They Will Want To Know More by Cristina Cousins
Dear Friends, Cristina came to hear Remi Kanazi last Wednesday and to see Five Broken Cameras and hear Iyad Burnat last Friday. I asked her if she’d be willing to write a response. This is what she…
Category: Poets
Share the Wealth: Poetry Night Sunday 6 April
April is National Poetry Month. In that spirit, select a couple of your favorites, bring several copies to pass around, and we’ll surely hear a variety of poets, themes, historical periods, and styles. Don’t be…
To My Friends by Primo Levi
Dear friends, and here I say friends the broad sense of the word: Wife, sister, associates, relatives, Schoolmates of both sexes, People seen only once Or frequented all my life; Provided that between us, for…
Share the Wealth with Johannes Wich-Schwarz: German-Jewish Poetry after the Holocaust
“The Not-Word: German-Jewish Poetry after the Holocaust” What does it mean to write in German as a Jewish author after the Holocaust? Can poetry recover, reclaim, and renew language after unspeakable trauma? How do we…
Shema, Primo Levi
You who live secure In your warm houses Who return at evening to find Hot food and friendly faces: Consider whether this is a man, Who labours in the mud Who knows no peace Who…
Would You Say Something About Old Age by Nicanor Parra
WOULD YOU SAY SOMETHING ABOUT OLD AGE His students once asked Of Dr. Bertrand Russell & the venerable elder replied: Old age… A time like any other For fighting for a cause that’s just –Chliean…
Always Mantain only a Joyful Heart
Dear Chris, Thanks to you, I now have the following favorite Alice Walker poems from The World Will Follow Joy: Blessed Are the Poor in Spirit Democratic Womanism Hope to Sin Only in the Service…
Being Free
Don’t let your life be governed by what disturbs you. — Abu-al-Ala al-Ma’arri [973-1052]
Radical Presence
The following passages are from an interview with U.S. poet Anne Waldman, co-founder of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics… Poetry needs the breath. It needs the voice. It needs the body. It needs…
You, Walt, and I (And Most Everybody Else We Know)
Cab, Here’s section 51 of Song of Myself, which you’ve heard me and others quote scores of times, and even today as we discussed The Brothers Karamazov. And you might also enjoy June Jordan’s essay,…