingdom), Andrea Gibellini (Italy), Robert Gray (Australia), Shoichiro Iwakiri (Japan), Gerður Kristný (Iceland), Peter van Lier (Netherlands), Roni Margulies (Turkey), Risto Oikarinen (Finland) , Mirta Rosenberg (Argentina), Silke Scheuermann (Germany), Miriam Van hee (Belgium), Szabolcs Várady (Hungary), Henk van der Waal (Netherlands), Natan Zach (Israel / Germany), Adam Zagajewski (Poland), Juan Manuel Roca (Colombia).

Live streaming on PIW:
Log on and tune in each day for live recordings of the poetry readings. English translations of the poems being performed will be shown alongside the film footage.

Festival website:
Visit the festival website regularly for updated information. Extensive programme information in both Dutch and English at http://www.poetry.nl