Happy New Year from Beltway Poetry Quarterly!
http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/
We begin 2008 with a rousing new issue of the journal, celebrating political poetry "borne out of a hunger." The Split This Rock Issue features seventeen poets who are participating in the upcoming festival of the same name, either as organizers or readers.
As co-editor Regie Cabico writes in his introduction, these poets sing "about gentrification, pop culture, immigration, war, heritage, disability, history and American iconography" to create a home "in the gut of a government that should hear, swallow, and ingest verses of provocation and witness."
Split This Rock Poetry Festival will take place in Washington, DC March 20-23, 2008. In addition to Beltway Poetry Quarterly, other co-sponsoring organizations include the Institute for Policy Studies, Sol and Soul, The White Crane Institute, Washington Friends of Walt Whitman, and Beloit Poetry Journal.
The Split This Rock Issue of Beltway Poetry Quarterly features poems by the following authors:
Winona Addison * Naomi Ayala * Sarah Browning * Grace Cavalieri * Teri Ellen Cross * Heather Davis * Joel Dias-Porter * Yael Flusberg * Brian Gilmore * E. Ethelbert Miller * Princess of Controversy * Tanya Snyder * Susan Tichey * Melissa Tuckey * Dan Vera * Rosemary Winslow * Kathi Wolfe
The Split This Rock Issue (Volume 9, Number 1), is co-edited by Regie Cabico and Kim Roberts. The issue is available online now at:
http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/
Monday, December 31, 2007
Saturday, December 22, 2007
The end of the year gets me a little nostalgic. Not sure about everyone else but time seems to literally be flying. I recall as a teenager figuring out that year 2002 would make me eighteen years old. For whatever reason eighteen sounds BIG and LIBERATING, and largely it was. Then 2003 happened, 2004, 2005 . . . and so on. It is important to be conscious of time as you move through and reflect in hindsight. Lately, I’ve pondered what can be carried into the future given modernity—the fleeting present—making things past and future. Perhaps, all that we can take with us from one year to the next are our memories and stories, remembering the unsaid as well as the said, remembering those whom we’ve hugged and later watched the earth hug their coffin as they transition to the other world. Here are some highlights of 2007 that I wish to share with you. If you have a 2007 moment you’d like to share, by all means, please send them to me.Best Movie?
So far, my favorite film of 2007 is “Talk to Me.” This film saved me from being a cynic of black cinema. When you look at the mile-long list of crap that’s being produced and bankrolled it easily give me the impression that there are no intelligent black actors, directors, or writers out there. Obviously, this is not true; nonetheless, we need to push a little harder to get quality movies out there. Kudos to Oprah Winfrey and Denzel Washington for teaming up to create “The Great Debaters.”
Best Blog?
Tayari Jones has a marvelous blog http://www.tayarijones.com/blog. It’s multifaceted, the entries extend beyond little post-it notes that so many bloggers tend to produce. The subject matter ranges from personal to political—yet all grounded in the writing life.
For local happenings and humorous commentary on politics and culture, I like to read E. Ethelbert’s blog. He’s a writer, but more than a writer he is an activist writer. You get critical commentary on matter of labor, politics, race, current events, job openings, causes one ought to know about. Become a part of the literary and activist world of E. Ethelbert Miller, check out his blog at http://www.eethelbertmiller1.blogspot.com/
Best Moment?
The summer of ’07 was the greatest. I hopped on the Chinabus and went up to New York City to Central Park to hear Amiri Baraka and Sonia Sanchez read from their respective corpses, then a post-show conversation about how the Black Arts Movement began ensued. It was a highlight of the year. And, I got to see Asha Bandele and my teacher and poet-friend Tyehimba Jess.
I could go on and on but I would love it if my readers can tell me what their best CD of 2007 was? Best Books? Or any of bests they’d like to share.
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Ann Darr (1920-2007)
I received this note moments ago--
"We note with sadness the passing of Ann Darr, a prominent DC poet. Dryad Press has started an 'In Memoriam' page on their website that is terrific. The link reprints poems, and gives biographical information. http://www.dryadpress.com/AnnDarr.htm
Though, I did not personally know Ms. Darr, I tend to look at the writing community as a body so when someone leaves that body, it's almost like suffering a lost limb or digit.
Merill Leffler, publisher of Dryad Press is accepting remembrances of Ann Darr; you may sent them to publisher@dryadpress.com
"We note with sadness the passing of Ann Darr, a prominent DC poet. Dryad Press has started an 'In Memoriam' page on their website that is terrific. The link reprints poems, and gives biographical information. http://www.dryadpress.com/AnnDarr.htm
Though, I did not personally know Ms. Darr, I tend to look at the writing community as a body so when someone leaves that body, it's almost like suffering a lost limb or digit.
Merill Leffler, publisher of Dryad Press is accepting remembrances of Ann Darr; you may sent them to publisher@dryadpress.com
Monday, December 3, 2007
I'm listening to Lauren Hill's Selah. It's a beautiful song. A good friend of mine first burned this song on a cd that she created just for me, on Valentine's day a few years back. She created an entire soundtrack for me. And in the playbook was this song with a note that read something like I think everyone feels as though they need to be "saved from themselves" sometimes. I think you do that for me when I need it: nagging me to sleep and eat all that. So, thanks... This one's for that.
Ain't it funny how one song can unlock the flood gates?
The weekend was spent writing papers. On Sunday, I visited a Buddhist community center and saw some of the happiest looking people I've ever seen. And they were very warm in welcoming me into their space. I love the idea that we are accountable for our happiness. That there is something in us that really can direct the kind of energy or results we want to see.
Back to writing papers.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
The African Burial Memorial
This past summer I hopped on the Chinabus and made my way back home, to New York City. I had spoken to brother Rasul on several occasions about the African Burial Memorial. It took me some time to process that New York had slaves. I always believed that my home was the place that enslaved brothers and sister fled to.
What follows is a brief discussion about this special place. My thoughts are in bold italics and Brother Rasul's are in regular typeset. I hope each of you will take your family and friends and learn about this part of history.
What follows are my personal observations and are not necessarily reflecftive of the positions of the National Park Service. While I am a volunteer there, I am speaking here for myself, not for them.
I am deeply appreciative of the opportunity they have afforded me to honor the ancestors through my efforts, but I am a spokesperson for myself alone, not for the National Park Service.
I am deeply appreciative of the opportunity they have afforded me to honor the ancestors through my efforts, but I am a spokesperson for myself alone, not for the National Park Service.
1. How did you first encounter this memorial?
nomenclature: the burial ground, the national monument, the memorials - city memorial in Foley Square, Triumph of the Human Spirit, and the federal memorial, The Ancestral Libation Chamber Memorial dedicated the weekend of October 6Th. We have since seen some 40 thousand visitors to the monument.
In 1991, when it was discovered by the African Descendant community what had been uncovered by the government and what disrespectful treatment was being afforded the discovery, the burial ground became a focus of action for the descendant activist community and word went out urging folks to attend the regular protests, ceremonies, and commemorations that were being conducted to support the elders who were leading the fight to halt the exhumations and the construction and assure proper respect for the remains of the ancestors.
Like many others, as my work schedule permitted, I visited the burial ground to lend my support. After the initial success and the dispatch of the remains to Howard for study, I assisted the government funded Office of Public Education and Information, both as a volunteer, at their various educational events, and as a volunteer consultant in automating their mailing list.
After the return of the remains from HU and the subsequent designation of the burial ground as a national monument, I began to volunteer as a docent, giving tours of the monument and the art work commissioned for the burial ground. I have been giving a tour of "Old Manhattan and its African Past" for many years, and the burial ground was a logical involvement for me, especially after my retirement.
nomenclature: the burial ground, the national monument, the memorials - city memorial in Foley Square, Triumph of the Human Spirit, and the federal memorial, The Ancestral Libation Chamber Memorial dedicated the weekend of October 6Th. We have since seen some 40 thousand visitors to the monument.
In 1991, when it was discovered by the African Descendant community what had been uncovered by the government and what disrespectful treatment was being afforded the discovery, the burial ground became a focus of action for the descendant activist community and word went out urging folks to attend the regular protests, ceremonies, and commemorations that were being conducted to support the elders who were leading the fight to halt the exhumations and the construction and assure proper respect for the remains of the ancestors.
Like many others, as my work schedule permitted, I visited the burial ground to lend my support. After the initial success and the dispatch of the remains to Howard for study, I assisted the government funded Office of Public Education and Information, both as a volunteer, at their various educational events, and as a volunteer consultant in automating their mailing list.
After the return of the remains from HU and the subsequent designation of the burial ground as a national monument, I began to volunteer as a docent, giving tours of the monument and the art work commissioned for the burial ground. I have been giving a tour of "Old Manhattan and its African Past" for many years, and the burial ground was a logical involvement for me, especially after my retirement.
2. What impact has working with the African Burial Memorial had on you?
Impossible to truly assess. It has been a profound turning point in my life. It has set me on one of the steepest learning curves of my intelectual life and on a spiritual journey that has only just taken its first baby steps. I have embarked on a literary challenge that is testing my craft in new and expanding directions.
The Burial Ground has become a focus for my retirement. There is the time there doing tours, the time spent reading, digeting, considering and learning new things about Manhattan and its African past, the efforts to capture the voices of African New Yorkers in my poem-becoming multi-media-performance-piece, and the persuit of the spiritual understanding I am being offered - all this and much more that I don't even have words for.
Can you recall how it has affected others?
The reactions vary, from surprise at all that visitors have not known before, to appreciation for the recognition and acknowledgement the ancestors are receiving, to a profound sorrow at the circumstances of early African Manhattanites. The many students of every age leave with an understanding of their history, Euro and African descendant alike, that was not previously available to them. The affect on them will only become evident as they become adults and we see the real impact of what they have learned on their committment to justice and peace.
There are those in the African descendant community who harbor deep disapointment that the sacred ancestroral grounds are not under the control of the African descendant community. The government building and the present federal memorial area should not, these elders suggest, have been built on at all, but the grounds should have been preserved as a completely undeveloped green space with signage.
While I respect and understand their position, I think that the educational potential of the monument as a national monument, with its visitors center and memorial, offer a greater educational opportunity, one that would be understood by the ancestors whose remains we honor.
3. How frequent do tours take place?
The visitors Center is currently housed within the Federal Building at 290 Broadway open from 9 to 5, Monday through Fridey, except on Federal holidays. There is a 25 minute video available and a walking tour of the commemorative art work in the lobby of the building on the site as well as of the memorial. Sometime in 2008, we will see the opening of a new visitors center in teh 290 building that will have its own enterance and allow us to be open 9-5 every day except major holidays.
Currently, there is a Park Ranger available at the memorial to provide tours of the The Ancestral Libation Chamber Memorial 9-5, every day except major holidays.
Group tours can be arranged by visiting the official National Park Service burial ground web site at http://nps.gov/afbg. Tours can be arranged for Monday through Friday, 9 to 5 or at other times, by special arrangement. Off site presentations can also be arranged. The current visitors Center can only accomodate 30-45 people at a time for a presentation of the video about the burial ground and I recomend that groups plan a visit of 90 minutes to two hours to fully benefit from the monument's resources. When the new visitors center is opened next year, we will have facilities to accomodate larger groups.
Music, Memoir and Muse
Nothing is as bad as it seems. The semester is moving ahead so fast. I'm trying to be productive (at my own pace, of course.) The weather is changing so fast. It's almost like it was warm, then, I blinked at it was cold. Thanksgiving is on Thursday. This is really is one of my favorite times of the year. The rainbow of leaves falling every day.
I've decided that I'm not going to worry about school anymore. It will work itself out. I always arrive on-time, eventually. I really want to focus on my grad school applications and perhaps, get back into the groove of writing. I really want to have a collection of poems finished early 2008. At one point, I thought I was close to finishing. Then, I started writing some more and all sorts of things fell out.
E. Ethelbert Miller has this phrase that we should know"How many books are in you?" How strange to think about that sort of thing. I love when books introduce themselves to me. I love the discovery of writing. I hear voices, and people talking, and the music of a bygone period in my life and I get excited and start writing. There are also times when we write not just to remember but to go back, because happiness is more often remembered than actually lived. Who has time to think about being happy when you're happy.
The same is true of listening to music. When I wanna hear a song it has little to do with dancing and more to do with remembering who I danced with when that song came out. How it felt to be inside that skin, in that moment, dripping, now an echo.
I've decided that I'm not going to worry about school anymore. It will work itself out. I always arrive on-time, eventually. I really want to focus on my grad school applications and perhaps, get back into the groove of writing. I really want to have a collection of poems finished early 2008. At one point, I thought I was close to finishing. Then, I started writing some more and all sorts of things fell out.
E. Ethelbert Miller has this phrase that we should know"How many books are in you?" How strange to think about that sort of thing. I love when books introduce themselves to me. I love the discovery of writing. I hear voices, and people talking, and the music of a bygone period in my life and I get excited and start writing. There are also times when we write not just to remember but to go back, because happiness is more often remembered than actually lived. Who has time to think about being happy when you're happy.
The same is true of listening to music. When I wanna hear a song it has little to do with dancing and more to do with remembering who I danced with when that song came out. How it felt to be inside that skin, in that moment, dripping, now an echo.
Thursday, November 8, 2007
At Howard University, if you are in the college of Arts and Sciences--as I am--taking Swimming before you graduate is mandatory. I hope to write about this experience.
Some feeling about swimming: it's all good until, the instructor start talking about jump into the eleven feet. Last time I checked I was only five foot eleven. Not eleven foot five. . .
Some feeling about swimming: it's all good until, the instructor start talking about jump into the eleven feet. Last time I checked I was only five foot eleven. Not eleven foot five. . .
The Legacy Awards went very well. I think Sonia was proud that such a cross-generation of poets connect to her work.
I'm just now shaking loose her poems from my inner ear. They just fizzled and would not leave. There's one poem of hers that simply loops everytime I think of it.
Personal Letter No. 3
nothing will keep us young you know
I'm just now shaking loose her poems from my inner ear. They just fizzled and would not leave. There's one poem of hers that simply loops everytime I think of it.
Personal Letter No. 3
nothing will keep us young you know
not young men or women who
spin their youth on cool playing sounds
I say these lines to myself trying to unpack the wisdom of youths being spend on cool playing sounds. It's really a beautiful poem just as so many of her poems in her first book Homecoming.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Rainy Day Reflection
- I'm listening to "Shh...Peaceful" by Miles Davis. Yeah, yeah, I know the title is ironic given the volatile and reputed violent nature of this musical genius but who says a brother can like someone's art but not so much everything about the artist. They call that ethical relativism, right?
- Rainy weather is my favorite weather.
- I'm reading a collection of essays by the Toure`. You should check him out in case you have not already. His website is http://www.toure.com/
- I have so much to do in way of school work, grad school applications, and still need to eat!!! I need to get my hands on a copy of Broke Diaries.
- I'm looking forward to the Legacy Awards that the Hurston/Wright Foundation has every year. I'll be doing a tribute for Sonia Sanchez with three other writers.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Midterm Reflection
This week marks midterm season, which means a little over a month left to school. There seems to be, unecessarily so, a long laundry list of things to do before getting out of here. I don't have a problem with my classes (except, Swimming and my Playwriting class.) I recall when I first got accepted to Howard my recruiter said to me "It's a lot easier to get in then to get out." I didn't quite grasp her meaning until now. My problem is one of patience. I want to break free like those migratory birds and show the colors of my coat that I recently discovered. I have so much writing I want to do. I want to find a job. Prepare for my MFA program. Start my life! School seems to be holding me back.
That aside, there will be some things I will miss about being a Howard student. There's something mythic about this space. When my peers and I talk in class we can hear our voices reverberate against the walls. If you listen closely you can hear other voices blending with our own. When I enter certain classes, I hear Ossie Davis and Carter G. Woodson and Frederick Douglass joining in on our conversations about uplift and progress and being conscientious about imperialism.
So much to be missed. Yet, I feel as if I'm choking on my blood staying here.
That aside, there will be some things I will miss about being a Howard student. There's something mythic about this space. When my peers and I talk in class we can hear our voices reverberate against the walls. If you listen closely you can hear other voices blending with our own. When I enter certain classes, I hear Ossie Davis and Carter G. Woodson and Frederick Douglass joining in on our conversations about uplift and progress and being conscientious about imperialism.
So much to be missed. Yet, I feel as if I'm choking on my blood staying here.
Monday, October 1, 2007
The District on My Mind.
Hello friends!
Check out the latest issue of Beltway which features an anthology of DC writers discussing the ways in which "change" has affected them. I am proud to see this issue morph into fruition, it began as a seed that I passed along to editor Kim Roberts, then it germinated into this wonderful issue.
The Fall issue of Beltway Poetry Quarterly is now online--and what a terrific issue it is! "The Evolving City" is an anthology of 36 poems that address the multiplicity of ways that cities change over time.
http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/
Co-edited by Teri Ellen Cross and Kim Roberts, the featured authors are:
Abdul Ali * Joseph Awad * Kimberly L. Becker * Japheth Brubaker * Rick Cannon * Kenneth Carroll * Grace Cavalieri * William Claire * Ramola D * Heather Davis * Mark DeFoe * Greta Ehrig * Mark Ftizgerald * Martin Galvin * Brian Gilmore * Fannie H. Gray * Daniel Gutstein * Jessica Haney * Joyce Latham * Grisella Martinez * E. Ethelbert Miller * Kathleen O'Toole * Jose Padua * Linda Pastan * John Peacock * Elizabeth Poliner * Katy Richey * Joseph Ross * Carly Sachs * David Salner * Kate Powell Shine * Tanya Snyder * Dan Vera * Joshua Weiner * Rosemary Winslow * Katherine E. Young
We hope you enjoy it!http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/
Check out the latest issue of Beltway which features an anthology of DC writers discussing the ways in which "change" has affected them. I am proud to see this issue morph into fruition, it began as a seed that I passed along to editor Kim Roberts, then it germinated into this wonderful issue.
The Fall issue of Beltway Poetry Quarterly is now online--and what a terrific issue it is! "The Evolving City" is an anthology of 36 poems that address the multiplicity of ways that cities change over time.
http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/
Co-edited by Teri Ellen Cross and Kim Roberts, the featured authors are:
Abdul Ali * Joseph Awad * Kimberly L. Becker * Japheth Brubaker * Rick Cannon * Kenneth Carroll * Grace Cavalieri * William Claire * Ramola D * Heather Davis * Mark DeFoe * Greta Ehrig * Mark Ftizgerald * Martin Galvin * Brian Gilmore * Fannie H. Gray * Daniel Gutstein * Jessica Haney * Joyce Latham * Grisella Martinez * E. Ethelbert Miller * Kathleen O'Toole * Jose Padua * Linda Pastan * John Peacock * Elizabeth Poliner * Katy Richey * Joseph Ross * Carly Sachs * David Salner * Kate Powell Shine * Tanya Snyder * Dan Vera * Joshua Weiner * Rosemary Winslow * Katherine E. Young
We hope you enjoy it!http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/
Saturday, September 22, 2007
Lush Life
This weekend I'm staying at a hotel with my fellow Bison from Howard University. We're all here working on graduate school essays and what not. I'm taking it easy, enjoying the wonderfully fluffy pillows, the largeness of the hotel beds. I could get use to this. I wonder do writers get to live like this?
Penning these essays feel a lot like looking into a puddle after a rainstorm. You want to see your reflection but instead you get a hint of yourself along with oily watercolors and part of a rainbow. When I think of the future, I revisit the reflection in the puddle, how it never quite looks like what you imagine it to look like.
The writer's fate is so unclear. Perhaps, this is why so many people don't understand us. We don't have time to look to the future--because we're still writing it.
Friday, September 21, 2007
Catching my breath.
I haven't posted in a while mostly because I've been overwhelmed with anxiety about my imminent graduation, pondering what's next in terms of career/life/writing.
I've also been incredibly solitary these past few weeks. I've got several deadlines: graduate school applications, financial woes, and more writing to do.
I've joined a writing group with a few local D.C writers. We had a wonderful meeting this past Monday.
I've also been incredibly solitary these past few weeks. I've got several deadlines: graduate school applications, financial woes, and more writing to do.
I've joined a writing group with a few local D.C writers. We had a wonderful meeting this past Monday.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Nora Poetry Reading Series
Just wanted to let everyone know that the line-up for the Sept. 13 reading at Nora is set:
Abdul Ali
Christina Beasley
Katy Richey
Bernadette Van-Field
The reading is Thursday, Sept. 13, at 7:30 pm, at the Nora School, 955 Sligo Avenue in Silver Spring. Directions are available at the school's website: http://nora-school.org/.
Please support poetry in the DC Metro area!
Sunday, August 12, 2007
An Interview with E. Ethelbert Miller
It was during my first semester at Howard that I met E. Ethelbert Miller. After tellng my English Professor that I was going to be a writer she pointed to Founders Library and said "You need to go meet Ethelbert Miller." Every now and again I make the three flight trek up to Ethelbert's office in the African American Reading Room at Founders' Library on the campus of Howard University.
Ethelbert represents a bridge: he was a student when Sterling Brown and others were at Howard. My getting to know Ethelbert Miller, in a way connects me to a large tradition of black writers that include Sterling Brown, the Black Arts writers that were coming of age around the time Ethelbert was a student at Howard and the youngins' like me who are struggling with their own words to tell the truth and simultaneously add beauty and possibility to this world.
Ethelbert represents a bridge: he was a student when Sterling Brown and others were at Howard. My getting to know Ethelbert Miller, in a way connects me to a large tradition of black writers that include Sterling Brown, the Black Arts writers that were coming of age around the time Ethelbert was a student at Howard and the youngins' like me who are struggling with their own words to tell the truth and simultaneously add beauty and possibility to this world.
A special thanks to poet-friend Melissa Tuckey for providing this photograph of E. Ethelbert Miller.
Abdul Ali: Can you tell me what a literary activist is, and what kinds of work they take up? When did you become a literary activist, what events revealed this calling?
Ethelbert Miller: People often inquire about what I do. Terms like poet, writer or teacher I find to be too restrictive. During a typical day, I’m involved in numerous projects and find myself representing several institutions and organizations. A considerable amount of my work is political and not literary. Social activism has always been important to my life. I feel everyone should be here to improve the social conditions of this world. I coined the term literary activist a few years ago. One other person I’ve seen embracing the term has been my friend Natalie Handal, a Palestinian poet and playwright.
Two of my major concerns are promoting other authors and documenting and preserving literary history. From 1974- 2000, I coordinated the Ascension Poetry Reading Series, which gave many African American writers residing in Washington their first public readings. Recently I’ve been archiving my own personal collection with three institutions: University of Minnesota,George Washington University and Emory and Henry College. Since the early 1970s I’ve been saving correspondence, flyers, and manuscripts from several hundred writers. I keep hundreds of files in the African American Resource Center at Howard. This material has been very helpful to scholars doing research, especially into the Black Arts Movement.
In May 1984, I helped to create the Poet Laureate position and honor Sterling A. Brown with the title. Years later, I would recommend Delores Kendrick to be the second Poet Laureate of Washington, D.C.
As a literary activist I’ve sat on the boards of many literary organizations, including The PEN American Center, PEN/Faulkner Foundation, The Associated Writing Programs (AWP) and The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, Maryland. Each year I read grant proposals, judge poetry contests and write blurbs and letters of recommendation for writers. One project I accomplished back in 1997 was placing the images of twelve African American writers are stamps coming out of Uganda and Ghana. Those writers were: Mari Evans, Stephen Henderson, June Jordan, Alex Haley, Zora Neale Hurston, Henry Louis Gates, Jr, Charles Johnson, Richard Wright, Maya Angelou, Rita Dove, Sterling A. Brown and Toni Cade Bambara.
I think some of us must do more than simply write. There will always be a need to protect, promote and preserve African American literature.
AA: I’ve noticed that Islam occupies a prominent space in your poetry. Can you speak to why Islam is important to you?
EM: In the 1970s I was reading many books about Eastern religions. I was attracted to Sufism and was influenced by the writings of Hazrat Inyat Khan. I remember purchasing some of his books from the old YES bookstore in Georgetown. In 1970, I took my Shahada at a community mosque located in the Bronx. I think the spiritual path I found myself on was no different from the one my older brother (Richard) had undertaken in the early 1960s. His journey encouraged him to join a Trappist monastery in upstate New York. My brother and I were searching for answers that would help explain the meaning of life. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse is one of my favorite books.
References to Islam appear in a number of my poems. In my last collection How We Sleep On The Nights We Don’t Make Love one will find the poem “Salat” on the first page. I wrote this poem while in Saudi Arabia:
SALAT
poetry is prayer
light dancing inside words
five time a day
I try to write
step by step
I move towards the mihrab
I prepare to recite
what is In my heart
I recite your name
American writers (in the future) will further explore Islam; it’s an outgrowth of how our world is changing. It will be important for many of us to visit places like Indonesia and Turkey. Islam is having a significant influence on the African American community. This is something Malcolm X predicted would happen. Islam is one of the fastest growing religions in the United States. Look for African Americans to play a key role in how Islam can best coexist with modernization and western values. Look for Islam to move African Americans beyond the 20th century’s double consciousness that DuBois described. In the 21st century, a person will talk about their triple identity. They will mention how they are Muslim, American and Black.
AA: I often tell my writer-friends that you are Howard’s unofficial MFA program. How did you earn the reputation as the go-to person for emerging writers?
EM: Well, I think Howard University needs an MFA program. In 1993, I was advocating the need for historical black colleges to have creative writing programs. I did this while serving as the Vice President of the AWP board. I pulled together a panel to discuss the topic at an AWP Conference in Philadelphia. One person I invited to give a presentation was Cornelius Eady. I think one of the reasons why Chicago State University (today) has a creating writing program is because Haki Madhubuti was one of the black writers who helped support the concept. Others were Marita Golden, Sonia Sanchez and Al Young. I invited them to a conference I organized in Norfolk in 1993, to meet with representatives from twelve historically Black colleges. The schools represented at the meeting were: Univesity of Arkansas, Pine Bluff, Dillard University, Howard University, Lincoln University in Missouri, Lincoln University, Pennsylvania, Norfolk State University, Prairie View A& M University, Spelman College, Southern University at New Orleans, Tennessee State University, Texas Southern University and Virginia State University.
The only people at Howard who were ever supportive of developing a creative writing program at the university were Claudia Tate, Sam Hamod, and Jennifer Jordan. Today Howard needs an MFA program. There’s no excuse for not having one.
If I have a reputation as the go-to guy it’s because when I arrived on Howard’s campus (1968) a number of people were helpful to me. I’m simply keeping a tradition alive. I wouldn’t be successful if people at Howard, like Stephen Henderson, Sterling A. Brown, Haki Madhubuti, Julian Mayfield, Jennifer Jordan, Arthur P. Davis, Clay Goss hadn’t been generous with their time and advice.
Working in one place for almost 40 years can also help a person merge their identity with an institution. That’s what has happened to me. When people think “writing” and “Howard,” my name is mentioned. In the old days the first name was Sterling Brown, maybe you would say Owen Dodson if you were very serious. Today, I’m ready to look over my shoulder to see who is coming after me. There is still so much work to do.
E. Ethelbert Miller is a literary activist. He is the board chair for the Institute for Policy Studies, a progressive think tank located in D.C. He was awarded an honorary doctorate of literature from Emory & Henry College in 1996. In 2003 his memoir Fathering Words was selected by DC WE READ for its first book, a city program sponsored by the D.C. Public Libraries. In 2004, Mr. Miller was awarded a Fulbright to visit Israel. Poets & Writers presented him with the 2007 Barnes & Noble/Writers for Writers Award. Mr. Miller is often heard on National Public Radio.
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Young Artist Grant
Must be a DC resident.
About the Young Artist Program:
The Young Artist Program offers grants of up to $3,500 to artists between the ages of 18 & 30. The Arts Commission recognizes that there are young segments of our community who are creating art and contributing to the vitality of our city. This program is devoted to identifying and assisting these young artists. Grants will support individuals in the following areas: crafts, dance, literature, media, music, interdisciplinary/performance art, theatre and visual arts. Eligible projects include support for innovative art projects and community service projects primarily at providing access and positive alternatives for youth and seniors.
About the Commission:
The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities is the official arts agency of the District of Columbia. Commission programs support and promote stability, vitality, and diversity of artistic expression in the District. The Commission is assisted in grants making by advisory panels of respected arts professionals and community representatives who make recommendations to the Commission on grant awards.
Deadline:
Wednesday, September 19, 2007 at 7 pm Sharp ( Do Not Miss this)
Workshops:
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities ( DCCAH)
2901 14th Street NW, Suite 100 A
Washington DC
Staff Contact:
Sherry Schwecten
sherry.schwecten@dc.gov
About the Young Artist Program:
The Young Artist Program offers grants of up to $3,500 to artists between the ages of 18 & 30. The Arts Commission recognizes that there are young segments of our community who are creating art and contributing to the vitality of our city. This program is devoted to identifying and assisting these young artists. Grants will support individuals in the following areas: crafts, dance, literature, media, music, interdisciplinary/performance art, theatre and visual arts. Eligible projects include support for innovative art projects and community service projects primarily at providing access and positive alternatives for youth and seniors.
About the Commission:
The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities is the official arts agency of the District of Columbia. Commission programs support and promote stability, vitality, and diversity of artistic expression in the District. The Commission is assisted in grants making by advisory panels of respected arts professionals and community representatives who make recommendations to the Commission on grant awards.
Deadline:
Wednesday, September 19, 2007 at 7 pm Sharp ( Do Not Miss this)
Workshops:
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities ( DCCAH)
2901 14th Street NW, Suite 100 A
Washington DC
Staff Contact:
Sherry Schwecten
sherry.schwecten@dc.gov
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Upcoming DC WritersCorp Events
Friday, August 10, 7:00 PMAnacostia Museum, 1901 Fort Place, SE
Washington, DC 20020
For Poets and Poetry Lovers of Every Shape and Size!
For the 2nd year, DC WritersCorps will lead a poetry slam and open mic poetry session as part of the Anacostia Museum’s summer programming. The readings lead by Isaac Colon and Kenny Carroll are open to youth and adults and will feature other young poets from DC WritersCorps.
This event is free and open to the public.
For more information call 202 633-4866
This event will be repeated on Friday, August 24, 2007 at 7:00 PM
DC WritersCorps History and Mission:
Overview:
DC WritersCorps has offered community writing workshops and literacy programs to at-risk and underserved residents in Washington, DC since 1994. In that time we’ve served over 10,000 residents, employed over 150 writers, and partnered with 100 community sites. DC WritersCorps sends accomplished writers into DC public middle/junior high schools to serve over 500 teens a year. We are a 501(C)3 organization.
Mission:
To use literature, media, performance and the teaching of creative writing to help youth change their orientation towards reading and writing and to strengthen basic literacy skills. Through artistic development, we provide hands on work experience and leadership skills to prepare youth for academic and lifelong success.
To find out how to participate in DC WritersCorps programs or how to support our operations, go to www.dcwriterscorps.org
Sunday, August 5, 2007
Bring the Poems, Bring the Funk. . .
The editor of the Indiana Review is doing a Funk issue. For more information check out their blog. They will begin accepting submissions after September 1. Please also check out the funky and wonderful interview that Tayari Jones did on her blog:
http://www.indianareview.blogspot.com/
http://www.tayarijones.com/blog/
http://www.indianareview.blogspot.com/
http://www.tayarijones.com/blog/
Friday, August 3, 2007
Calling all (women) Writers!
Just read this a few moments ago! Ms. Sewell does awesome work so please support her literary contributions.
***
JUST LIKE A GIRL - CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
Just Like a Girl: A Manifesta!
The latest offering from GirlChild Press is intended to be a rough and tumble, sassy, wickedly clever kick-ass anthology.
Where Growing Up Girl: An Anthology of Voices from Marginalized Spaces was a meditation on the state of girlhood; Just Like a Girl is meant to highlight the clever girls, the funny girls, the girls who don't ask for permission and take up as much room as they damn well like. She is the girl who knows there is no sin in being born one; and that in spite of all evidence and current belief systems girl/woman does not equal weak.
Said girl doesn't have to be a super hero, but she has hit a few balls out of the park, cursed out a couple trash talking construction workers, and took a few racist, homophobic, misogynistic folks to task. Ultimately, she knows how to pick herself up and brush herself off.
She's a feminist. 2nd Wave. 3rd Wave. No Wave.
She's high maintenance.
She has read the Patriot Act. She understands it.
She recognizes that people's lives fall apart, but with time and some Elmer's glue it all works itself out.
She's an urban girl. A country girl.
She lives in a square state. A blue state. A red state.
She seriously ponders what are the SAT scores of those girls grinding in the music videos. She is the girl in the music video.
She has the perfect plan on how to break up with a boyfriend and how not to lose her cool when her 38 triple D bra snaps in the middle of a cocktail party.
She's a 25th century girl.
She knows the words to Roberta Flack's Killing Me Softly.
She secretly pinches her best friend's bratty three year old.
She is a cashier at WALMART.
She's the second chair flute in her 8th grade band.
She marches on Washington
She makes fun of vegans
She has 6,000 friends on myspace.com
She still hides the tattoo that she got at senior beach week from her mother – she's 42.
She writes for herself. She writes for her sister. She writes for the girls still not born.
Think of Just Like a Girl as a travelogue for the bumpy, powerful, action packed world of girlhood.
Tell a secret.
Reveal a lie
Go tell it on the mountain.
You get the point.
So cast a net and see what the day's catch brings
Submission Details
Deadline: September 30, 2007
The anthology is open to any subject matter.
Work is especially welcomed from new and emerging writers.
Contributors may submit up to three pieces.
Essays and short stories should be no longer than 3,000 words.
Poems should have the contributor's name on each page
Sci-fi is encouraged!
Electronic Mail
Send your work to http://blog.myspace.com/..parent.ComposeTo(
Attachments should be titled with your name and the email subject should be Just Like a Girl.
Snail mail
Michelle Sewell
GirlChild Press
PO Box 93
Hyattsville, MD 20781
Please include a brief bio and a mailing address.
Contributors will receive a copy of the anthology and the opportunity to read at the official Spring 2008 booksigning.
For more information on Michelle Sewell and the press check out http://www.girlchildpress.com/
***
JUST LIKE A GIRL - CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
Just Like a Girl: A Manifesta!
The latest offering from GirlChild Press is intended to be a rough and tumble, sassy, wickedly clever kick-ass anthology.
Where Growing Up Girl: An Anthology of Voices from Marginalized Spaces was a meditation on the state of girlhood; Just Like a Girl is meant to highlight the clever girls, the funny girls, the girls who don't ask for permission and take up as much room as they damn well like. She is the girl who knows there is no sin in being born one; and that in spite of all evidence and current belief systems girl/woman does not equal weak.
Said girl doesn't have to be a super hero, but she has hit a few balls out of the park, cursed out a couple trash talking construction workers, and took a few racist, homophobic, misogynistic folks to task. Ultimately, she knows how to pick herself up and brush herself off.
She's a feminist. 2nd Wave. 3rd Wave. No Wave.
She's high maintenance.
She has read the Patriot Act. She understands it.
She recognizes that people's lives fall apart, but with time and some Elmer's glue it all works itself out.
She's an urban girl. A country girl.
She lives in a square state. A blue state. A red state.
She seriously ponders what are the SAT scores of those girls grinding in the music videos. She is the girl in the music video.
She has the perfect plan on how to break up with a boyfriend and how not to lose her cool when her 38 triple D bra snaps in the middle of a cocktail party.
She's a 25th century girl.
She knows the words to Roberta Flack's Killing Me Softly.
She secretly pinches her best friend's bratty three year old.
She is a cashier at WALMART.
She's the second chair flute in her 8th grade band.
She marches on Washington
She makes fun of vegans
She has 6,000 friends on myspace.com
She still hides the tattoo that she got at senior beach week from her mother – she's 42.
She writes for herself. She writes for her sister. She writes for the girls still not born.
Think of Just Like a Girl as a travelogue for the bumpy, powerful, action packed world of girlhood.
Tell a secret.
Reveal a lie
Go tell it on the mountain.
You get the point.
So cast a net and see what the day's catch brings
Submission Details
Deadline: September 30, 2007
The anthology is open to any subject matter.
Work is especially welcomed from new and emerging writers.
Contributors may submit up to three pieces.
Essays and short stories should be no longer than 3,000 words.
Poems should have the contributor's name on each page
Sci-fi is encouraged!
Electronic Mail
Send your work to http://blog.myspace.com/..parent.ComposeTo(
Attachments should be titled with your name and the email subject should be Just Like a Girl.
Snail mail
Michelle Sewell
GirlChild Press
PO Box 93
Hyattsville, MD 20781
Please include a brief bio and a mailing address.
Contributors will receive a copy of the anthology and the opportunity to read at the official Spring 2008 booksigning.
For more information on Michelle Sewell and the press check out http://www.girlchildpress.com/
Calling all Writers!
A gift from writer-friend Sarah Browning:
WHAT: IN TWO TONGUES/EN DOS LENGUAS program for emerging writers (involving mentoring, a public reading, and publication)
WHEN: Submission deadline: Monday, August 13 Event: Wednesday, October 10
WHO: The Master Poet is E. Ethelbert Miller
COST: This program is free; there is no charge for entry or participation
HOW: Go to www.arlingtonartscenter.org for an application or call 703-248-6800 x 11 for more information
http://www.arlingtonartscenter.org/call_for_entries.htm
**
Dear Angsty People in WASHINGTON DC ,- Did you write lame-ass love letters as a kid?- Did you write angsty lyrics as a teenager?- Did you spend high school writing melodramatic journals?So did the people behind MORTIFIED. And if you live near Washington, DC, they want you to join them. Yep, Mortified is actively looking for new readers to join the fun as we open a chapter in your city . If you or someone you know would like to read aloud utterly embarrassing childhood relics in front of total strangers... we'd LOVE to meet with you and hear your material. Open to all.WHAT: MORTIFIED CASTINGWHEN: AUGUST 18-19, 2007REQUEST A SCREENING SESSION: http://www.getmortified.com/casting-------------
WHAT IS MORTIFIED:Hailed a "cultural phenomenon" by Newsweek and celebrated by the likes of This American Life, The Today Show, The Onion AV Club, Entertainment Weekly, Esquire, Jane, Daily Candy and more... the project collects childhood creations and uses them to reveal uniquely autobiographical tales. There are amazing stories buried in the pages of people's lives. Our mission is to simply help find them. The result is a unique show-and-tell presentation where the emphasis is always on narrative.
WHAT DO I SUBMIT?All material must be written between the ages of 6-21 and by ALL MEANS, totally totally suck. We look for stuff that is real, written by you, laugh-out-loud funny (but not on purpose), and reveals something unique about yourself. Topics can range from the sweet (crushes) to the dark (depression)... just as long as they make people laugh. And no, you do NOT have to be an actor of any kind... just someone who is very good at playing themselves. To watch sample clips or find more info, visit at http://www.getmortified.com.
MATERIAL WORTH SHARING:- Diaries / Journals- Notebooks- Poems- Lyrics (tormented ballads, anthems, metal, raps...)- Letters (love letters, camp letters, etc.)- Locker Notes- School Assignments- Plays / Scripts (the more pretentious the better)- Fiction- Etc.ANY QUESTIONS?Great. Read our Casting FAQ or request a screening session at http://www.getmortified.com/casting. We are always looking for new people.Share the shame...www.getmortified.com
**
For an anthology of contemporary poetry on girlhood aimed at high school and college level readers, co-editors Arielle Greenberg and Becca Klaver seek submission of poems on or relevant to any aspect of the experience of girlhood, from childhood to young adulthood by poets with at least one published or forthcoming poetry collection from a nationally-distributed press. We aim to create an anthology that addresses the need young women have for challenging, intelligent, complicated literature about their lives. Possible subjects include but are not limited to experiences of family relationships, work, activism, sexuality, friendship, consumer culture, physical or mental illness, body image, domesticity, athleticism, intellectual pursuits, creativity, geography, displacement, belonging, separation, identity formation, partnership and triumph. Poems that are not “subject-driven” or narrative but might still be of particular interest to a teenage girl reader are also welcome.
In addition to submissions of your own work, we would be interested in hearing suggestions of individual poems that you know of and feel should be included in such an anthology.
As we have a very limited permissions budget, we prefer submissions of poems that are either unpublished or to which the poet retains the rights. Previously published poems will be considered; please indicate if the poems you are submitting have been published.
Switchback Books plans to publish the anthology in 2009.
Please send no more than three poems no later than October 1, 2007 via email Word attachment to becca [at] switchbackbooks [dot] com or via snail mail in care of Becca Klaver, Assistant Programs Director, English Department, Columbia College Chicago, 600 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60605-1996. Please include an email address. We expect to notify poets regarding submission status via email by Summer 2008.
**
CUTTHROAT, A JOURNAL OF THE ARTSThe 2007 JOY HARJO POETRYandRICK DEMARINIS SHORT STORY PRIZES$1250 1st and $250 2ndplus publication
Judges: Rebecca Seiferle/PoetryJohn McNally/Fiction
Send three poems (100 line limit/one poem per page) or one short story(limit 5000 wds.) and a cover sheet w/name, phone, mailing address &email, a SASE for announcement of winners and $15 reading fee persubmission made to Raven’s Word Writers to:
CUTTHROAT, A JOURNAL OF THE ARTSP.O. BOX 2414DURANGO, COLORADO 81302
Postmark date: Oct. 10, 2007. Unpublished work only. No author’s namemay appear on the manuscript. Multiple submissions are fine, but authormust inform us if work is accepted elsewhere. Names of winners arepublished on the web & in CUTTHROAT. Winners announced in the AWPChronicle and in Poets & Writers. For more infomation, go to:www.cutthroatmag.com
**
QUERCUS REVIEW Poetry Series Annual Book Award:DEADLINE: OCTOBER 19Publication & $1000 is given for an unpublished collection of poetry. New & emerging poets are especially invited to submit. Winner also receives 50 copies of published book. Send manuscripts w/$20 READING FEE to QUERCUS REVIEW PRESS; MJC English Dept; 435 College Ave; Modesto, CA 95350. For complete guidelines, visit: www.quercusreview.com.
**
The Cream City Review, published by the Dept. of English at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, announced the theme for its Fall 2008 issue: found.They are looking for "poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction addressing accidental discovery: of an object, an idea, a text, an epiphany - an element that creates memorable, surprising, and evocative art." Submissions will be accepted between August 1 and November 1, 2007.TCCR accepts simultaneous submissions.
http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/English/ccr/index.html
**
PERUGIA PRESS PRIZE – accepting submissions NOW!for a First or Second Book of Poetry by a WomanPrize: $1000 and publicationA prize of $1000 and publication by Perugia Press is given annually for a first or second unpublished poetry collection by a woman. Submit 48 to 72 pages with a $22 entry fee between August 1 and November 15. Send an e-mail, SASE, or visit the Web site for complete guidelines.
**
Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award
Poets & Writers, the nation’s largest nonprofit organization serving creative writers, invites poets and fiction writers who are residents of Washington, D.C. to apply for its 2008 Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award. The winning writers will travel to New York to meet with editors, agents, writers, and other members of the New York literary community during a five-day all-expenses-paid trip. This year’s judges are Tayari Jones for fiction and Frank X. Walker for poetry.
ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTSWashington, D.C. poets and fiction writers who:• Have never published a book, or;• Have published no more than one full-length bookin the genre in which they are applying, and;• Have been a resident of Washington, D.C. for at least 2years prior to the date they submit their manuscripts.
Writers may apply in the poetry and/or fiction categories. An official application must accompany all manuscripts. For complete guidelines and an application, please visit www.pw.org/prizesCompleted applications must be postmarked after October 1 and no later than December 1, 2007.
WHAT: IN TWO TONGUES/EN DOS LENGUAS program for emerging writers (involving mentoring, a public reading, and publication)
WHEN: Submission deadline: Monday, August 13 Event: Wednesday, October 10
WHO: The Master Poet is E. Ethelbert Miller
COST: This program is free; there is no charge for entry or participation
HOW: Go to www.arlingtonartscenter.org for an application or call 703-248-6800 x 11 for more information
http://www.arlingtonartscenter.org/call_for_entries.htm
**
Dear Angsty People in WASHINGTON DC ,- Did you write lame-ass love letters as a kid?- Did you write angsty lyrics as a teenager?- Did you spend high school writing melodramatic journals?So did the people behind MORTIFIED. And if you live near Washington, DC, they want you to join them. Yep, Mortified is actively looking for new readers to join the fun as we open a chapter in your city . If you or someone you know would like to read aloud utterly embarrassing childhood relics in front of total strangers... we'd LOVE to meet with you and hear your material. Open to all.WHAT: MORTIFIED CASTINGWHEN: AUGUST 18-19, 2007REQUEST A SCREENING SESSION: http://www.getmortified.com/casting-------------
WHAT IS MORTIFIED:Hailed a "cultural phenomenon" by Newsweek and celebrated by the likes of This American Life, The Today Show, The Onion AV Club, Entertainment Weekly, Esquire, Jane, Daily Candy and more... the project collects childhood creations and uses them to reveal uniquely autobiographical tales. There are amazing stories buried in the pages of people's lives. Our mission is to simply help find them. The result is a unique show-and-tell presentation where the emphasis is always on narrative.
WHAT DO I SUBMIT?All material must be written between the ages of 6-21 and by ALL MEANS, totally totally suck. We look for stuff that is real, written by you, laugh-out-loud funny (but not on purpose), and reveals something unique about yourself. Topics can range from the sweet (crushes) to the dark (depression)... just as long as they make people laugh. And no, you do NOT have to be an actor of any kind... just someone who is very good at playing themselves. To watch sample clips or find more info, visit at http://www.getmortified.com.
MATERIAL WORTH SHARING:- Diaries / Journals- Notebooks- Poems- Lyrics (tormented ballads, anthems, metal, raps...)- Letters (love letters, camp letters, etc.)- Locker Notes- School Assignments- Plays / Scripts (the more pretentious the better)- Fiction- Etc.ANY QUESTIONS?Great. Read our Casting FAQ or request a screening session at http://www.getmortified.com/casting. We are always looking for new people.Share the shame...www.getmortified.com
**
For an anthology of contemporary poetry on girlhood aimed at high school and college level readers, co-editors Arielle Greenberg and Becca Klaver seek submission of poems on or relevant to any aspect of the experience of girlhood, from childhood to young adulthood by poets with at least one published or forthcoming poetry collection from a nationally-distributed press. We aim to create an anthology that addresses the need young women have for challenging, intelligent, complicated literature about their lives. Possible subjects include but are not limited to experiences of family relationships, work, activism, sexuality, friendship, consumer culture, physical or mental illness, body image, domesticity, athleticism, intellectual pursuits, creativity, geography, displacement, belonging, separation, identity formation, partnership and triumph. Poems that are not “subject-driven” or narrative but might still be of particular interest to a teenage girl reader are also welcome.
In addition to submissions of your own work, we would be interested in hearing suggestions of individual poems that you know of and feel should be included in such an anthology.
As we have a very limited permissions budget, we prefer submissions of poems that are either unpublished or to which the poet retains the rights. Previously published poems will be considered; please indicate if the poems you are submitting have been published.
Switchback Books plans to publish the anthology in 2009.
Please send no more than three poems no later than October 1, 2007 via email Word attachment to becca [at] switchbackbooks [dot] com or via snail mail in care of Becca Klaver, Assistant Programs Director, English Department, Columbia College Chicago, 600 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60605-1996. Please include an email address. We expect to notify poets regarding submission status via email by Summer 2008.
**
CUTTHROAT, A JOURNAL OF THE ARTSThe 2007 JOY HARJO POETRYandRICK DEMARINIS SHORT STORY PRIZES$1250 1st and $250 2ndplus publication
Judges: Rebecca Seiferle/PoetryJohn McNally/Fiction
Send three poems (100 line limit/one poem per page) or one short story(limit 5000 wds.) and a cover sheet w/name, phone, mailing address &email, a SASE for announcement of winners and $15 reading fee persubmission made to Raven’s Word Writers to:
CUTTHROAT, A JOURNAL OF THE ARTSP.O. BOX 2414DURANGO, COLORADO 81302
Postmark date: Oct. 10, 2007. Unpublished work only. No author’s namemay appear on the manuscript. Multiple submissions are fine, but authormust inform us if work is accepted elsewhere. Names of winners arepublished on the web & in CUTTHROAT. Winners announced in the AWPChronicle and in Poets & Writers. For more infomation, go to:www.cutthroatmag.com
**
QUERCUS REVIEW Poetry Series Annual Book Award:DEADLINE: OCTOBER 19Publication & $1000 is given for an unpublished collection of poetry. New & emerging poets are especially invited to submit. Winner also receives 50 copies of published book. Send manuscripts w/$20 READING FEE to QUERCUS REVIEW PRESS; MJC English Dept; 435 College Ave; Modesto, CA 95350. For complete guidelines, visit: www.quercusreview.com.
**
The Cream City Review, published by the Dept. of English at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, announced the theme for its Fall 2008 issue: found.They are looking for "poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction addressing accidental discovery: of an object, an idea, a text, an epiphany - an element that creates memorable, surprising, and evocative art." Submissions will be accepted between August 1 and November 1, 2007.TCCR accepts simultaneous submissions.
http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/English/ccr/index.html
**
PERUGIA PRESS PRIZE – accepting submissions NOW!for a First or Second Book of Poetry by a WomanPrize: $1000 and publicationA prize of $1000 and publication by Perugia Press is given annually for a first or second unpublished poetry collection by a woman. Submit 48 to 72 pages with a $22 entry fee between August 1 and November 15. Send an e-mail, SASE, or visit the Web site for complete guidelines.
**
Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award
Poets & Writers, the nation’s largest nonprofit organization serving creative writers, invites poets and fiction writers who are residents of Washington, D.C. to apply for its 2008 Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award. The winning writers will travel to New York to meet with editors, agents, writers, and other members of the New York literary community during a five-day all-expenses-paid trip. This year’s judges are Tayari Jones for fiction and Frank X. Walker for poetry.
ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTSWashington, D.C. poets and fiction writers who:• Have never published a book, or;• Have published no more than one full-length bookin the genre in which they are applying, and;• Have been a resident of Washington, D.C. for at least 2years prior to the date they submit their manuscripts.
Writers may apply in the poetry and/or fiction categories. An official application must accompany all manuscripts. For complete guidelines and an application, please visit www.pw.org/prizesCompleted applications must be postmarked after October 1 and no later than December 1, 2007.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Let's Talk Film: Talk to Me
I've wanted to write something about this film the moment I first saw it( about four days ago.) At first, I thought I'd write a funky neat little review, witty, kind of like the ones you'd see in the City Paper. But, then I thought why? Why not just write something plain-spoken without the posturing of a critic. So here's what I thought about Talk to Me.Talk to Me gets several cool points from me. This was that rare gem from the black cinema god (Apollo) who sends us a little something nice every year. Notice the rich dramatization of the time and place of this film. The music the imagined whiff of afro sheen, the bell bottoms, the polite sounds of the Supremes juxtaposed to James Brown. I'm always fascinated by works that treat history in unsentimental ways. I actually could feel the heaviness of the air, the shattered windows, the upturned cars in the city when Dr. Martin Luther King was assasinated.
And what about the realness of the film. I like how the writers/director didn't succumb to drawing a line in the sand where the bourgeois black character lives and where the felon/hustler/street brother existed. There's was an interesting walk on a tight rope where each character had something to impart on the other. They did not live in a vacuum as many folks would have us believe. There was a community that existed in the world of that film.
The characters weren't stock in the least. They were flawed, noble, vulnerable, and powerful in their own ways. Its examination of the ways in which the black community depend one another was right on. And, it also presented a different life of a former offender. When do we see a film that does not glorify the prison life? Although there were several hustler tactics that the protagonist play by Don Cheadle utilized. This film also brought to bear the attitudes that many middle class blacks have towards their kin who may have a history with the penal system.
On the whole, I thought this film was a sterling example of what black writers, directors, and actors should be doing with their talents. This is a work of art--both hands down.
Did anyone else see this film? What did you think?
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Employment Opportunity
Do you know anyone who needs a job?
I'm managing a Karibu Bookstore (metro accessible) in Pentagon City Mall and am looking for sales associates to start ASAP. Have them fax me their resumes at 703-415-4644 or email them to pcmanager@karibubooks.com
I'm managing a Karibu Bookstore (metro accessible) in Pentagon City Mall and am looking for sales associates to start ASAP. Have them fax me their resumes at 703-415-4644 or email them to pcmanager@karibubooks.com
DC African American Writers Guild
We have wonderful news!
The Washington DC African-American Writer’s Guild (AAWG) is in the process of reemerging as the home base for African American writers working to realize their creative projects. As you know, the DC/Metro area is populated with a number of talented writers of diverse disciplines who are in varied stages of completing their works. Part of the DC AAWG’s mission will be to organize and provide workshops, access to a network of peers and collaborate with local artists and businesses. We need the assistance and guidance of former DC AAWG members as well as newcomers residing in the DC/metropolitan and surrounding areas.
Please confirm your availability to attend an August, 2007 Washington DC African-American Writer’s Guild Planning Meeting by completing the attached form, in its entirety by Thursday, August 2nd, 2007. Once the time and location of the meeting are confirmed, more information will be sure to follow. Also, the Agenda will be distributed at the meeting.
This will be an awesome year! We look forward to growing exponentially with you and the DC African American Writer’s Guild. And we certainly are excited about the journey ahead.
Abundant Blessings,
Majeedah Johnson and Abdul Ali
The Washington DC African-American Writer’s Guild (AAWG) is in the process of reemerging as the home base for African American writers working to realize their creative projects. As you know, the DC/Metro area is populated with a number of talented writers of diverse disciplines who are in varied stages of completing their works. Part of the DC AAWG’s mission will be to organize and provide workshops, access to a network of peers and collaborate with local artists and businesses. We need the assistance and guidance of former DC AAWG members as well as newcomers residing in the DC/metropolitan and surrounding areas.
Please confirm your availability to attend an August, 2007 Washington DC African-American Writer’s Guild Planning Meeting by completing the attached form, in its entirety by Thursday, August 2nd, 2007. Once the time and location of the meeting are confirmed, more information will be sure to follow. Also, the Agenda will be distributed at the meeting.
This will be an awesome year! We look forward to growing exponentially with you and the DC African American Writer’s Guild. And we certainly are excited about the journey ahead.
Abundant Blessings,
Majeedah Johnson and Abdul Ali
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Interview with Sarah Browning
Abdul Ali: How did your title come to you? It's actually quite clever and appropriate..."Whiskey in the Garden of Eden." It's a dramatic incongruity.
Sarah Browning: Thank you. The title comes from a poem in the book called, “Things They Never Tell You.” The poem asks, “Was there whiskey in the garden – / heat to cool / the blood that calls / to the blue wing at the edge of the sky?”
So whiskey is both the transgressive (the bad girl in the garden) and a tonic to dampen down the longing, the blue wing. The poem concludes:
There is that apple.
They don’t say
how long Eve dreamed
of reaching
– her belly taut with the tang of it –
before she took.
At the time I wrote the poem, I was preoccupied with the question of women’s ambition and longing. I think we have a very complicated relationship to these things in our society – witness the really hateful misogyny so often directed at women who are ambitious or sexually assertive. In those years I was asking myself: What is it OK to want? I come from a family that emphasized putting others first, which is a good thing, of course, but it meant that it didn’t feel alright to want things for myself. I’m doing a lot better with this now, thanks in part to writing about it.
As an aside, I should note that titles are very hard for me in general. The book had four or five as a manuscript and I lately came across a page in a notebook on which I tried out another 15 or 20 options. I’m glad the final choice is a hit.
Abdul Ali: You sensitively deal with themes ranging from feeling like an outsider moving into a "Chocolate City" and being a political activist. Can you speak on the different voices that you assume in this work?
Sarah Browning: The fact is that I always write from who I am, we all do. I try to write from the experience as honestly as I can.
I was born into an activist family and grew up on the South Side of Chicago in the late 60s and early 70s. It was a time of war and intense social change. The neighborhood was mixed, racially and by social class. So, unlike some white people, who grow up without an awareness of their race, I have always been acutely aware of the fact that I am white and middle class (my father was an academic, my mother a social worker and then a health administrator). And of the privileges that my skin color afford me. I studied American social history in college and have worked as a community organizer in public housing and as a political organizer. So I know our history and am aware of the fact that social forces are always present in all our human interactions. A poem in the book about an encounter with a young Black man when I was 13 or so says “so much / of our history is in this moment / … 400 years that brought us to this street.”
When I moved to DC, I had lived in a very monochromatic part of Massachusetts for several years and so I was at first acutely aware of my race. And I bought a house in Petworth, a predominantly African-American neighborhood. By doing so, I am contributing to the gentrification of the city and of Petworth. I have many conflicted feelings about it: On the one hand, it is outrageous that housing prices have climbed so high that people who grew up in Petworth can’t afford to buy a house here. That long-time DC residents are being forced out of the city. On the other hand, I don’t want to live in an all-white neighborhood and I couldn’t afford to buy a house in one even if I wanted to. So I bought here. I want to live in a vibrant, diverse city, where people of all races, ethnicities, and social classes live side by side and enrich each other’s lives. That’s what I want for my child. We’ll have to work hard to make that happen and it may be too late. I don’t know.
In the poems I try to be truthful about the complexity of these issues – how they feel, how they are lived (by me, that is; of course they are lived very differently by others). As the great Sekou Sundiata, who we so sadly lost last week, said, these are questions of the first person plural; that is, they are deeply personal issues that implicate each of us personally and they are public issues as well. I try to hang out at that intersection as much as possible.
Abdul Ali: How long did it take you to complete this book? What was your hardest challenge finishing this work?
Sarah Browning: Oy – I knew someone would ask this question eventually. This is my first book of poems. I started writing seriously about 15 years ago and almost right away began publishing poems in literary journals. I first put a manuscript together 10 years ago. It bears very little resemblance to Whiskey in the Garden of Eden – just a handful of poems remain from that first version. I sent it to the ridiculous first-book prizes out there off and on (spending a ton on copying and postage costs, entry fees…), all the while revising and renaming. I had a baby. I tore the manuscript apart and sat on it for a year. Friends made very helpful suggestions on structuring it. And finally, I was fortunate enough to be approached by the folks at the Word Works, who asked me if I had a manuscript and then were kind enough to decide to publish it.
So the challenge of finding a publisher was significant. But more importantly, the poems about race, and especially about how race often played itself out on the streets of my childhood, were very difficult to write, very vulnerable, very scary (more on this below). It took me many, many years and drafts to write and complete these poems and to feel OK about putting them out in the world. And then they needed to find their right place within the book. When I finally figured out their position – in the second section called “Some Borders,” after a first section of poems written about Washington, DC, the war, raising a child in these circumstances – I realized that the book was at last done, and ready to be launched.
Abdul Ali: What sustains your activism?
Sarah Browning: That I am not alone. I find community in the other spectacular poet-activists here in DC who I am privileged to call friends, companions, inspiration. I find community in the poets I read – from Walt Whitman to June Jordan to Muriel Rukeyser to Pablo Neruda to our living contemporary writers. And I know our history: that all the great improvements to our society have come as a result of social movements: the right to vote – for women and people of color; the 40-hour work week; the end to the Vietnam War. We have a long way to go but only we can take us there, the poets and the activists. As Paulo Freire says, we make the way by walking.
Abdul Ali: Your poem "The Beautiful African American Workshop Leader Tells Us to Write About Difference" is probably one of your most vulnerable poems. You even write in all italics. Can you expand on why you made that choice? And how you navigate feeling different in the various spaces you travel through in the DC area?
Sarah Browning: The poem relates an experience I had when I was probably 6 or 7, of older Black girls throwing rocks at my friend and me as we walked home from the library, holding hands. My friend was Black and I am, obviously, white. The girls were giving my friend, who I call Robin in the poem, a hard time for being friends with a white girl. They called me a honky bitch. This was not an isolated incident but because I was so young it seared itself on my consciousness.
I tried to write about this experience for many years. But it made me very uneasy. And still does. It was a very specific historical moment – it would have been about 1969 or 1970: the height of the Black Power Movement, of separatism. And a time when Black people were feeling empowered to express their very legitimate anger at a deeply, malevolently racist society. Of course two six-year-old girls are never an appropriate target for anger, but that’s often how things work: suppressed anger explodes and the target hardly matters. Little kids, of course, don’t understand these things and there was very little discussion in my household about that anger and that threat of violence. We basically pretended it wasn’t going on.
There is a lot of silence from white people about race. Because these stories are a part of my experience of race (though only a part – I had close Black friends all through my childhood and spent many hours of warmth and grace with them and their families), I felt that it was important to write about them. But we do still live in a very racist society and I didn’t want to give fodder to the racists by telling these stories in a cavalier manner. And I certainly didn’t want to equate my experience with that of Black children who face a daily, grinding racism – from the media, popular culture, and our leaders, as well as in personal encounters from an early age. As Ethelbert Miller pointed out when we talked about this, I could easily escape this tension by leaving the city, going elsewhere, visiting relatives; while Black people live with a permanent unease and uncertainty.
So I wanted to be very careful in the way that I presented these poems. I wrote this particular poem dozens of times, trying to get it right. One of the times I wrote it, I was the only white person in a writing workshop at a conference Black Voices for Peace had organized. The workshop leader really did give us this exercise, to write about the first time we learned about difference. I wrote the story of the girls and my friend Robin, but didn’t get up and read what I’d written. Later I wrote about the uneasiness I had felt writing the story in that setting. One of the challenges with these poems was how to balance the child voice – the direct relating of the experience itself – with the adult voice of understanding what was going on. I finally realized that the title could provide that framing adult perspective. So the whole poem, the story itself, is in italics, as being remembered by the adult self, in a self-aware act of writing.
I was still wrestling with this material when I moved to DC and it has been in discussion with several writer-activists (most particularly E. Ethelbert Miller, as I mentioned before, Yael Flusberg, Michele Elliott, Becky Thompson, and Reuben Jackson) that I was able to come unstuck. I am very grateful to them and to all the other writers and activists in this city – Black, white, Latino, Asian – who have encouraged me to write honestly about race. It’s scary, but I know it is worth it. We only make progress by taking risks and talking with one another honestly, across our differences and in the presence of our similarities. I know that poetry can reach across these chasms, humanize us for one another. If we open ourselves to it. In these desperate times, I feel we don’t have a choice. We have to choose poetry.
Sarah Browning: Thank you. The title comes from a poem in the book called, “Things They Never Tell You.” The poem asks, “Was there whiskey in the garden – / heat to cool / the blood that calls / to the blue wing at the edge of the sky?”
So whiskey is both the transgressive (the bad girl in the garden) and a tonic to dampen down the longing, the blue wing. The poem concludes:
There is that apple.
They don’t say
how long Eve dreamed
of reaching
– her belly taut with the tang of it –
before she took.
At the time I wrote the poem, I was preoccupied with the question of women’s ambition and longing. I think we have a very complicated relationship to these things in our society – witness the really hateful misogyny so often directed at women who are ambitious or sexually assertive. In those years I was asking myself: What is it OK to want? I come from a family that emphasized putting others first, which is a good thing, of course, but it meant that it didn’t feel alright to want things for myself. I’m doing a lot better with this now, thanks in part to writing about it.
As an aside, I should note that titles are very hard for me in general. The book had four or five as a manuscript and I lately came across a page in a notebook on which I tried out another 15 or 20 options. I’m glad the final choice is a hit.
Abdul Ali: You sensitively deal with themes ranging from feeling like an outsider moving into a "Chocolate City" and being a political activist. Can you speak on the different voices that you assume in this work?
Sarah Browning: The fact is that I always write from who I am, we all do. I try to write from the experience as honestly as I can.
I was born into an activist family and grew up on the South Side of Chicago in the late 60s and early 70s. It was a time of war and intense social change. The neighborhood was mixed, racially and by social class. So, unlike some white people, who grow up without an awareness of their race, I have always been acutely aware of the fact that I am white and middle class (my father was an academic, my mother a social worker and then a health administrator). And of the privileges that my skin color afford me. I studied American social history in college and have worked as a community organizer in public housing and as a political organizer. So I know our history and am aware of the fact that social forces are always present in all our human interactions. A poem in the book about an encounter with a young Black man when I was 13 or so says “so much / of our history is in this moment / … 400 years that brought us to this street.”
When I moved to DC, I had lived in a very monochromatic part of Massachusetts for several years and so I was at first acutely aware of my race. And I bought a house in Petworth, a predominantly African-American neighborhood. By doing so, I am contributing to the gentrification of the city and of Petworth. I have many conflicted feelings about it: On the one hand, it is outrageous that housing prices have climbed so high that people who grew up in Petworth can’t afford to buy a house here. That long-time DC residents are being forced out of the city. On the other hand, I don’t want to live in an all-white neighborhood and I couldn’t afford to buy a house in one even if I wanted to. So I bought here. I want to live in a vibrant, diverse city, where people of all races, ethnicities, and social classes live side by side and enrich each other’s lives. That’s what I want for my child. We’ll have to work hard to make that happen and it may be too late. I don’t know.
In the poems I try to be truthful about the complexity of these issues – how they feel, how they are lived (by me, that is; of course they are lived very differently by others). As the great Sekou Sundiata, who we so sadly lost last week, said, these are questions of the first person plural; that is, they are deeply personal issues that implicate each of us personally and they are public issues as well. I try to hang out at that intersection as much as possible.
Abdul Ali: How long did it take you to complete this book? What was your hardest challenge finishing this work?
Sarah Browning: Oy – I knew someone would ask this question eventually. This is my first book of poems. I started writing seriously about 15 years ago and almost right away began publishing poems in literary journals. I first put a manuscript together 10 years ago. It bears very little resemblance to Whiskey in the Garden of Eden – just a handful of poems remain from that first version. I sent it to the ridiculous first-book prizes out there off and on (spending a ton on copying and postage costs, entry fees…), all the while revising and renaming. I had a baby. I tore the manuscript apart and sat on it for a year. Friends made very helpful suggestions on structuring it. And finally, I was fortunate enough to be approached by the folks at the Word Works, who asked me if I had a manuscript and then were kind enough to decide to publish it.
So the challenge of finding a publisher was significant. But more importantly, the poems about race, and especially about how race often played itself out on the streets of my childhood, were very difficult to write, very vulnerable, very scary (more on this below). It took me many, many years and drafts to write and complete these poems and to feel OK about putting them out in the world. And then they needed to find their right place within the book. When I finally figured out their position – in the second section called “Some Borders,” after a first section of poems written about Washington, DC, the war, raising a child in these circumstances – I realized that the book was at last done, and ready to be launched.
Abdul Ali: What sustains your activism?
Sarah Browning: That I am not alone. I find community in the other spectacular poet-activists here in DC who I am privileged to call friends, companions, inspiration. I find community in the poets I read – from Walt Whitman to June Jordan to Muriel Rukeyser to Pablo Neruda to our living contemporary writers. And I know our history: that all the great improvements to our society have come as a result of social movements: the right to vote – for women and people of color; the 40-hour work week; the end to the Vietnam War. We have a long way to go but only we can take us there, the poets and the activists. As Paulo Freire says, we make the way by walking.
Abdul Ali: Your poem "The Beautiful African American Workshop Leader Tells Us to Write About Difference" is probably one of your most vulnerable poems. You even write in all italics. Can you expand on why you made that choice? And how you navigate feeling different in the various spaces you travel through in the DC area?
Sarah Browning: The poem relates an experience I had when I was probably 6 or 7, of older Black girls throwing rocks at my friend and me as we walked home from the library, holding hands. My friend was Black and I am, obviously, white. The girls were giving my friend, who I call Robin in the poem, a hard time for being friends with a white girl. They called me a honky bitch. This was not an isolated incident but because I was so young it seared itself on my consciousness.
I tried to write about this experience for many years. But it made me very uneasy. And still does. It was a very specific historical moment – it would have been about 1969 or 1970: the height of the Black Power Movement, of separatism. And a time when Black people were feeling empowered to express their very legitimate anger at a deeply, malevolently racist society. Of course two six-year-old girls are never an appropriate target for anger, but that’s often how things work: suppressed anger explodes and the target hardly matters. Little kids, of course, don’t understand these things and there was very little discussion in my household about that anger and that threat of violence. We basically pretended it wasn’t going on.
There is a lot of silence from white people about race. Because these stories are a part of my experience of race (though only a part – I had close Black friends all through my childhood and spent many hours of warmth and grace with them and their families), I felt that it was important to write about them. But we do still live in a very racist society and I didn’t want to give fodder to the racists by telling these stories in a cavalier manner. And I certainly didn’t want to equate my experience with that of Black children who face a daily, grinding racism – from the media, popular culture, and our leaders, as well as in personal encounters from an early age. As Ethelbert Miller pointed out when we talked about this, I could easily escape this tension by leaving the city, going elsewhere, visiting relatives; while Black people live with a permanent unease and uncertainty.
So I wanted to be very careful in the way that I presented these poems. I wrote this particular poem dozens of times, trying to get it right. One of the times I wrote it, I was the only white person in a writing workshop at a conference Black Voices for Peace had organized. The workshop leader really did give us this exercise, to write about the first time we learned about difference. I wrote the story of the girls and my friend Robin, but didn’t get up and read what I’d written. Later I wrote about the uneasiness I had felt writing the story in that setting. One of the challenges with these poems was how to balance the child voice – the direct relating of the experience itself – with the adult voice of understanding what was going on. I finally realized that the title could provide that framing adult perspective. So the whole poem, the story itself, is in italics, as being remembered by the adult self, in a self-aware act of writing.
I was still wrestling with this material when I moved to DC and it has been in discussion with several writer-activists (most particularly E. Ethelbert Miller, as I mentioned before, Yael Flusberg, Michele Elliott, Becky Thompson, and Reuben Jackson) that I was able to come unstuck. I am very grateful to them and to all the other writers and activists in this city – Black, white, Latino, Asian – who have encouraged me to write honestly about race. It’s scary, but I know it is worth it. We only make progress by taking risks and talking with one another honestly, across our differences and in the presence of our similarities. I know that poetry can reach across these chasms, humanize us for one another. If we open ourselves to it. In these desperate times, I feel we don’t have a choice. We have to choose poetry.
New Poetry Journal
Please help us spread the word about this terrific new journal! Subscriptions are free (please subscribe from the web site). Thanks for your interest!
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Dennis Forney (302) 645-7700 dnf@capegazette.com
NEW ONLINE JOURNAL FEATURES DELMARVA POETS
The first issue of the Delaware Poetry Review, an online magazine featuring new works from the Mid-Atlantic region, is now available. Beautifully designed, easy to navigate, and free, the Delaware Poetry Review publishes a wide range of poets, including:
Fleda Brown, Poet Laureate of Delaware,
Nin Andrews, author of 5 books of poems, including Sleeping with Houdini
Beth Joselow, author of 8 books of poems, most recently Begin at Once,
Jamie Brown, owner of John Milton & Company Books and founder of the John Milton Poetry Festival,
Rich Boucher, award-winning slam poet and co-coordinator of the Open Mic and Slam at the Crimson Moon Tavern in Wilmington,
Martin Galvin, author of Wild Card, winner of the Columbia Poetry Prize,
Ann Colwell, Associate Professor of English at the University of Delaware, and
Ben Greer, author of 5 novels and one poetry collection, A Late Disorder.
The inaugural issue features 23 poets. Sixty percent of writers in the first issue live or work in Delaware or elsewhere on the Delmarva Peninsula.
The Delaware Poetry Review was formed when the editors of five well-respected, award-winning journals in Delaware, Virginia, and Washington, DC (Bay Oak Press, Beltway Poetry Quarterly, Bogg, Delmarva Quarterly, Delmarva Review, and Gargoyle) decided to collaborate on a new project together. The group has met regularly each winter for the past three years at the Milton Poetry Festival in Milton, DE. "It's exciting to have this opportunity to learn from one another," says Kim Roberts of Beltway Poetry Quarterly. "We have combined our different skills to publish a truly engrossing magazine that shows off the best the Mid-Atlantic has to offer--and beyond."
To read the Delaware Poetry Review, please see: http://www.depoetry.com.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Dennis Forney (302) 645-7700 dnf@capegazette.com
NEW ONLINE JOURNAL FEATURES DELMARVA POETS
The first issue of the Delaware Poetry Review, an online magazine featuring new works from the Mid-Atlantic region, is now available. Beautifully designed, easy to navigate, and free, the Delaware Poetry Review publishes a wide range of poets, including:
Fleda Brown, Poet Laureate of Delaware,
Nin Andrews, author of 5 books of poems, including Sleeping with Houdini
Beth Joselow, author of 8 books of poems, most recently Begin at Once,
Jamie Brown, owner of John Milton & Company Books and founder of the John Milton Poetry Festival,
Rich Boucher, award-winning slam poet and co-coordinator of the Open Mic and Slam at the Crimson Moon Tavern in Wilmington,
Martin Galvin, author of Wild Card, winner of the Columbia Poetry Prize,
Ann Colwell, Associate Professor of English at the University of Delaware, and
Ben Greer, author of 5 novels and one poetry collection, A Late Disorder.
The inaugural issue features 23 poets. Sixty percent of writers in the first issue live or work in Delaware or elsewhere on the Delmarva Peninsula.
The Delaware Poetry Review was formed when the editors of five well-respected, award-winning journals in Delaware, Virginia, and Washington, DC (Bay Oak Press, Beltway Poetry Quarterly, Bogg, Delmarva Quarterly, Delmarva Review, and Gargoyle) decided to collaborate on a new project together. The group has met regularly each winter for the past three years at the Milton Poetry Festival in Milton, DE. "It's exciting to have this opportunity to learn from one another," says Kim Roberts of Beltway Poetry Quarterly. "We have combined our different skills to publish a truly engrossing magazine that shows off the best the Mid-Atlantic has to offer--and beyond."
To read the Delaware Poetry Review, please see: http://www.depoetry.com.
Letter to the Editor
I just sent this off to the Washington Post:
The July 24th Kids Post “Monumental Collectables” ought to be applauded for its engagement of history and variety of historical notables. It’s unfortunate; however, that Ms. Bethune’s profile contains a monumental blunder: “Mary McLeod Bethune was born to freed slaves in 1875.” How inappropriate to call someone’s parents who used to be a slave-- a slave-- given the blood-stained measures to attain freedom. This is a gross oversight whose implications are rather sobering about the state of progress at an elite newspaper. Even if the notions of freedom and bondage are murky for adults, it should at least—momentarily—be clear for young people what a contradiction is. Maybe, this wasn’t a blunder, yet a reminder that for people of color freed or enslaved, one can never escape being thought of as a slave by those who take freedom for granted.
Abdul Ali
Howard University
The July 24th Kids Post “Monumental Collectables” ought to be applauded for its engagement of history and variety of historical notables. It’s unfortunate; however, that Ms. Bethune’s profile contains a monumental blunder: “Mary McLeod Bethune was born to freed slaves in 1875.” How inappropriate to call someone’s parents who used to be a slave-- a slave-- given the blood-stained measures to attain freedom. This is a gross oversight whose implications are rather sobering about the state of progress at an elite newspaper. Even if the notions of freedom and bondage are murky for adults, it should at least—momentarily—be clear for young people what a contradiction is. Maybe, this wasn’t a blunder, yet a reminder that for people of color freed or enslaved, one can never escape being thought of as a slave by those who take freedom for granted.
Abdul Ali
Howard University
Monday, July 23, 2007
Local Artist Feature
One of the things I'd like to do with my blog is spotlight local artists who are doing good work. Dale Coachman is the twenty-something year old publisher of the online magazine, Scheme, who has the distinction of being the very first feature on this blog.
I met Dale Coachman at Bus Boys and Poets, a hangout, artsy, lounge-like place where creative and political people convene. Dale was spotted at Bus Boys with his business partner when he first created his online e-zine, Scheme Magazine [www.schememag.com]. Dale is very much typical of the hip hop generation: he hustles with his 9-5, yet finds time to commit to what he loves and he juggles it all so well.
Dale: hey
abdulali: Thanks for doing this interview, Dale.
Dale: np
abdulali: Can you tell me a bit about why you created Scheme Magazine?
Dale: Well I created Scheme because one night my fiance and a good friend, who is now my partner, Khary Campbell asked me within 5 minutes of each other if I ever thought about starting my own online e-zine. I've always wanted to contribute to hip hop and I can't spit a hot 16 or make beats so I figured why not. Plus the interviews I would read didn't get at what I wanted to know about these artists and individuals in the hip hop community.
abdulali: Where would you say Scheme is now? It's still under a year old, yes?
Dale: We are 6 months old.
abdulali: Congratulations! What are you learning about online publishing? About being an artist, an entrepreneur?
Dale: It's tons of work and long nights especially after my 9-5 job, but its very rewarding when you give an artist some light and they are so grateful and appreciative for being recognized and it's cool for me because we can slowly educate people and get them out of the matrix, lol
abdulali: Tell me more about the matrix, and your mission to educate people.
Dale: Well the matrix to me is what mass media has created and commodified and told the hip hop community what their hip hop is and have through every media outlet brainwashed a people and trained them to listen to certain kinds of rap music and how to somewhat socialize in hip hop culture from how to walk, talk and dress to how to approach a women or man and has told us what they think each gender ultimately wants out of the other
abdulali: In a sense, you're trying to "flip" or "rewrite" the script, huh?
Dale: Our goal is to tell people they have other options and bring back the balance of hip hop not just with the music but with the culture on a whole. Not rewrite because it was written already, but because of the dollar it has gotten away from why it was made and done
abdulali: I know this point has been addressed on numerous occasions but can you state what the difference between hip hop music and Hip Hop culture is?
Dale: We're really not trying to change much we're just trying to give people other options and different branches of music and occupations to apply their expression. To me hip hop culture is what you live and rap music is what you do, to take the statement from KRS-ONE.
abdulali: LOL. I was afraid you'd quote somebody else.
Dale: But media has really erased that line and the term has been used so much that
people call this and that hip hop. To me hip hop is something you can see hear and feel
abdulali: Where would you like to see Scheme Magazine at 1 yr old? and at 2 years old?
Dale: Well at 2 years old I would like to see it develop a print version as well. at one year I want to have enough ad sales to get to that point of print. However, we don't want beer and or liquor ads
we want Microsoft and Black Enterprise and companies that we can work with in the future
abdulali: Good for you...What can the local arts community do to contribute to Scheme Magazine?
Dale: And maybe put computers in someone's school.
abdulali: What can the local arts community do to contribute to Scheme Magazine?
Dale: Basically keep doing what their doing we just had the hip hop theatre festival the 10th Movement Session Anniversary event and in August there is the Can A Sista Rock the Mic Fest and there are plenty of artists here the reality is DC really isn't known for it's hip hop scene but I would slowly like to change that and get cats like Kev Brown, Stacey Epps, W. Ellington Felton, Oddisee and others that exposure. Hip hop does exist here.
abdulali: Are you doing anything with young people? I think every movement should begin with young people. Perhaps you can identity a HS and have the students do some freestyling or maybe some writing and learn about hip hop journalism.
Dale: well I'm trying to create a festival right here on U Street with a friend of mine and give some of the proceeds back to Duke Ellington because I heard their losing funding and have had to shut down some of their programs because of it.
abdulali: Let me know. I happen to be good friends with the Chair of the Creative Writing Program there.
Dale: Cool, I'm trying to get a proposal in order.
abdulali: Any final comments you'd like to make before we conclude this interview?
Dale: But the kids are the one's that are going to change hip hop culture and the music so it's important we give them more than Young Jeezy, Jay-Z and Lil' Wayne and Flavor Flav and that show A hot Ghetto Mess. Just keep your mind and you ear open to new and different things and be a leader not a follower just because the music is played on the radio and a certain form of hip hop is given to you that doesn't mean you have to accept it
abdulali: I agree. I think our young people just need the tools to critically decode some of the messages that are sent their way via media via hip hop
Dale: Very much so...
abdulali: This has been fun, will you let me call you so I can rap to you for a few....?
Dale: Sure, one final thing
abdulali: uh huh?
Dale: ok I'm done. Nah, but really, lol. I think the minute we labeled this expression we we're in trouble because it's already boxed in. Why can't we just have artists just make good music. Do people want to be known as a great hip hop artists or just a great artist or musician.
I met Dale Coachman at Bus Boys and Poets, a hangout, artsy, lounge-like place where creative and political people convene. Dale was spotted at Bus Boys with his business partner when he first created his online e-zine, Scheme Magazine [www.schememag.com]. Dale is very much typical of the hip hop generation: he hustles with his 9-5, yet finds time to commit to what he loves and he juggles it all so well.
Dale: hey
abdulali: Thanks for doing this interview, Dale.
Dale: np
abdulali: Can you tell me a bit about why you created Scheme Magazine?
Dale: Well I created Scheme because one night my fiance and a good friend, who is now my partner, Khary Campbell asked me within 5 minutes of each other if I ever thought about starting my own online e-zine. I've always wanted to contribute to hip hop and I can't spit a hot 16 or make beats so I figured why not. Plus the interviews I would read didn't get at what I wanted to know about these artists and individuals in the hip hop community.
abdulali: Where would you say Scheme is now? It's still under a year old, yes?
Dale: We are 6 months old.
abdulali: Congratulations! What are you learning about online publishing? About being an artist, an entrepreneur?
Dale: It's tons of work and long nights especially after my 9-5 job, but its very rewarding when you give an artist some light and they are so grateful and appreciative for being recognized and it's cool for me because we can slowly educate people and get them out of the matrix, lol
abdulali: Tell me more about the matrix, and your mission to educate people.
Dale: Well the matrix to me is what mass media has created and commodified and told the hip hop community what their hip hop is and have through every media outlet brainwashed a people and trained them to listen to certain kinds of rap music and how to somewhat socialize in hip hop culture from how to walk, talk and dress to how to approach a women or man and has told us what they think each gender ultimately wants out of the other
abdulali: In a sense, you're trying to "flip" or "rewrite" the script, huh?
Dale: Our goal is to tell people they have other options and bring back the balance of hip hop not just with the music but with the culture on a whole. Not rewrite because it was written already, but because of the dollar it has gotten away from why it was made and done
abdulali: I know this point has been addressed on numerous occasions but can you state what the difference between hip hop music and Hip Hop culture is?
Dale: We're really not trying to change much we're just trying to give people other options and different branches of music and occupations to apply their expression. To me hip hop culture is what you live and rap music is what you do, to take the statement from KRS-ONE.
abdulali: LOL. I was afraid you'd quote somebody else.
Dale: But media has really erased that line and the term has been used so much that
people call this and that hip hop. To me hip hop is something you can see hear and feel
abdulali: Where would you like to see Scheme Magazine at 1 yr old? and at 2 years old?
Dale: Well at 2 years old I would like to see it develop a print version as well. at one year I want to have enough ad sales to get to that point of print. However, we don't want beer and or liquor ads
we want Microsoft and Black Enterprise and companies that we can work with in the future
abdulali: Good for you...What can the local arts community do to contribute to Scheme Magazine?
Dale: And maybe put computers in someone's school.
abdulali: What can the local arts community do to contribute to Scheme Magazine?
Dale: Basically keep doing what their doing we just had the hip hop theatre festival the 10th Movement Session Anniversary event and in August there is the Can A Sista Rock the Mic Fest and there are plenty of artists here the reality is DC really isn't known for it's hip hop scene but I would slowly like to change that and get cats like Kev Brown, Stacey Epps, W. Ellington Felton, Oddisee and others that exposure. Hip hop does exist here.
abdulali: Are you doing anything with young people? I think every movement should begin with young people. Perhaps you can identity a HS and have the students do some freestyling or maybe some writing and learn about hip hop journalism.
Dale: well I'm trying to create a festival right here on U Street with a friend of mine and give some of the proceeds back to Duke Ellington because I heard their losing funding and have had to shut down some of their programs because of it.
abdulali: Let me know. I happen to be good friends with the Chair of the Creative Writing Program there.
Dale: Cool, I'm trying to get a proposal in order.
abdulali: Any final comments you'd like to make before we conclude this interview?
Dale: But the kids are the one's that are going to change hip hop culture and the music so it's important we give them more than Young Jeezy, Jay-Z and Lil' Wayne and Flavor Flav and that show A hot Ghetto Mess. Just keep your mind and you ear open to new and different things and be a leader not a follower just because the music is played on the radio and a certain form of hip hop is given to you that doesn't mean you have to accept it
abdulali: I agree. I think our young people just need the tools to critically decode some of the messages that are sent their way via media via hip hop
Dale: Very much so...
abdulali: This has been fun, will you let me call you so I can rap to you for a few....?
Dale: Sure, one final thing
abdulali: uh huh?
Dale: ok I'm done. Nah, but really, lol. I think the minute we labeled this expression we we're in trouble because it's already boxed in. Why can't we just have artists just make good music. Do people want to be known as a great hip hop artists or just a great artist or musician.
Art Matters
Did anyone read the Metro section of the Washington Post today? There was a large picture of the most beautiful little black ballerinas. The story was about a recreation center that opened two years ago in the Anacostia area. Art really does matter. Can you imagine a world without some kind of something to do?
Sunday, July 22, 2007
See Amiri Baraka and Sonia Sanchez
Amiri BarakaSonia Sanchez
Thursday, August 02, 2007 From 7:30 PM to 10:00 PM Central Park SummerStage
Two literary giants from the Black Power era read from their latest and greatest.
http://www.summerstage.org/index.aspx?lobid842&page=2
Launch of Blog
I just got back from the Hurston-Wright Writer's Week at AU. It will be a long time before I forget the bonds created over words. As promised there are a few things I wanted my fellow writers to know about:
a) If you'd like to submit a 200-300 word paragraph about your experience this past week send it to me at poeticnoise1984@aol.com
b) If you'd like to submit something to Howard's literary journal, The Amistad, check out submission guidelines and past issues here www.coas.howard.edu/english/publications-amistad.html
c) I would like all of the High School students from Writers' Week to submit the poem or their short story that you read during open mic to me so I can do a special feature of your work for the Journal.
Best to you,
abdul ali
a) If you'd like to submit a 200-300 word paragraph about your experience this past week send it to me at poeticnoise1984@aol.com
b) If you'd like to submit something to Howard's literary journal, The Amistad, check out submission guidelines and past issues here www.coas.howard.edu/english/publications-amistad.html
c) I would like all of the High School students from Writers' Week to submit the poem or their short story that you read during open mic to me so I can do a special feature of your work for the Journal.
Best to you,
abdul ali
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