Join us ONLINE Saturday August 22nd join us the 4th Saturday of every Month
THE MUSIC OF THE WORD
(LA PALABRA MUSICAL) still in English, Spanish, Spanglish y Lo Que Sea & until the Virus lets the Libraries re-open we’ll be on ZOOM
3PM – 5PM No Cover hosted by Avotcja And don’t forget to bring your Congas, Guiros, Maracas, Panderetas, etc.
SATURDAY AUGUST 22nd
VENUS JONES (Poet/Actress)
PABLO PAREDES (Poeta/Educator)
CLARA HSU (Poet/Musician)
GREGORY POND (Poet/Musician) &
you on the Open Mic y mas
Always the word festival to remember!
Highest good is like water Water is good for all things but does not compete. It lies in the lowest place which all men disdain. Therefore it is close to the Tao.
–Tao-te Ching VIII
I whispered into Don Brennan’s ear,”I’m interpreting the Tao-te Ching.” He would want to know this, lying on his deathbed. Not long ago he wanted us to get together to translate Li Po. I said yes, let’s. We had such a good time translating Li Po at Cafe La Boheme a few years ago, such a good time organizing Poets with Trees Readings in the parks, getting together once a month at the Poetry Salon, carpooling, cooking, eating…
And while I’m trying to handle life’s full-course meal Don decided that he had had enough. I found a file of his poems on my computer. He wrote them while helping me to take care of my dad.
AN EMPTY MINDFUL by Don Brennan
I will bear myself in my own arms if you will simply explain how we have come to find ourselves surrounded by children of toddling age demanding justice when they can barely utter anything more significant than all of the confounding mysteries that neither of us has ever been able to comprehend and then leave it to us to fathom the uncharted depths of their unaccountable laughter that cries for mercy.
How do they do that, and who do they think they are, anyway, barely able to run around at the level of our ankles and knees, judging us without even knowing what questions to ask?
I therefore promise to bear you and me together with the lot of them in my sagging and weary arms and agree to cease my whining and complaining immediately as soon as we are able to glimpse by looking into our own selves how to put an end to the contemporary and relentless history of random and intolerable suffering of the innocent, thereby allowing all of us to live until we die in peace.
“Don, leave a little piece of your goodness to me.”
*
Don Brennan passed away on the morning of March 18, 2014.
We came together at the Poetry Salon. Some of us came “for the food”. Most of us didn’t know much about Muriel Rukeyser.
We began with eating–an important communal experience–then sat down and listened to Muriel read. Her recorded voice came through loud and strong from the speaker.
Sydney Clemens brought a book of Muriel’s poems. Jack O’Neil borrowed a few from the library. I had some print-outs from the computer. We honored the poet by reading her work.
Stephanie Manning brought out a cake. After Muriel’s dark poem Absalom we all needed some sweetness in our mouths.
Here’s one that will bring a smile:
Myth
Long afterward, Oedipus, old and blinded, walked the
roads. He smelled a familiar smell. It was
the Sphinx. Oedipus said, ‘I want to ask one question.
Why didn’t I recognize my mother?’ ‘You gave the
wrong answer,’ said the Sphinx. ‘But that was what
made everything possible,’ said Oedipus. ‘No,’ she said.
‘When I asked, What walks on four legs in the morning,
two at noon, and three in the evening, you answered,
Man. You didn’t say anything about woman.’
‘When you say Man,’ said Oedipus, ‘you include women
too. Everyone knows that.’ She said, ‘That’s what
you think.’
“Cast a cold eye on Life, on Death. Horseman, pass by.” –W.B. Yeats
Steve,
I opened the reading at Sacred Grounds tonight, just like what you did for years. Except this time there was no “hear ye, hear ye!” but a sad announcement. Your poems led the way: Minotaur, A Thin Line Between the City and the Sea, and A Poem of the Wounded God. There were just a handful of poets there. Has the wind changed? The landscape that we found ourselves in five, six years ago is no longer, as we file out of the picture one by one.
The city, its streets and cafes, the crows outside your window, the luring women in North Beach and then the gyre and the spiral, the gods and goddesses and the myths… You preferred to wander in these vivid worlds than work at the bleak 9 to 5 job. You are a lover. A romantic. It was between Yeats’ tomb and San Francisco that your love affair lasted until the very end. But the heart, no matter how you look at it, was wounded.
Here is a poem for Carlos Ramirez, who is in dire sickness. He was one of the founders of the “Poetry Hotel”, a hotel of the imagination serving the real poet community of the San Francisco Bay Area. Carlos has been hospitalized since mid February and now in the ICU. May blessings be upon him.
Langston Was Found
Langston was found in El Salvador
great big frosty beard
discovered on the library shelf
Langston, Langston Hughes
dances in schoolyards, they called him
Santa Claus silver liquid drops, he loved the rain.
Pete Seeger was found in Dolores Park
white sleeveless undershirt
Mime Troupe on the Fourth of July
Pete held his arms up
turned turned turned
sun on his brown skin
sun in his brown eyes.
El Poeta de la Treinta
shy in front of the midwife
she penciled a question mark
a spark, a mite
each leaf a time.
“Carlos, Carlos
don’t be afraid.”
He came out
who-ooo, who-ooo
swore not to grow up
El Zipote
met an angel
rolling down the slope
pushing an ice cream truck.
*
Notes:
“silver liquid drops” April Rain Song by Langston Hughes.
Carlos named himself “El Poeta de la Treinta” in his book, My Heart in the Matter.
Photo credit: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle
We come out of our mothers, propagating the intricate and long lines of genes that go back to the beginning of man. Society, community, environment, personal experiences contribute to the formation of our physical growth and characters. Parents, siblings, teachers, lovers, friends, affect our views in life. We keep changing and growing. We are never one thing. Who are we? Who am I? The proper time to define ourselves is after we’re dead.
Maybe that’s how we can look at a poem too. Sure it has a mother. But after it is born it might be quoted, cut up, or translated into another language. It might be edited and interpreted, with or without the poet’s knowledge.
In old China, a painting was considered more valuable if a respected poet put commentary on it. What about poems? Can one poem dialogue with another? Can they argue? Can they metamorphosize? At the end of the day, what’s important is the emergence of something new and exciting out of the ocean of literature. The poet has gifted the world with a poem. May it evolve.
Dan Brady, host of the Sacred Grounds Reading Series
There’s nothing like getting obsessed over writing these paired and rhymed couplets. It’s a great way to learn about exact rhymes. My over-the-top enthusiasm is a bit scary for Jack Foley. He keeps shaking his hands: Stop! Stop! Quality, please.
Well, just a few more, for the Sacred Grounds poets:
Laurie Hampton prints a poem
more stylish than a Russian goem
“Justice” is she
Say, can you see?
*
Bill Mercer dips his brushes
to make smudges and rushes
Buddha by the bayou
cooks red bean and rice for you
*
Don Brennan
fires a cannon
aims at the Empire
stakes it like a vampire
*
From Sacramento comes Kellyann Conway
with her GPS there’s only one-way
to Sacred Grounds she goes
on her tippy toes
*
Greg Pond
calm as a frond
takes you into darkness
exposes interior starkness
*
Deirdre Evan’s crypt
is plainly in her script
She is Mother Goose
who has since run loose
*
Christopher Trian gives you a head
in paint, without the lead
He’s tall as a tower
and boy, his voice is power
*
Carlos Ramirez dances
goes into trances
time is lost
in the frost
*
Owen Dunkel writes
the metaphor of kites
high flying are they
before diving into the bay
*
Buford Buntin has a story
that has nothing to do with fiori
he gives a helping hand
to a fallen kid in the sand
*
Foley starts the clerihews
When Hsu attempts they lose their hues
A poet came up to the open mic and told everyone he had just arrived from Los Angeles. He pulled out folded pieces of paper and began his rap on politics, life style and consumerism. The house was electrified. Many nodded in agreement and clapped enthusiastically when he finished. The poet was pleased, selected another piece of paper and recited another poem, in the same vein that dealt with the injustice, the hypocrisy, the blatant manipulations that are going on in our society. The house roared. He walked away from the mic a hero.
But the hero did not stay to be with the mass. He did not stay a minute longer to listen to the next poet. He opened the cafe door and walked out, shaking a few hands, much like a politician. If he had spoken the truth about the world, he had spoken the truth about himself.
The movie Sylvia portrayed the stormy relationship of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes. While Hughes received recognition, Plath felt trapped as a housewife and unable to write under her husband’s shadow. A sad tale, and I wonder during the peak of their romance whether there was a time when they were able to influence and elevate each other’s writing.
Love and art merged for sculptors Rodin and Camille Claudel (she died in a mental hospital), composers/pianists Robert and Clara Schumann (he committed suicide and she raised eight children), and poets Robert and Elizabeth Browning, and each became formidable in their own right. The synthesis requires humility and trust; and love, which does magical things.
O’Farrell seems to be the one street that draws the line. From there it is all downhill. Pigeons peck on orange cheetos shaken out of a bag by a man on the sidewalk. People loiter about and a queue on Turk Street snakes out of a community center serving meals. The area smells of urine. Someone’s belongings are piled high in a Safeway shopping cart.
This is where poverty meets art, where poets live in tiny compartments of residential hotels and scribble their thoughts on their beds. It is where the most evocative verse are written. But it is also doom. Most of these works will not see the light of day and likely to be lost in the turbulence of life.
Uptown glamour is only one street away, but the line is hard to cross.
