MUSELETTER #12
12/31/99
To all our readers & writers, poets & subscribers,
May your path to the year 2000 be smooth & serene, wherever you are & whatever time it is when you read this message. May you find all the poetry that comes before you, & make into poems all the poetry that arises within & around you in the next year.
This last Museletter of 1999 brings news & musings from Larry Jaffe & Victor Infante, our two southern California correspondents.
Happy New Millennium!
Margy Snyder & Bob Holman
Your About.com Poetry Guides
POETRY IS EVERYWHERE AT ABOUT.COM
About.com's Sleep Disorders Guide, Florence Cardinal, is seeking contributions to her collection of poems "by and for those who cannot sleep" -- & she's offering $5 for each submitted poem she uses on her poetry page. Have you been up late writing lately? Send her a poem.
LOS ANGELES
Musin' on a Wednesday Afternoon
Really couldn't get away too soon
I can't imagine anything that's better
The world is ours whenever we're together. . .
Musin', on a Wednesday afternoon. . .
Really, couldn't get away too soon.
No, No, No, No. . .
Musin. . . Musin. . .
I hope the Young Rascals forgive my paraphrasing, but life is kind of groovy at the moment. I am spending some holiday time up in Sausalito in would you believe the Hotel Sausalito, looking out over the San Francisco Bay. No reads, no hosting, doing some poetizing between walks and gazing.
As we move on to the new millennium, I think it is important to recognize the power of poetry. . . your poetry and how it affects the people around you. In this age of computerization, an era many think of as being cold and impersonal, poetry is one of the last vestiges of the personal. I have watched poetry touch people, make them laugh or cry, and even heal rifts between folks including some relatives of my own. And while I'm hearing LA Weekly declare that poetry is all but dead, I'm watching our reading at the Moondog Café continue to grow in stature and number.
I see what visibly takes place on my various tours both in the United States and abroad. I see people reaching out and touching each other with words. When I recently read an antiwar poem in Bristol, England, two Serbian women came up to me after the reading in tears, not believing that an American could be compassionate after we bombed the daylights out of them. Somehow our words make friends across the planet. It blurs out nationalistic lines and borders of race and religion. I believe poetry is the heart and soul of a civilization, a nation, a community. As we move into this new poetic era, I think it is important to reaffirm our commitments to our art, craft and community. I am proud to be a poet and read my words. I am proud to be a host and provide poets with a safe forum to read their works and nurture new poets. When I post a new poet on poets4peace, I can almost feel the balance of aesthetics shift a little more to the positive. (Yes, I have always been Optimistic Oscar and I do have my bad days, but it is a personal decision to reach down deep and offer hope rather than fear.)
There is so much trash put out on such a variety of media and we get so overwhelmed with it all that it makes you wonder what can be done about it. The airwaves, the newspapers, even the Internet are filled with negative content. Is it not part of our jobs as poets to point out the truth and create beauty in this universe?
Our Reading at the Moondog Cafe
I never talk about our own weekly poetry reading in this column, but we are hitting some milestones that are worth noting. We have come up with a workable formula that fills our venue every week rain or shine, holidays or not. We are on the last half of our fifth year of delivering poetry to the Los Angeles poetry community -- it was just about 5 years ago that Donn Deedon started this reading (every Tuesday at 8 pm at 7160 Melrose Avenue, 2 blocks West of La Brea in Hollywood). Not too long ago our reading had a weekly total of 12 to 15 attendees. Perhaps it is not huge by rock and roll standards or even some slam venues -- but we fill the dawg with 50 to 60 people every week now. We have had upwards of 40 poets read in our open mic. There is a regular crew that comes around, but we see a regular turnover of poets and audience that is gratifying. Poets come from around the world to read there. On my recent trips to London and New York folks knew about the reading at the dawg.
You can find out more about the readings at the online café I created many years ago. We use the Internet to help expand and strengthen the reading. There is a weekly newsletter and the Web site has photos and poetry from the various poets that read at the dawg.
Georgia Popoff West Coast Tour
Renowned Syracuse poet Georgia Popoff cut a poetic swathe through Southern California in early December. She read at the Brewery in Laguna Beach, Moondog Café and Exile Records and Books in Sherman Oaks. Georgia also appeared on a radio broadcast with Victor Infante promoting poetry. I had the privilege of featuring with her at Amelie Frank's Exile reading and she creates a commanding yet warm presence on stage. Her words are strong yet tender. We look forward to having her back in socal. You can check out her works both at IncognitoCafe and also at her own site.
Henry Fool, the Movie
Caught up somewhere between farce and innuendo is a movie called Henry Fool made in 1998 about the creative time of a New York poet. The hero is a garbageman turned poet, one Simon Grim. I don't imagine it was a box office smash, but it is a very cool if not amusing movie, worth watching. You can get a fairly good synopsis at the Web site, plus you can download some clips.
ORANGE COUNTY/SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Busy Winter
Used to be that Winter was dead for poetry. So why am I so gosh-darn busy all of a sudden? Seems this Millennium Fever has gotten poets into a "gee I gotta do something" sort of grind. Change is in the air. Which is good, because this is southern California, so snow certainly isn't.
Perhaps the biggest change locally is Jaimes Palacio shutting down his Monday night reading in San Clemente, only to re-open it at Santa Ana's beautiful new "Gypsy Den Grand-Central," a gorgeous and spacious coffeehouse in the middle of Santa Ana's bustling new Artists' Village. The reading re-opens Monday, Jan 3rd and will feature local superstars Derrick Brown and Buzzy Enniss, and NYC's National-Slam-Champ-In-Residence Roger Bonair-Agard. Should be quite a show. The San Clemente reading ended on a quiet note, with wonderfully heartfelt readings by Riverside's wacky professor Mike Cluff, and one of OC's finest, Katya Garitsky. One open reader noted that he was "going to miss the Stewart Smalley of poetry readings."GYPSY DEN GRAND-CENTRAL CAFÉ
125 N. Broadway, Santa Ana, CA, (714) 835-8840
Did Someone Say Roger Bonair-Agard?
That's right, SoCal is going to be blessed by a visit from NYC's celebrated 1999 National Poetry Slam Champion. Bonair-Agard's schedule out here keeps changing (and growing) but here's the list so far:
- Monday, Jan. 3, 8 p.m.
Gypsy Den Grand Central, 125 N. Broadway, Santa Ana, (714) 835-8840
Opening night of this old series hosted by Jaimes Palacio in its new venue, with Derrick Brown and Buzzy Enniss.- Tuesday, Jan. 4, 8 p.m.
Claire de Lune, 2906 University Ave., North Park, (619) 291-7070
Hosted by Cherryl Latif.- Wednesday, Jan. 5, 9 p.m.
Club Mesa, 843 W. 19th Street, Costa Mesa, (949) 642-6634
With Mike Cluff, hosted by Lob.- Thursday, Jan. 6, 8 p.m.
Laguna Beach Brewing Co., 422 S. PCH, Laguna Beach, (949) 499-2337
With Victor D. Infante, hosted by John Gardiner.- Monday, Jan. 10
The new reading Gerry Quickley runs in LA which I don't have any info on because I suck.- Tuesday, Jan. 11, 8 p.m.
Moondog Cafe, 7160 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles
Hosted by Larry Jaffe.- Thursday, Jan. 13, 8 p.m.
Exile Books, 14925 Magnolia, Sherman Oaks, (818) 986-6409
Hosted by Amelie Frank.
Lastly, Another Lit Journal Goes Bye-Bye
Blue Satellite, edited by LA poets Matthew Niblock and Amelie Frank, and for my money the finest lit journal in all of SoCal, will be folding with its Spring Issue. Sources have it that both Niblock and Frank will be moving on to other projects. Drop them a line at sacredbev@aol.com, or pre-order a copy at P.O. Box 10312, Burbank, CA 91510-0312.
