Baby wood dragons

So last week, I was teaching poetry to fifth graders, some of whom I have known since kindergarten, but haven’t worked with them in a few years, at Malcolm X Elementary School in Berkeley—when I mentioned the four elements and the six Chinese elements for our I Am poetry prompt, which led circuitously to the upcoming year of the dragon. And I said, I’m a dragon, I was born in the year of the water dragon, and many of the kids raised their hands and said, We are dragons too. OK so our calculations may have been a tad off, but that’s all right. And then I thought, here I am teaching poetry, kindling the imaginations of baby wood dragons. The next generation to ignite the world.

Inside-out & backwards interview (Florida Journals)

Last night in Miami, I thought my interview with Fire Haus Projects went well, but when I got home, I discovered that I had my blouse on inside-out for the entire videotaped interview and poetry reading. You can edit out glitches but you can’t edit out the fact that my shirt will be on inside-out forever. I guess it could’ve been worse, I could’ve had it on both inside-out and backwards. Hopefully no one will notice. Only problem is, that it has these cute little maroon satin strings attached to the shoulders so that I can hang it off a hanger. 

After a full day, snorkeling offshore at the Grecian Rocks in Key Largo, I guess I’m allowed a little eccentricity. Talk about metaphor in action. My host, Lilia Fontana, who originally hailed from Havana, was a lovely hostess. We got on like a house afire.

When I got my first CAC grant to teach poetry I had many early morning classes. At that time I was a night owl and I remember getting to class to teach and looking down and realizing I had my stylin’ shirt on inside out. Thing is, it had shoulder pads. Hard to laugh that one off as a style statement. Oh well. Carry on.

Serendipity 2.0

A care package from Robin Rule.

Serendipity 2.0. Just yesterday I was wishing I had some CBD oil salve for my lower back, as I pulled some deep lumbar muscles. Nothing seems to be working. But as we hunker down to avoid the latest Delta variant, driving to a dispensary was beyond my ability to cope. In the mail today a package arrived from the north, a homemade salve from Shenandoah’s Daughter, still molten from the heat of the mail box. I spread the unctuous golden oils on my back and began to feel relief almost immediately. CBD oil, calendula, arnica, poppy, comfrey, and yarrow—a mountain meadow of wildflowers for my spine. I was moved to tears, even beyond tears, as there was more, much more—a packet of Yorkshire Gold tea, a tea towel from Connemara, and a homemade card with a robin collaged on it. Not things themselves. But something larger than even love. Ah, Robin, I am grateful, doubly blessed by a namesake bird, that harbinger of regrowth and renewal, a bright flame of love that flies across the distance of time. She who feeds the homeless, arrives on the wings of hope—she is the vox populi, the voice of the disenfranchised, banishing despair. She who pays beauty forward wherever she goes. I am both honored, and blessed to have known her across the years. Go raibh maith agat, mo anam chara, mo spideóg bhroinndearg, Roibín. I have nothing to reciprocate, except these small husks words. A transcendental feather wafts in the breeze.

• Synchronicity at work

A day in the life

Knackered—I lost hours promoting the upcoming CPITS/CalPoets Symposium, Poetry Flash Watershed reading, & the Petaluma Poetry Walk. While getting poems for my PPW set, and I fell down a rabbithole. I will emcee with Brennan DeFrisco at Watershed. We still need a poet-teacher list and everybody is beyond late getting back to me. Feeling overwhelmed. While promoting poetry events, I discovered my Brownie Mary photo was stolen, and shared 32,000 times, sans permission on Facebook and Instagram. Oh, and the thief removed my copyright and name. Still don't have my poetry set organized. I need to do it ASAP because I won't have a printer after tomorrow. Then, I need to nail down some airline tickets, and also knock out two pieces of art in the next few days for an upcoming art show. Things are going too fast. Where’s Alice? said the Rabbit. It’s later than you think. Now if only I got paid some actual money for all this work. Or my Brownie Mary photo.

Uniting the World through Poetry journal, writing to all the poets

25 July, 1993: another Uniting the World through Poetry editing, and paste-up marathon in Bolinas, preparing letters to the poets for the two upcoming UWP issues, Middle East and Eastern Europe.

I’m sending out a raft of letters to world-famous poets, we are now on first name terms with most of them.

And on the homefront, I can’t seem to get any recognition for my own work. This is why I am putting my life’s blood into this poetry venture. Nature abhors a vacuum. This discouragement I have faced is becoming chronic. I know my work strong, but it seems no one else thinks so.

Another rejection letter from the California Arts Council. I did not get the writers fellowship for a mere $2000. Only 20 out of 182 entries were funded and I’ve got to wait another four years for the next round? This is the shits.

The Korean War poems anthology will be delayed again as there is not enough work. Green Fuse is holding hostage three of my poems hostage for final round. Someone gave them poems to give to me from Yugoslavia. Word is out, and poems arrive from all over the world. 

I was just writing to Tomaž Šalamun, whom I had met at Poetry International, lamenting that I wasn’t even sure if my letter would reach him, wondering if there was even mail delivery as he’s living in war-torn Serbia. What of the other poets—are they even still alive? So many poets living in exile these days.

I read some poems from David Charlton, wondering where he was living when he was there, in Dubrovnik? I remember the first time I was in Belgrade, it was a sultry August night, and we ate ice cream with dark cherries in syrup. The best I have ever tasted. On my return trip, my luggage liked Belgrade so much it stayed a couple of months before returning home to me.

The last time I was in Belgrade I bought an upcycled dress made from linen hand towels and the cuffs of fancy embroidered bedsheets (or what I planned to use as a wedding dress). Once I was hopeful about Oleg… Where did the love disappear to? Now burial shrouds are considered a luxury item in a war-ravaged country. My Croatian dictionary is buried under a pile of now obsolete books on Russia. Sigh.

I should keep track of my myriad correspondences with these world-famous poets: Tomaž Šalamun, Dr. Miroslav Holub, Breyten Breytenbach, Ana Blandiana, Boris Xristov, Bella Akhmadulina—How old is she now? Blaga Dimitrova, Sylvia Fischerová, Gulya Kodalini (sp?), Chenjerai Hove, Niyi Osundare, Hawad, and the contributing American poets: Maya Angelou, Gary Snyder, Robert Bly, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Diane Wakowski, Diane diPrima, Maxine Kumin—to just name a few. 

I am keeping the dour, stone-faced postmaster at the Bolinas post office busy, if not entertained. Such exotic addresses. You’d think he’d at least crack a smile once and a while. I walk back the long way to Herman’s place on the Mesa just to clear my aching head.

So far, we have 218 poems in both issues. Plus we also sent letters to every PEN organization in Africa and letters to all our Rotterdam contacts. There are so many unfinished bits and pieces to do before I do a mass mailing.

I’ve got working addresses for a third of the poets, and we still have to send copies out to the translators (many of the poems need additional polishing from English to English). If I can get their addresses that is, and then, send out thank you letters by the bushel. Sometimes I dream I am writing letters in my sleep.

• Letter to Niyi Osundare
• Letters to/from Charles Simic