Black History, Fat Tuesday & Chicken Bones

I missed on posting something just for Mardi Gras. Still grieving the death of a legendary city. Her songs will come. And the Queen City will also share other songs lamenting fallen cities. Baudelaire's Swan comes to mind (deposed African queen, exiled, bedraggled, wandering the streets: je pense à vous) despite its parched environment. He understood the city without ever having been there.

Until then, this is for her ... for end days of Black History Month (that she is so much a part of) and to introduce readers to Chicken Bones

I Am New Orleans

New Orleans poet, 1900-1976, Marcus B. Christian's Whitmanesque poem catalogs and celebrates the city's complexities and the role of African-Americans in its long history.

New Orleans sunflower growing out of post-Katrina toxic muck

More NOLA images (2005-2009), photos by Eric Paul, Metairie LA

A Survivor's Poem (excerpt)

Give me a drink. I have been

bound here for three days
watching the wretched water

have its way
destroying and terrorizing

anything in its path
and here I stand thirsty

in the Aftermath
Stand . . . I stand when waves

of death surround me
when treacherous floods

attempt to swallow me
I look to the left there is water
I look to the right there is water
I look for my children there is water
I look for my home

and all I see is water
But I’m here

and I’m looking for water
not the kind I can drink

and be thirsty again
but something that will become

in me a fountain
of water springing up

By Denay Fields, posted 11 September 2005

Chicken Bones: A Journal for Literary and Artistic African-American. More poetry in Literary New Orleans: Poems, Essays, Reports, etc, from those outside or those in the Big Easy.

2009 ABQ Youth Slam-Off, Friday Feb 27

from "MAS Poetry de ABQ" <maspoetry@yahoo.com> via ABQ Slam list:

2009 ABQ Youth Slam-Off for youth poets from the Albuquerque Metro , National Hispanic Cultural Center - tomorrow, Friday Feb 27 @ 7 pm

The ABQ Youth Slam-off an open poetry slam for poets, MCs, and spoken word performers ages 13-19, co-produced by ABQSlams, Warehouse 508 and the DCYPC (Duke City Youth Poetry Collective). "ABQ Unidos" is also being sponsored by the N4th Arts Center.

The 7 pm Slam-off will take place in the NHCC's Bank of America Theater. Sign-up starts at 6:15 p.m. Come early: only 20 spots are guaranteed

Admission is free, but donations will be accepted before, during and after the show.

The ABQ Youth Slam-off will pick the top five ABQ Metro-area youth spoken word performers, who will then represent Albuquerque at the international BRAVE NEW VOICES poetry slam conference in Chicago, Ill. in July 2009.

The slam will follow all standard slam rules except time limit – poets:

• must recite original poems in each round (up to three rounds possible)
• cannot use props, music or costumes
• have three (3) minutes to do their poem plus a 20 second grace period. After that, they will be penalized half a point (0.5) for every ten seconds they go over.

Five judges will be chosen randomly from the audience and judge the poems on a scale of 1-10. The high and low score will be dropped and the other scores combined for a final score.

The ABQ Unidos team is also looking to raise $5,000 to pay for the trip to Chicago as well as accommodations in the Windy City while at Brave New Voices. Donations can be made online at ABQSlams.org or by contacting ABQSlams slammaster Kenn Rodriguez at 505.379.2666 (call or text). For information, call/text Kenn Rodriguez at 505.379.2666 or email info@abqslams.org.

Poetry for Black History Month

There's Hakim Bellamy of course,

• http://www.myspace.com/hakimbellamyazhizelf
• http://www.myspace.com/theoriginallawofattraction
  

And more (many sites with audio)

• Black History at the Academy of American Poetry
• Mr. Africa Poetry Lounge!
• 20th Century African-American Poets - set of lessons
• Afro Poets.Net - Famous Black Writers
• Phat African American Library including Langston Hughes, Amiri Baraka (Le Roi Jones), Nikki Giovanni and Nobel Prize winner Derek Walcott
• fragments of THE LAST POETS, rappers of the civil rights era

________When the revolution comes
________some of us will catch it on TV
________with chicken hanging from our mouths
________you'll know it's revolution
________because there won't be no commercials
________when the revolution comes - 1970

Derek Walcott's "A City's Death by Fire" (Omeros)

After that hot gospeller has levelled all but the churched sky,
I wrote the tale by tallow of a city's death by fire;
Under a candle's eye, that smoked in tears, I
Wanted to tell, in more than wax, of faiths that were snapped like wire.
All day I walked abroad among the rubbled tales,
Shocked at each wall that stood on the street like a liar;
Loud was the bird-rocked sky, and all the clouds were bales
Torn open by looting, and white, in spite of the fire.
By the smoking sea, where Christ walked, I asked, why
Should a man wax tears, when his wooden world fails?
In town, leaves were paper, but the hills were a flock of faiths;
To a boy who walked all day, each leaf was a green breath
Rebuilding a love I thought was dead as nails,
Blessing the death and the baptism by fire.

And let us not forget the musical splendor of AfroCuban poet Nicolas Guillen - CAÑA (from (Poemas)

El negro
junto al cañaveral.

El yanqui
sobre el cañaveral.

La tierra
bajo el cañaveral.

¡Sangre
que se nos va!

2009 Picnic Update & Sunflower Preview

Just a quick note updating you about pwp 2009 - the 12th annual Poets & Writers Picnic: no overkill this early in the year, not to mention avoiding plogger burnout. After all, I'll be writing on the subject periodically from now through August.

If you are not on organizer Dale Harris's pwp/workshop mailing list, let her know. e-mail poetdale@yahoo.com, telephone: (505) 242-4930 or surface mail (Dale Harris, 2115 Aspen Avenue, NW, Albuquerque, NM 87104).

Dale & I met here in Mountainair last week end to go over a few details & confirm arrangements with the Shaffer Hotel (garden & gazebo for picnic, conference room for workshop, box lunches for workshop, room discount for workshop and picnic participants and so on). It's all a go - same days and locations as last year (& the year before & so on).

sharing poems & stories around the fire

Sunflower Poetry Writing Workshop: Thursday afternoon - Saturday just past noon; grand finale, reading at Picnic. Workshop leader: Dale Harris; guest lecturer/ workshop instructor (& picnic featured reader): Gary "Mex" Glazner (in from the wilds of Manhattan). I suppose I'm the resident Renfield: checking in workshoppers Thursday and sending them out on their 1st assignment, perhaps offering blogging tutorials if there is any call for such. The 2009 brochures & flyers are not ready yet but will be mailed to Dale's list, distributed at poetry venues, posted here & elsewhere when they are. In the meantime, look at last year's brochure & flyer, visit past workshops.

Poets & Writers Picnic: it's all here, updated as we go along. Featured readers & open mic. I'll be posting bios of featured readers as they are confirmed & send bios. New this year: a co-mc, Ken Gurney, to share mic duty with Dale as well as reading as a featured. What I wrote above about flyers goes for here too.

Our sponsor, the Manzano Mountain Arts Council puts on Mountainair's annual Sunflower Festival, concurrent with PWP and just a few block away at the Dr Saul Community Center, exuberantly spilling out into the street in front. Don't miss it: vendors, art, crafts, flea & farmers market, live music, Sunflower Hat contest, library (across the street) book sale and more. Don't miss the Children's Sunflower Art and sunflower displays in storefront windows all over town.

I'll keep you posted - and my other blog, Mountainair Arts, covers it as extensively as the arts council information flow permits. More to come... including Sunflower, Picnic and Workshop participation in the Gran Quivira Centennial and still more (got to keep a few things under my sunflower hat...)

February 23: "Fixed and Free" reading

from Billy Brown (401-8139, welbert53@aol.com) to the Poetry Community of Albuquerque & New Mexico, via post to Abq Slams' yahoo groups mailing list

Details for February "Fixed and Free" reading:

• Date: Monday, February 23, 2009
• Time: 6:30 pm sign-up, open mic readings 7–8:45. Feature at approximately 7:45 pm
• Featured Poet & Visual Artist: Marilyn Stablein
• Suggested (but optional) Focus: Love Poems & Erotic Poems
• Place: F Gallery, (part of the Fixed and Free Bike Shop); 114 Tulane SE, Nob Hill, behind (south of) Starbucks at 3400 Central Avenue. Double Chocolate Biscotti available for sale. MANY THANKS to Fixed and Free for use of their space!

This month's reading features Marilyn Stablein, author of eight books including Sleeping in Caves: A Sixties Himalayan Memoir; Climate of Extremes: Landscape and Imagination (personal essays); Night Travels to Tibet (prose poems); The Census Taker: Tales of a Traveler in India and Nepal (short fiction & prose poems), and Vermin: A Bestiary.

Marilyn's awards include two Yaddo artist residencies, a Houston Brazos fiction prize, a University of Houston Cullen Fellowship, the Southwest Writers Poetry Prize & grants from the NEA, the Seattle and King County Arts Commissions and the NY Foundation for the Arts. Also a visual artist, her assemblages, collages and artist’s books have been exhibited internationally. Recent assemblages were included in the Originals 2007, Harwood Museum, Taos, and the Arte de Descartes VII recycle show, Stables Gallery. She and husband Gary Wilkie own Acequia Booksellers on 4th Street in Albuquerque’s North Valley. Marilyn may bring some of her visual art pieces to Monday's reading

My Hindi Primer
book art by Marilyn Stablein, Santa Fe Book Arts Group

Remaining 2009 "Fixed & Free" Dates & Features - every 4th Monday of the month:

March 23 - Rich Boucher
April 27 - Deb Brody
May 25 - Jason Yurcic
June 22 - Dale Harris
July 27 - Sa l Treppiedi
August 24 - Hakim Bellamy
September 28 - Richard Wolfson
October 26 - Merimee Moffitt
November 23 - Kenneth Gurney
December 28 - Bill Nevins

Please come and enjoy poetry at “Fixed and Free!” Comments & Suggestions: welcomed (along with questions & offers of help).

• Host(s): Billy Brown, and others TBD; Please contact Billy if interested in sharing host duties: email welbert53@aol. com or call 401-8139.
• Features: Please contact Billy if interested in being a featured poet in 2010
• Rules: There ARE no rules … JK … J; 5 minute limit on the open mic
• Admission: Free. Donations are welcome (to help cover costs)
• Food/drink: Some pastries for sale at site; LOTS nearby (Starbucks, Flying Star, Satellite, etc.)

Poetry International: Adieu I

ADIEU I: To myself

This is, so be it, the last note
that I shall,
_________will,
_____________can
_________________play
in the last life that I live,
on the last keys of my body.
An instrument hard as a safe
from which I have squandered the craziest pennies,
from which I have pulverised the most expensive spider webs.
The dust has stuck to my bones.
It will be buried with me.
The worms will not eat it,
the poison is only intended for me.
I can, I could know
that each beautiful song decorates itself with a conclusion,
as each conclusion decorates itself with a prayer after eating,
and that this end, now or never,
must be called beginning.

© 1958, the estate of Gaston Burssens
© Translation: 1982, John Stevens Wade

*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*

About Gaston Burssens (+ links to more poems) & Belgian poetry (Does Belgian Poetry Exist?).

(All from Poetry International Web)

Firestorm, Open Mic, Feb 20

Firestorm, Albuquerque' s all women's poetry slam and open-mic will be this Friday February 20th at The Petting Zoo performance space, 1407 4th st SW at 7:30. Sign up starts at 7 pm, Come early to make sure your name is on the list. Plus! We have just confirmed our special guest will be *BEATBOX QUEEN~MS. SAYWUT?!* (Like this means anything to me... these updates I remind myself are sent to those already in the slam know, members of the subculture....so here's a MySpace video that may or may not provide enlightenment) So ladies come out and share your words: listen and learn men - come out and support. Vanessa, also blogging @ Mountainair Arts & Mountainair Announcements

A Valentine 4 U

Happy Valentine's Day: Poet-Bot Loves You

get more chicken wisdom, along with tees & other trinkets

The Ruin

For the ruins of Gran Quivira: 2009 is the Gran Quivira Centennial.

Gran Quivira

The Ruin is an 8th century Old English poem from the Exeter Book by an unknown author. Its subject is ancient Roman ruins, assumed to be the ruins of Aquae Sulis at modern Bath, England, and the powerful fate (Weird or Wyrd) that has reduced a once lively community and its sturdy stone buildings to ruins.

Modern English Translation (excerpted)

This masonry is wondrous; fates broke it
courtyard pavements were smashed; the work of giants is decaying.
Roofs are fallen, ruinous towers,
the frosty gate with frost on cement is ravaged,
chipped roofs are torn, fallen,
undermined by old age. The grasp of the earth possesses
the mighty builders, perished and fallen,
the hard grasp of earth, until a hundred generations
of people have departed. Often this wall,
lichen-grey and stained with red, experienced one reign after another,
remained standing under storms; the high wide gate has collapsed.
Still the masonry endures in winds cut down
.....
Bright were the castle buildings, many the bathing-halls,
high the abundance of gables, great the noise of the multitude,
many a meadhall full of festivity,
until Fate the mighty changed that.
Far and wide the slain perished, days of pestilence came,
death took all the brave men away;
their places of war became deserted places,
the city decayed. The rebuilders perished,
the armies to earth. And so these buildings grow desolate,


Original Old English

Wrætlic is þes wealstan, wyrde gebræcon;
burgstede burston, brosnað enta geweorc.
Hrofas sind gehrorene, hreorge torras,
hrungeat berofen, hrim on lime,
scearde scurbeorge scorene, gedrorene,
ældo undereotone. Eorðgrap hafað
waldend wyrhtan forweorone, geleorene,
heardgripe hrusan, oþ hund cnea
werþeoda gewitan. Oft þæs wag gebad
ræghar ond readfah rice æfter oþrum,
ofstonden under stormum; steap geap gedreas.
Wonað giet se ...num geheapen,
fel on
grimme gegrunden
scan heo...
...g orþonc ærsceaft
...g lamrindum beag
mod mo... ...yne swiftne gebrægd
hwætred in hringas, hygerof gebond
weallwalan wirum wundrum togædre.
Beorht wæron burgræced, burnsele monige,
heah horngestreon, heresweg micel,
meodoheall monig mondreama full,
oþþæt þæt onwende wyrd seo swiþe.
Crungon walo wide, cwoman woldagas,
swylt eall fornom secgrofra wera;
wurdon hyra wigsteal westen staþolas,
brosnade burgsteall. Betend crungon
hergas to hrusan. Forþon þas hofu dreorgiað,
ond þæs teaforgeapa tigelum sceadeð
hrostbeages hrof. Hryre wong gecrong
gebrocen to beorgum, þær iu beorn monig
glædmod ond goldbeorht gleoma gefrætwed,
wlonc ond wingal wighyrstum scan;
seah on sinc, on sylfor, on searogimmas,
on ead, on æht, on eorcanstan,
on þas beorhtan burg bradan rices.
Stanhofu stodan, stream hate wearp
widan wylme; weal eall befeng
beorhtan bosme, þær þa baþu wæron,
hat on hreþre. þæt wæs hyðelic.
Leton þonne geotan
ofer harne stan hate streamas
un...
...þþæt hringmere hate
þær þa baþu wæron.
þonne is
...re; þæt is cynelic þing,
huse ...... burg....

(More Old English poetry to read and listen to)

Poems for Lincoln Bicentennial

Today Feb 12 is the 200th birthday of Abraham Lincoln, out most poetic president. Time for rounds of Whitman...others, even Lincoln himself

Oh Captain! My Captain!
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

When lilacs last in the doorway bloomed
And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the night,
I mourn’d—and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

Both poems are from Leaves of Grass

More Lincoln poems, most of the poets here seem dated today. but Whitman, like his near contemporaries Wordsworth and Baudelaire and fellow wanderers of city streets, is as alive today as he was in his lifetime.

Lincoln as poet and avid reader of poetry: Shakespeare, Lord Byron, Robert Browning, Thomas Gray, Thomas Hood, Oliver Wendell Holmes, William Cullen Bryant, John Greenleaf Whittier, Fitz-Greene Halleck, and, second only to Shakespeare, Robert Burns. As poetic prose or prose poem, Lincoln's Gettysburg Address equals any of these and surpasses more than a few.

Poem: An Impression of Being Alive

AN IMPRESSION OF BEING ALIVE
© 2009, Mona Zote

All day we have watched the street shift
and careen, shed skin, refill, crest and yaw,
corrected our taste for oranges
packed by other hands from other places, bought
tokens of summer and the coming happiness —
we paused at the Korean romances: A Tale of a Prince,

Over Rainbow, Tree of Heaven. And the corporate type
who went mad for a girl.
No prince arrived with a piece of fax.
You said Plainly, it’s all money and for-
nication, just like everywhere else. We smiled
at the notion of moon bases and hummed a tune
from the movie we figured
we were still living in.

All day the sun kept tangling and stumbling
among bright open windows while the shopgirls cheered on,
and the pavement singers, and those women
fingering black laces in Foreign Lane
and we lived in and out of restaurants, smoking nonstop,

plate after plate of consommé
not thinking or speaking, our nerves
shattered by the urge to depart. All day
we have waited and waited
under heaven’s wide and lovely tree
for princes, advisors,
even some flannel postman to come and say
that the ship’s sailed, the bus
has left, all families look for us.
Have we said too much? Or not enough –

And here we are, the day gone
to its usual brilliant bedtime, the astronauts gone, the rain
now cadencing in our heads. The restaurant must close.
We have learned nothing. You wisely add: Really,
there was nothing to learn.

*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*

"Mona Zote lives in Aizawl in the Northeast Indian state of Mizoram. She describes herself as a poet “disguised as a government employee”. She writes in English and has published her poetry in various journals, including Indian Literature and Carapace. Her work was also featured in the Anthology of Contemporary Poetry from the Northeast, edited by Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih and Robin Ngangom. She publishes sparingly. Zote’s poetry startles with its unsentimental and disquieting imagery, its register that moves from the formal to the colloquial and its determinedly fragmentary, non-linear style." (Arundhathi Subramaniam)

*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*

Links

• Welcome to Indian Poetry – February 2009 (February 2009)
  Poetry in times of peril: that’s the theme for the nineteenth edition of the India domain. The theme suggested itself for obvious reasons. India, we are told by The Times of India, has “the highest number of terror-related incidents and injured” of all the countries in the world (barring war-ravaged countries, such as Iraq).
  
• SPARROW: An extract from an interview with Mona Zote, part of an oral history recording by SPARROW (Sound and Picture Archives for Research on Women).
• Mizo Writing in English: A blog showcasing writers from Mizoram, includes poems by Mona Zote.
• Poetry International Web: “The Poet as Chronicler: An Overview of Contemporary Poetry in Northeast India”, an essay by Robin Ngangom
• Muse India: ‘Locating Cultures: A Semi-Academic Essay on the English Poetry of the North-East’ by Sumanyu Satpathy

Slam Laureate competitors and article

from Zachary Kluckman tigerbrighttiger@yahoo.com @ New Mexico Poetry Slam

A list of current competitors and a link to the Albuquerque Arts article on the slam poet laureate program.....

http://www.abqarts. com/archive/ albuquerqueARTS0 2-09.pdf

Current competitors:

• Manual Gonzalez
• Carlos Contreras
• Hakim Bellamy
• Bill Nevins
• Prisicilla Baca y Candelaria
• Jessica Lopez
• Bobbi Lurie
• Ryan Pace Sloan
• Rich Boucher
• Erin Northern
• Sal Treppiedi

and possibly a few more yet to confirm ....

There is room for several more competitors so don't wait to register. For a measly $10 you could be the first Slam Poet Laureate and the take part in what will surely be one of the most exciting and dynamic poetry events ever! Check out NM Poetry Tangents @ http://www.nmpoetrytangents.org or e-mail zgkluckman@msn. com for more information.

Also, the competition will need judges for the jury on the finals night. Contact Zachary if you'd like to volunteer for that as well.....

Legislative Alert: NM Arts Funding

Legislative update forwarded from Arts Alliance The last Arts Alliance legislative update explained that the House Appropriations and Finance Committee had tabled the discussion of New Mexico Arts funding and established a subcommittee to review the situation. Please take a moment to call the two representatives on that subcommittee and other members of the HFAC. The message is simple: Please restore full funding to New Mexico Arts. Subcommittee Brian Egolf, Jr. (D-SF) --986-4211 Kathy McCoy (R-Cedar Crest) -- 986-4214 Other HFAC members: Kiki Saavedra, chair, (D-ABQ) -- 986-986-4316 Lucky Varela, deputy chair (D-SF) -- 986-4318 Danice Picraux, vicechair (D-ABQ) -- 986-4438 Ray Begaye (D-Shiprock) -- 986-4436 Richard J. Berry (R-ABQ) -- 986-4452 Donald Bratton (R-Hobbs) -- 986-4227 Joni Marie Gutierrez (D-Mesilla) -- 986-4234 John Heaton (D-Carlsbad) -- 986-4432 Rhonda King (D-Stanley) -- 986 4438 Larry Larranaga (R-ABQ) -- 986-4215 Antonio Lujan (D-LasCruces) -- 986-4436 Patricia Lundstrom (D-Gallup) -- 986-4435 Nick Salazar (D-OhkayOwingeh) -- 986-4433 Don Tripp (R-Socorro) -- 986-4220 Richard Vigil (D-Ribera) -- 986-4242 Jeannette Wallace (R-LosAlamos) -- 986-4452 Thank you! Cricket Appel, Executive Director Arts Alliance, Inc. PO Box 27657, Albuquerque, NM 87125 505/268-1920; 505/232-5383 (fax)

Two slams

MAS Poetry de ABQ via abqslam list: Two slams in Burque this first week of February. Wednesday night is POETRY and BEER at Blackbird Buvette Downtown, 509 Central Avenue NW, 505-243-0878, and Friday night is the second ever FIRST FRIDAY with slam and open mic at Winning Coffee Co. by UNM Ed Note: More details at the ABQSlams website. ABQ Slams is also on both MySpace and Facebook. Want to keep au courant about slam events/opps? Plog coverage is not consistent. Best you subscribe to ABQ Slams and/or NM Slam groups @ Yahoo Groups. Slam FAQ for the interested.

Transforming the World through Poetry

Due to an unexpected but welcome turn of events, this plog may be going where few if any plogs have gone before. The connection was language but not poetry related.

Perhaps a little context will help. I teach ESL online as a volunteer and mentioned the plog to a colleague, an American living and teaching in Italy. She immediately thought of her friend Giada who organizes an annual international poetry event in Calabria. We connected, and now it seems that Poets & Writers Picnic will be collaborating with Angoli Corsari on Verso Sud. ... How's that for serendipity?

Who says you have to be Santa Fe to go global? Here's Giada's letter:

Vanessa,
I'm so glad to hear from you.. Well, I created an association, called "Angoli Corsari" (in English something like "privateer corners") to create an international poetic family around the world through events that put poets in contact with each and of course with the public.

We organized a lot of poetic readings, in which the artists read (with music if they want) in their original language while there's the projection of the translated lines. "Verso sud" is our most ambitious project and it's an international poetry festival.

I'm working now to raise funds for the second edition of it which should be next June. Last year it was a huge success with 20 poets from different countries (from Us to Chile, from Bosnia to Iraq and so on) and it took place in Reggio Calabria (in South Italy) where I live, in a square outside a medieval castle. Inside the castle there were photography shows and meetings throughout the day, along with spontaneous performances..

I'm poetry-addicted and my first love was Lawrence Ferlingehtti, of whom I'm a official-non accademic-subjective beat-biographer (that's his definition) and translator here in Italy. I've just published a book called "Io sono come Omero" which is this very unusual choral biography of Lawrence...

So let me know what you think of all this and, if you'd like to, bring proposals and let's try to see if we can enlarge this family much more.

Love and poetry,
Giada

Hakim Bellamy @ Sanjevani Poetry Circle

Remember Hakim at last summer's Poets & Writers picnic? Here's more about his February reading @ Sanjevani, mostly but not entirely from Bill Nevins post on abq slam announcement list. As usual, I can't resist hunting down links to add...

Hakim Bellamy @ Sanjevani Poetry Circle happens Monday February 9, 2009--7 pm at Sanjevani Health & Lifestyle Center. 7920 Wyoming NE Suite B-- south of Paseo Del Norte (Bank of the West Complex)

Hakim Bellamy is a two-time National Slam Poet Champion. He was a member of the 2005 National Poetry Slam Champs Team Albuquerque in his first year of poetry slam, 6 months after his first ever slam, which he also won.

Hakim respects the blessing, but could care less about winning poetry slams, as opposed to cultivating creativity. Hence, he is in the process of adding playwright, actor and musical performer to a resume that already includes: freelance journalist, community organizer and social justice advocate. In 2008 he was recognized for his work as a community organizer and journalist with an honorable mention for the University of New Mexico Paul Bartlett Re Peace Prize.

He Absolutely Had To Be A "Community Organizer" by Hakim Bellamy, Wire Tap, November 19, 2008

YouTube: Hakim Bellamy reading @ UNM for National Poetry Month

Hakim’s poetry and journalism have been published internationally and on Albuquerque inner-city buses as well as in more conventional area poetry publishing venues such as the Harwood Anthology (2006), Earthships: A New Mecca Poetry Collection (2007) and Sin Fronteras Journal (2008)

A Poem by Hakim: Forty-Fives