MAY Sunday Kind of Love: Richard Blanco and Sami Miranda

MAY

Sunday Kind of Love
Featuring 

Richard Blanco & Sami Miranda 

  
Sunday May 19, 2013
5-7m Busboys & Poets 
2021 14th St. NW Washington, DC 20009 
Hosted by Sarah Browning and Katy Riche
5$ online or at the door
As always, open mic follows! 
Co-sponsored by Busboys and Poets & Split This Rock   

Richard Blanco's acclaimed first book of poetry, City of a Hundred Fires, explores the yearnings and negotiation of cultural identity as a Cuban- American, and received the Agnes Starrett Poetry Prize from the University of Pittsburgh Press. His second book, Directions to The Beach of the Dead, won the Beyond Margins Award from the PEN American Center for its continued exploration of the universal themes of cultural identity and homecoming. Looking for The Gulf Motel, (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2012) examines the blurred lines of gender, the frailty of his father-son relationship, and the intersection of his cultural and sexual identities as a Cuban-American gay man living in rural 

In January 2013, Blanco was selected by President Obama to be the inaugural poet, joining the ranks of Robert Frost and Maya Angelou.

Blanco's poems have appeared in top literary journals, including The Nation, the New Republic, Ploughshares, Michigan Quarterly Review, and TriQuarterly Review; and several anthologies including, The Best American Poetry, Great American Prose Poems, Breadloaf Anthology of New American Poets, and American Poetry: The Next Generation. Blanco is recipient of two Florida Artist Fellowships, a Residency Fellowship from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and is a John Ciardi Fellow of the Bread Loaf Writers Conference. A builder of cities as well as poems, he holds a bachelors of science degree in Civil Engineering and a Master in Fine Arts in Creative Writing.

Sami Miranda is an educator, poet and visual artists who makes his home in Washington, DC. His work has been published in Al Pie De la Casa Blanca, Full Moon on K St, the Chiron Review, DC Poets Against the War Anthology, MiPoesias.com and Beltway among others.  He has performed at venues such as the Kennedy Center, The Smithsonian Museum of American Art, The Smithsonian Museum of African Art and GALA Theatre.  

Sami curated the Sabor Sunday reading series in Washington DC, that brought two poets, a trio of musicians and two visual artists into conversation. He is currently recording a jazz and poetry collaboration with bass player Pepe Gonzalez. He develops and facilitates interactive poetry workshops for youth and adults and holds an MFA from The Bennington Writing Seminars.

Poem of the Week: Patricia Monaghan

         

Loaded

 

They were always taught that all guns were loaded.

It was a way, he said, to keep them safe.

Don't you notice, he said, how people get shot

by pistols they think are unloaded? The gun

on the living room shelf, the unhidden

luger, the rack full of rifles: the children

 

knew each one was death. Now children,

he'd ask, his hand on a gun, is this loaded?

Mute chorus of yes. Mute yearning to hide.

That was their home. At school they were safe

even when textbooks talked about guns

and described how the buffalo hunters would shoot

 

and buffalo crumple down dead, one shot

enough to bring down the biggest. No child

in that school had ever seen bison, gunned

down or living, seen meat being loaded

on travois by leather-clad scouts, safety

bolts on their guns; no child had worn hides

 

or rode on the plains. But in history hid

critical truths that they sought about shooting

and fear and escape. Learn and be safe,

history whispered its promise to children

like them, learn and be safe. But a loaded

gun holds only one promise. A gun,

 

any gun, threatens use of a gun

no matter how they tried to hide

in books, no matter how they loaded

themselves down with schoolwork. A shot

or two in the evening, then, children,

he'd say, don't think the world's safe,

 

then he'd tell how once he had saved

someone's life with that very gun

over there on the wall and then children,

he'd say, be prepared for the worst, never hide

from attackers, they all deserve shooting,

so all guns must always be loaded.

 

Even dreams weren't safe, for hiding

in them were guns, aimed, ready to shoot.

Even children know this: loading leads to unloading.

-Patricia Monaghan   

Used by permission.

From Homefront (WordTech, 2005) 

Patricia Monaghan (1946-2012) died on November 11, 2012 in her Wisconsin home, Brigit Rest, in the arms of her beloved husband Michael McDermott. Homefront is a collection about the effect of war on veterans' return to their families and the damage to both. Patricia was a poet, scholar, spiritual pioneer and practitioner, activist, gardener and endlessly energetic creator. 

Patricia co-founded the Black Earth Institute with Michael and recently co-founded the Association for the Study of Women and Mythology. The Institute is dedicated to artists serving the causes of inclusive spirituality, healing and protecting the earth and social justice. Patricia published over 20 books including many of poetry.  She was awarded a Pushcart Prize among many others. She was also an active supporter of Split This Rock.

  

Please feel free to forward Split This Rock Poem of the Week widely. We just ask you to include all of the information in this email, including this request. Thanks!

If you are interested in reading past poems of the week, feel free to visit the blog archive.   

Poem of the Week: Pamela Uschuk

              

        

Domestic Affairs and Foreign Policy

 

If we shoot past one another
like asteroids on a collision course with Mars,
our tongues acidic with accusations
that scour our hearts like lye
shoveled over a shallow grave,
and if we reach such velocity
in our keening to have the last word,
ragged in its self-loathing, then
how can we open to the first
purple crane's neck blooming against
love's adobe wall or notice
the three year old at the wedding
in Afghanistan, her small chest
abloom with bloody roses
or hear her cry lost
with her mother's to helicopter blades
slapping revenge into blue sky
we all breathe?

-Pamela Uschuk  

Used by permission.

From Wild in the Plaza of Memory (Wings Press, 2012) 

Called by The Bloomsbury Review, "one of the most insightful and spirited poets today," Pam Uschuk is the author of six books of poems, including the award-winning Without the Comfort of Stars: New and Selected Poems (2007 Sampark Press, New Delhi and London), Crazy Love (Wings Press), winner of a 2010 American Book Award and Wild in the Plaza of Memory (Wings Press, April 2012). Translated into a dozen languages, Uschuk won the 2011 War Poetry Prize from Winning Writers, 2010 New Millennium Poetry Prize, 2010 Best of the Web, the Struga Poetry Prize (for a single poem), the Dorothy Daniels Writing Award from the National League of American PEN Women, and others. Uschuk is Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Fort Lewis College. Editor-In-Chief of the literary magazine,

Cutthroat, A Journal of the Arts, she lives in Bayfield, Colorado and Tucson, Arizona.

   

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If you are interested in reading past poems of the week, feel free to visit the blog archive.   

Poem of the Week: Ruth Forman

       

Stand

why so afraid to stand up?
someone will tell you
sit down?

but here is the truth
someone will always tell you
sit down 

the ones we remember
kept standing

  

-Ruth Forman 

Used by permission.

From Prayers Like Shoes (Whit Press, 2009) 

Ruth Forman is the author of three award-winning books: poetry collections We Are the Young Magicians and Renaissance (both from Beacon) and the children's book, Young Cornrows Callin Out the Moon (Children's Book Press). She is the recipient of the Barnard New Women Poets Prize, The Pen Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award, The Durfee Artist Fellowship, the National Council of Teachers of English Notable Book Award, and recognition by The American Library Association. She provides writing workshops at schools and universities across the country and abroad, and has presented in forums such as the United Nations, the PBS series The United States of Poetry and National Public Radio. Forman is a former teacher of creative writing with the University of Southern California and June Jordan's Poetry for the People program at UC Berkeley and an eleven-year faculty member with the VONA-Voices writing program. Her latest collection is Prayers Like Shoes (2009) from Whit Press. Forman currently lives in Washington, DC.

  

Please feel free to forward Split This Rock Poem of the Week widely. We just ask you to include all of the information in this email, including this request. Thanks!

If you are interested in reading past poems of the week, feel free to visit the blog archive.    

 

April Sunday Kind of Love: Pam Uschuk & Ruth Forman

APRIL
Sunday Kind of Love
Featuring

Pam Uschuk & Ruth Forman

 

Sunday April 21, 2013

5-7pm

Busboys & Poets

2021 14th St. NW
Washington, DC 20009

Hosted by

Sarah Browning & Katy Richey
$5 online or at the door

As always, open mic follows!

Co-Sponsored by Busboys and Poets &
Split This Rock

Called by The Bloomsbury Review, "one of the most insightful and spirited poets today," Pam Uschuk is the author of six books of poems, including the award-winning Without the Comfort of Stars: New and Selected Poems (2007 Sampark Press), Crazy Love (Wings Press), winner of a 2010 American Book Award, and Wild in the Plaza of Memory (Wings Press, April 2012). Translated into a dozen languages, Uschuk has won the War Poetry Prize from Winning Writers, the New Millennium Poetry Prize, 2010 Best of the Web, the Struga Poetry Prize, the Dorothy Daniels Writing Award from the National League of American PEN Women, and others. Uschuk is Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Fort Lewis College. Editor-In-Chief of the literary magazine, Cutthroat, A Journal of the Arts, she lives in Bayfield, Colorado, and Tucson, Arizona.  

Ruth Forman is the author of three award-winning books: poetry collections We Are the Young Magicians and Renaissance (both from Beacon) and the children's book, Young Cornrows Callin Out the Moon (Children's Book Press). She is the recipient of the Barnard New Women Poets Prize, The Pen Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award, The Durfee Artist Fellowship, the National Council of Teachers of English Notable Book Award, and recognition by The American Library Association. She provides writing workshops at schools and universities across the country and abroad, and has presented in forums such as the United Nations, the PBS series The United States of Poetry and National Public Radio. Forman is a former teacher of creative writing with the University of Southern California and June Jordan's Poetry for the People program at UC Berkeley and an eleven-year faculty member with the VONA-Voices writing program. Her latest collection is Prayers Like Shoes (2009) from Whit Press. Forman currently lives in Washington, DC.

Speak Out Against Proposed DC Arts Funding Cuts!

Despite a $400 million surplus for the District of Columbia, Mayor Vincent Gray's proposed budget cuts $6 million in funding for the arts.

How does this contribute to a rich and vibrant life for our city's residents? In just one example of the difference city funds can make, Split This Rock can now offer after-school poetry clubs in a dozen DC public high schools. Next year? Probably not. Unless we can get the funds restored.

We urge you to take action and protest the mayor's proposed cut by contacting your Councilmembers. Find their contact info here. Tell them to restore arts funding to FY2013 levels!

Remember: the Chairman and at large members represent us all, so please write to them too!

With gratitude, 

Split This Rock 

**

Partner Statement on the Mayor's FY 14 Arts Budget Proposal

The Mayor's FY14 budget proposal includes a $6 million dollar year on year decrease in local funds for the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities (DCCAH). The DCCAH is a central support for artists, arts education, and arts organizations in the District, and DCCAH grants are essential to the arts in all eight wards. We are outraged at this proposed cut, and ask the Mayor and Council to reconsider, and level fund the DCCAH (at least) for FY14. We call on our communities to take action to protest this cut, and invite participation in DC’s Arts Advocacy Day on April 17, 2013. We also call on our allies in the public, the media, and non-profits, to speak out against the proposed cut.

Sincerely,

Philip Hutinet, East City Art
Robert Bettmann, Day Eight
Jack Hannula, Arts Club of Washington
Joy Austin, Humanities Council of Washington
Shanti Norris, Smith Center for the Arts and Healing
Christie Walser, Project Create   
Rosemary Reed, Double R Productions 
Joshua Simmonds, DC Youth Orchestra Program
Jon Gann, DC Shorts Film Festival
Philippa Hughes, Pinkline Project
Sarah Browning, Split This Rock Poetry Festival
John Cavanagh, Institute for Policy Studies
Andy Shallal, Busboys and Poets
Paul Woodruff, Warehouse Theater
Wanda Aikens, Ward 7 Arts Collaborative

Arts Advocacy Day spokesperson Phil Hutinet, COO of ARCH Development Corporation and Editor-in-Chief of East City Art explains, “The reduction in the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities’ grant making ability outlined in the Mayor’s proposed budget jeopardizes the vitality and revitalization of neighborhoods by reducing funding for a key component of the city’s infrastructure - the arts. The arts have sparked vitality into many neighborhoods, including H Street NE, East of the River and Brookland. That is not possible without stable funding for the DCCAH."

DC's Arts Advocacy Day is organized by the DC Advocates for the Arts in partnership with the Arts Club of Washington, the DC Youth Orchestra Program, the Humanities Council of Washington DC, the Warehouse Theater, the Pinkline Project, East City Art, DC Film, Ward 7 Arts Collaborative, the Institute for Policy Studies, Split This Rock Poetry Festival, Project Create, Busboys and Poets, Double R Productions, and the Smith Center for Healing and the Arts.

To learn how you can participate in DC's Arts Advocacy Day on April 17, visit http://www.DCAdvocatesfortheArts.org.

Poem of the Week: Dan Vera

            

      

The Borders Are Fluid Within Us 

 

This is what is feared:

that flags do not nourish the blood,

that history is not glorious or truthful.

  

I sleep and dream in two languages.

I gain wisdom from more than one fountain.

  

I pass between borders

made to control what is owned.

The body cannot be owned.

The land cannot be owned,

only misunderstood or named by its knowing. 

-Dan Vera    

Used by permission.

From Speaking Wiri Wiri (Red Hen Press, 2013) 

Dan Vera is a writer, editor, and literary historian living in Washington, DC. He is the author of the poetry collection The Space Between Our Danger and Delight (Beothuk Books, 2008), and the editor of the gay culture journal White Crane. His second collection, Speaking Wiri Wiri, was the inaugural winner of the Letras Latinas/Red Hen Poetry Prize. His poetry has appeared in various journals including Notre Dame Review, Beltway Poetry, Delaware Poetry Review, Cutthroat, Gargoyle, Little Patuxent Review, Naugatuck River, the anthologies Divining Divas, Full Moon On K Street: Poems About Washington, DC, and DC Poets Against the War. He's the co-creator of the literary history site, DC Writers' Homes, and on the board of Split This Rock. 

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If you are interested in reading past poems of the week, feel free to visit the blog archive.