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Showing posts with label conferences. Show all posts
Showing posts with label conferences. Show all posts
Monday, July 22, 2024
Tuesday, May 12, 2015
La Bloga News ‘n Notes
Michael Sedano
This second week of 2015's only May brings bustle and last-minute hustle for gente only just now finding out about a reading, a conference, or a conjunto. A pair of calls for submissions open now or soon and have long-opened windows of opportunity.
The weekend conference at Cal State LA--the one in El Sereno--promises invigorating panels and interesting teatro. The grandchildren of los de abajo have Ph.D.s now, and are studying their antepasados from interesting points of view. The conference is free but parking is fee.
Here are notes from a variety of La Bloga friends' emails for this week.
Late-breaking news
Librería Martínez Hosts Santiago Vaquera-Vasquez
The author presents his new book of cuentos, the first in English, One Day I'll Tell You the Things I've Seen (UNM Press, 2015), in Santa Ana California.
Libreria Martinez Books & Art Gallery is still at 216 N Broadway, Santa Ana, CA 92701
Phone:(714) 954-1151. The organization now exists under the umbrella of Chapman University.
Call For Submissions
“Pariahs: Writing From Outside the Margins” anthology
Editors Mónica Teresa Ortiz and Sarah Rafael García invite creative non-fiction, prose, poems and short stories up to 4,000 words or a maximum of three poems. All submissions will be read blind; thus, your name or contact information should only appear on your cover letter. Please submit previously unpublished work only. We accept simultaneous submissions, but please notify us as soon as possible should your work be accepted elsewhere.
The theme for this anthology is “Pariahs.” We encourage submissions that provoke thought or discussion about this topic from the writing perspective and address one of the following questions: as a writer, have you ever felt left out and expected to only write from the place where you stand (specific to gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, geography, education, etc)? Has academia, such as the MFA experience, limited you and your perspective? Have you been left out from “mainstream” literature or the writing industry? Do you feel silenced as a writer?
We require a $5 submission fee. Call for submissions runs from May 31st through September 1st. Submissions will be accepted through Submittable. The Submittable link is scheduled for activation on May 16.
Please email the editors at pariahsanthology2015@gmail.com with any questions.
Mónica Teresa Ortiz was born and raised in Texas. Her work has appeared in Bombay Gin, Sinister Wisdom, Huizache, Pilgrimage Magazine, Paso del Rio Grande del Norte, Borderlands, As/US, The Texas Observer, Autostraddle, and Black Girl Dangerous. A two-time Andres Montoya Letras Latinxs Poetry prize finalist, Ortiz is the Poetry Editor for Raspa Magazine, a Queer Latinx literary art journal.
Sarah Rafael García is a writer, community educator and traveler. Since publishing Las Niñas in 2008, she continues to share her passion by founding Barrio Writers and hosting Wild Womyn Writers workshops. Her words have been featured in Connotation Press, EXSE Spoken Word Showcase, Label Me Latina/o, La Bloga, Brooklyn & Boyle, LATINO Magazine, Santanero Zine, Flies, Cockroaches and Poets, IN MY BED Magazine, E4rth is my Flesh Zine and has a forthcoming publication in theContraPuntos III anthology. Sarah Rafael is the Editor for the Barrio Writers annual anthology.
Call For Submissions
Origins Journal Seeks Shame
Origins Journal explores the narrative arts through the lens of identity. We’re interested in distinct voices. Writing that tells us something about a character's roots or what makes her unique. Stories that transport us across town and country, beyond and within borders both physical and abstract, to discreet moments that change or define us. We publish poetry, prose, translation, interviews and flash fiction. Our fall issue will focus on the theme of shame. For full guidelines, visit us here: http://www.originsjournal.com/submit/.
Free Conference
Cal State LA Hosts Conference on Mariano Azuela and Novels of the Mexican Revolution
from the event's website: Mariano Azuela (Lagos de Moreno, Jalisco, 1873-1952) was a medical doctor by profession and by mid-century one of Mexico’s leading writers. The author of novels, plays, biographies, and literary criticism, Azuela served as field doctor under Francisco Villa during the Mexican Revolution and, after Villa’s military defeat, published Los de abajo (The Underdogs) while in exile in El Paso, Texas. This conference on Azuela commemorates the first centenary of the publication of Los de abajo (1915) and aims to trace its narrative affiliation to twentieth-century autobiographies, memoirs ,and, more specifically, narratives of the Mexican Revolution.
Click here for the details of this event.
SanAnto Conjunto Festival Kicks Off With Seniors Dance
Go to the Guadalupe site for the full schedule.
This second week of 2015's only May brings bustle and last-minute hustle for gente only just now finding out about a reading, a conference, or a conjunto. A pair of calls for submissions open now or soon and have long-opened windows of opportunity.
The weekend conference at Cal State LA--the one in El Sereno--promises invigorating panels and interesting teatro. The grandchildren of los de abajo have Ph.D.s now, and are studying their antepasados from interesting points of view. The conference is free but parking is fee.
Here are notes from a variety of La Bloga friends' emails for this week.
Late-breaking news
Librería Martínez Hosts Santiago Vaquera-Vasquez
The author presents his new book of cuentos, the first in English, One Day I'll Tell You the Things I've Seen (UNM Press, 2015), in Santa Ana California.
Libreria Martinez Books & Art Gallery is still at 216 N Broadway, Santa Ana, CA 92701
Phone:(714) 954-1151. The organization now exists under the umbrella of Chapman University.
Call For Submissions
“Pariahs: Writing From Outside the Margins” anthology
Editors Mónica Teresa Ortiz and Sarah Rafael García invite creative non-fiction, prose, poems and short stories up to 4,000 words or a maximum of three poems. All submissions will be read blind; thus, your name or contact information should only appear on your cover letter. Please submit previously unpublished work only. We accept simultaneous submissions, but please notify us as soon as possible should your work be accepted elsewhere.
The theme for this anthology is “Pariahs.” We encourage submissions that provoke thought or discussion about this topic from the writing perspective and address one of the following questions: as a writer, have you ever felt left out and expected to only write from the place where you stand (specific to gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, geography, education, etc)? Has academia, such as the MFA experience, limited you and your perspective? Have you been left out from “mainstream” literature or the writing industry? Do you feel silenced as a writer?
We require a $5 submission fee. Call for submissions runs from May 31st through September 1st. Submissions will be accepted through Submittable. The Submittable link is scheduled for activation on May 16.
Please email the editors at pariahsanthology2015@gmail.com with any questions.
Mónica Teresa Ortiz was born and raised in Texas. Her work has appeared in Bombay Gin, Sinister Wisdom, Huizache, Pilgrimage Magazine, Paso del Rio Grande del Norte, Borderlands, As/US, The Texas Observer, Autostraddle, and Black Girl Dangerous. A two-time Andres Montoya Letras Latinxs Poetry prize finalist, Ortiz is the Poetry Editor for Raspa Magazine, a Queer Latinx literary art journal.
Sarah Rafael García is a writer, community educator and traveler. Since publishing Las Niñas in 2008, she continues to share her passion by founding Barrio Writers and hosting Wild Womyn Writers workshops. Her words have been featured in Connotation Press, EXSE Spoken Word Showcase, Label Me Latina/o, La Bloga, Brooklyn & Boyle, LATINO Magazine, Santanero Zine, Flies, Cockroaches and Poets, IN MY BED Magazine, E4rth is my Flesh Zine and has a forthcoming publication in theContraPuntos III anthology. Sarah Rafael is the Editor for the Barrio Writers annual anthology.Call For Submissions
Origins Journal Seeks Shame
Origins Journal explores the narrative arts through the lens of identity. We’re interested in distinct voices. Writing that tells us something about a character's roots or what makes her unique. Stories that transport us across town and country, beyond and within borders both physical and abstract, to discreet moments that change or define us. We publish poetry, prose, translation, interviews and flash fiction. Our fall issue will focus on the theme of shame. For full guidelines, visit us here: http://www.originsjournal.com/submit/.
Free Conference
Cal State LA Hosts Conference on Mariano Azuela and Novels of the Mexican Revolution
from the event's website: Mariano Azuela (Lagos de Moreno, Jalisco, 1873-1952) was a medical doctor by profession and by mid-century one of Mexico’s leading writers. The author of novels, plays, biographies, and literary criticism, Azuela served as field doctor under Francisco Villa during the Mexican Revolution and, after Villa’s military defeat, published Los de abajo (The Underdogs) while in exile in El Paso, Texas. This conference on Azuela commemorates the first centenary of the publication of Los de abajo (1915) and aims to trace its narrative affiliation to twentieth-century autobiographies, memoirs ,and, more specifically, narratives of the Mexican Revolution.
Click here for the details of this event.
SanAnto Conjunto Festival Kicks Off With Seniors Dance
Check the organizer's website for contact information to attend the kick-off event, a dance for senior citizens featuring Tim Rodríguez y Oro de Tejas (San Antonio). The major musical happenings are Friday through Sunday.
Scheduled at the reasonable hour of 10 a.m. to noon, the dance--free for seniors--is Wednesday, May 13 at Guadalupe Theatre.
Go to the Guadalupe site for the full schedule.
Tuesday, April 28, 2015
Foto Ése: Poesia Para La Gente in the Garden. Community News Bits 'n Pieces.
Floricanto Para la Tierra
Michael Sedano
Then one day, Chicken Boy disappeared from Broadway. Que plus ça change and all that, but this icon of a fried chicken restaurant above Los Angeles’ most expensive commercial real estate locus stood as a constant reminder back in the 1970s to a Chicano grad student juggling the weighty issues of no money, ample research, and a recalcitrant dissertation, to take life with a smile.
Chicken Boy is back, lifting spirits of gente fighting encroaching gentrification of northeast El Lay. Book designer artist Amy Inouye rescued Chicken Boy. She mounted him above her Future Studio Design on Highland Park’s Figueroa Street.
How sublime, then, that Jessica Ceballos, LA’s peerless promoter of poesia and all things artful, scheduled a Poesia Para la Gente reading in Milagro Allegro Community Garden, just up the alley from Chicken Boy, whose presence adds nostalgic joy to a thoroughly enchanting “para la tierra” reading.
Reading your stuff al fresco creates unique challenges that Sunday afternoon’s poets skillfully engage. Flocks of parrots screech by, unmuffled police helicopters noisomely roar overhead, cars cruise down the potholed alley, bright sunlight overpowers electronic devices. For a photographer, that brilliant light creates a host of problems, from squinting eyes to wildly variant illumination when readers move into shade, into light, stand in dappled light, hold a bright white manuscript. Exposing for open shade with full sun in the background adds another complication; one’s eye easily adjusts but a camera's computer chip and lens don’t.
Setting renders moot standard delivery issues. The constant struggle for personalization through eye contact occurs whether on stage or in the garden. Eyes glued to a tiny telephone screen or manuscript denies eye contact, wearing shades against the brilliant day likewise shuts the window to the soul. Holding the manuscript affects the nature of gestures available. Memorization always frees the performer to use one’s entire technology of the body to create memorably dynamic experiences for grateful audiences.
Projection and volume inadequacies, ordinarily a plein aire hazard, are not in evidence today. The casual outdoor setting encourages the basking audience to interaction, “louder!” or “Say that again?” Karineh Mahdessian greets me as I maneuver for a better angle as she begins her reading, “Hey, Michael, how you doing?” A former speech coach urges one reader to go from memory in lieu of being bound to the text, a useful practice because the words are already in the writer’s mouth and memory. Besides, only the poet knows if a line changes or something drops out.
Karen Anzoategui and Amanda Yates Garcia elect the open shade under the mora tree (under the mor, under the a, under the mora tree). This encourages a manual setting of the camera to avoid exposure variance. When white paper catches and reflects light into its sensor, a camera wants to close the aperture producing underexposed, dark, faces and good values on bright spots.
In full light, automatic exposure using the camera’s partial metering system produces acceptable exposures and little-noticed changes in depth of focus as the speaker moves and turns, reflecting more or less light. Although elements of the background grow darker and lighter with the aperture/shutter changes, those don’t unacceptably affect the portrait.
Dappled light and portraits where the face is in shadow but the body in bright sun call for flash fill-in. Modern cameras allow flash exposures at high speeds, a wondrous benefit over conventional cameras whose flash synchronization demands 1/60 second exposures. In bright light at 1/60 second, many lenses will not have small enough apertures to produce good results without also dropping the ISO value—the camera’s sensitivity to light. Digital cameras automatically adjust ISO at the photographer’s option. In bright light, that’s not much of an issue. Lower ISO images come with Kodachrome richness. I hold my ISO at 800 whenever practical for more consistent appearance.
Flash is not a panacea but today artificial light saves some otherwise too dark/too bright portraits. The images of Vicky Vertiz and Kenji Liu would have been too dark in the shade, or washed out in the light, except for the fill-in. Liu’s light plaid washes out despite the flash, Vertiz’ polka dots just barely survive but detail on her neck whites out. Alex Hohmann’s bright orange dress in full light, and wonderfully expressive face in open shade, would have confused the heck out of the camera’s brain. Hohmann’s skin tones render beautifully and her eyes sparkle owing to the balancing effect of flash fill-in.
“Para la tierra” offered a fabulous floricanto that deserves a hearing and re-hearing. My gosh, I would love to read those pieces I could hear only in the moment and then they were gone.
Oscar Duardo, guardian of the garden, videoed the performances. Hopefully the microphone picked up with clarity and one day the readings will be sharable with others. Possibilities abound with modern technology, especially inexpensive remote microphones. If sponsors and poets want to put themselves through the hassle of donning and doffing the tiny devices and bulkier battery pack transmitters, video and mic’ing artists offers freedom from time and place. As my grandfather used to say when faced with life’s possibilities, “mmn, a ver.”
Los Angeles
Late-breaking News!
Today, Tuesday! Rush Hour Reading by Los Angeles-based poets in celebration of National Poetry Month! Come for the poetry and mingle with the poets afterwards. Rush Hour has never been so inspiring!
Be there, or be square. Levi's and Capri's welcome.
Latinopia Update: Short Fiction from Daniel Acosta
La Bloga friend Jesus Treviño is among the hardest-working documentarians in Aztlán. Latinopia, Treviño's wondrous public service on the internet, shares videos and essays on historical subjects, cooking, literature, zombies, and the continuation of the adventures of Arnie and Porfi, a cartoon series Sergio Hernández launched in the iconic raza magazine Con Safos.
This week's update--Treviño updates Latinopia weekly--includes a reading from 2010's Festival de Flor y Canto • Yesterday • Today • Tomorrow. The entire video program of that reunion Floricanto will be distributed via USC's Digital Library sometime this summer. A ver.
http://latinopia.com/latino-literature/latinopia-word-daniel-acosta-homeboy-1/
May Update and Looking Even Forwarder
CSULA (Cal State El Sereno) professor, and La Bloga friend, Roberto Cantu, looks forward to next month and welcoming visitors to a popular celebration and scholarly conference on the work of Mariano Azuela and novels of the Mexican revolución. The Conference comes to the eastside of Los Angeles in May. Except for parking and no-host lunch, the conference is free.
Looking forward to 2016’s iteration of the conference, Cantu announces a call for proposals—abstracts that will be collocated to form panels—concerning the work of Americo Paredes.
Américo Paredes belonged to a generation of Mexican American writers that included Fabiola Cabeza de Baca (New Mexico, 1894-1991), Ernesto Galarza (México, 1905-1984), José Antonio Villarreal (California, 1924-2010) and, among others, Mario Suárez (Arizona, 1925–1998), writers who served their country as educators, labor organizers, journalists, and oftentimes as soldiers during the Second World War. Conference organizers welcome papers that spotlight the work of these Mexican American writers with an emphasis on their autobiographies (Cabeza de Baca, Galarza), or on their narrative fiction (Suárez, Villarreal) in relation to border narratives, the frontier experience, the relocation of home, and the way Mexican American culture is represented in such works, namely: as one that continues to grow out of the tension between tradition and modernity. Other proposed areas of study are the critical examination of scholarly works on the corrido, such as María Herrera-Sobek's The Mexican Corrido: A Feminist Analysis (1990), and Northward Bound: The Mexican Immigrant Experience in Ballad and Song (1993); or on Paredes's life and work, for instance José Limόn’s Américo Paredes: Culture and Critique (2013); Ramόn Saldívar’s The Borderlands of Culture: Américo Paredes and the Transnational Imaginary (2006); José R. Lόpez Morín’s The Legacy of Américo Paredes (2006); and Manuel Medrano’s Américo Paredes: In His Own Words, an Authorized Biography (2010).
The deadline for a 250-word abstract is February 14, 2016. The submitted abstracts can be in Spanish or in English. Submissions will be peer-reviewed and their acceptance or rejection will be communicated by e-mail on or before February 21. Send abstracts to rcantu@calstatela.edu.
¡Gente! ¡Scholars! Dust off your guitar and begin practicing a couple of corridos.
Los Angeles Theatre Center Has A Seat With Your Name On It.
LATC's new season presents a diverse array of work, with artists from Los Angeles, Riverside, Chicago, and Spain. The stories on display include topics capturing the popular imagination such as women and sex; "machismo," and what makes a man; the challenges of interfaith romance; the use of deadly force by police; and the power of love against the effects of Alzheimer's.
Cultures from around the globe make contact this spring at LATC. You should too, according to LATC's website.
LATC's East of Broadway Spring Season kicks-off with Teatro Luna, as they bare it all without blushing in Generation Sex (April 17-May17), and Dreamscape's (April 16-May 17) reimagination of 1998 police-involved shooting in Riverside.
Tickets and schedules are conveniently available at LATC's website, with a click here.
Tía Chucha Soliciting Submissions
SanAnto
15 Poets Six Hours
La Bloga friend Gregg Barrios sends the following:
Back by community demand, Mega Corazon will return on Thursday, April 30—the closing day of National Poetry Month!
Celebrating a hybrid San Anto poetic tradition that combines street, classical, and slam performance styles, at times incorporating musical performance into spoken word. The result is frontal, improvisational, inspired, and often choreographed for a highly visual impact.
Poets Performing in the 2015 Mega Corazon Include:
∙ Lahab Assef Al-Jundi ∙ Gregg Barrios ∙Nephtali Deleon ∙ Amanda Flores ∙Anthony “The Poet” Flores ∙Fernando Flores ∙ Eduardo Garza ∙Andrea Greimel ∙ Bryce Milligan ∙Andrea "Vocab" Sanderson ∙ Carmen Tafolla ∙ Juan Tejeda ∙ Frances Trevino Santos ∙ Eddie Vega
Conjunto Fest Growing Faster Than You Can Say Juan Tejeda
From La Bloga friend Juan Tejeda:
Familia, Camaradas and Colleagues, just wanted to personally invite you and your familia to the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center's 34th Annual Tejano Conjunto Festival en San Antonio 2015 which will take place from May 13-17 at the Guadalupe Theater and Rosedale Park. Check out the complete schedule and musical line-up in the attached official poster of this year's Tejano Conjunto Festival, with the wild award-winning design by John Medina. Hope to see you here in San Anto in three weeks to witness the cucuy accordion invasion. Por favor spread the palabra and the poster. Gracias. Juan
Is Your Community Event Not Mentioned in La Bloga News & Notes?
Órale, it's not that we're stuck up. More likely, La Bloga hasn't been notified! Not that it's your fault or nothing, sabes, but marketing and outreach are the keys to getting La Bloga to soma pa'ca.
Email announcements to Labloga@readraza.com
Michael Sedano
Then one day, Chicken Boy disappeared from Broadway. Que plus ça change and all that, but this icon of a fried chicken restaurant above Los Angeles’ most expensive commercial real estate locus stood as a constant reminder back in the 1970s to a Chicano grad student juggling the weighty issues of no money, ample research, and a recalcitrant dissertation, to take life with a smile.
Chicken Boy is back, lifting spirits of gente fighting encroaching gentrification of northeast El Lay. Book designer artist Amy Inouye rescued Chicken Boy. She mounted him above her Future Studio Design on Highland Park’s Figueroa Street.
 |
| Jessica Ceballos |
 |
| Karen Anzoategui, Amanda Yates Garcia |
 |
| Karen Anzoategui |
 |
| Amanda Yates Garcia |
Karen Anzoategui and Amanda Yates Garcia elect the open shade under the mora tree (under the mor, under the a, under the mora tree). This encourages a manual setting of the camera to avoid exposure variance. When white paper catches and reflects light into its sensor, a camera wants to close the aperture producing underexposed, dark, faces and good values on bright spots.
 |
| Viviana Franco |
 |
| Vicky Vertiz |
 |
| Alex Hohmann |
 |
| Karineh Mahdessian |
 |
| Kenji Liu |
Oscar Duardo, guardian of the garden, videoed the performances. Hopefully the microphone picked up with clarity and one day the readings will be sharable with others. Possibilities abound with modern technology, especially inexpensive remote microphones. If sponsors and poets want to put themselves through the hassle of donning and doffing the tiny devices and bulkier battery pack transmitters, video and mic’ing artists offers freedom from time and place. As my grandfather used to say when faced with life’s possibilities, “mmn, a ver.”
 |
| Francisco Escamilla, Bustop Poet |
 |
| Seeclawleek Guehosah - Xitlalic Guijosa-Osuna |
 |
| Oscar Duardo - Guardian of the Garden |
Late-breaking News!
Today, Tuesday! Rush Hour Reading by Los Angeles-based poets in celebration of National Poetry Month! Come for the poetry and mingle with the poets afterwards. Rush Hour has never been so inspiring!
Be there, or be square. Levi's and Capri's welcome.
Latinopia Update: Short Fiction from Daniel Acosta
La Bloga friend Jesus Treviño is among the hardest-working documentarians in Aztlán. Latinopia, Treviño's wondrous public service on the internet, shares videos and essays on historical subjects, cooking, literature, zombies, and the continuation of the adventures of Arnie and Porfi, a cartoon series Sergio Hernández launched in the iconic raza magazine Con Safos.
This week's update--Treviño updates Latinopia weekly--includes a reading from 2010's Festival de Flor y Canto • Yesterday • Today • Tomorrow. The entire video program of that reunion Floricanto will be distributed via USC's Digital Library sometime this summer. A ver.
http://latinopia.com/latino-literature/latinopia-word-daniel-acosta-homeboy-1/
May Update and Looking Even Forwarder
CSULA (Cal State El Sereno) professor, and La Bloga friend, Roberto Cantu, looks forward to next month and welcoming visitors to a popular celebration and scholarly conference on the work of Mariano Azuela and novels of the Mexican revolución. The Conference comes to the eastside of Los Angeles in May. Except for parking and no-host lunch, the conference is free.
Looking forward to 2016’s iteration of the conference, Cantu announces a call for proposals—abstracts that will be collocated to form panels—concerning the work of Americo Paredes.
Américo Paredes belonged to a generation of Mexican American writers that included Fabiola Cabeza de Baca (New Mexico, 1894-1991), Ernesto Galarza (México, 1905-1984), José Antonio Villarreal (California, 1924-2010) and, among others, Mario Suárez (Arizona, 1925–1998), writers who served their country as educators, labor organizers, journalists, and oftentimes as soldiers during the Second World War. Conference organizers welcome papers that spotlight the work of these Mexican American writers with an emphasis on their autobiographies (Cabeza de Baca, Galarza), or on their narrative fiction (Suárez, Villarreal) in relation to border narratives, the frontier experience, the relocation of home, and the way Mexican American culture is represented in such works, namely: as one that continues to grow out of the tension between tradition and modernity. Other proposed areas of study are the critical examination of scholarly works on the corrido, such as María Herrera-Sobek's The Mexican Corrido: A Feminist Analysis (1990), and Northward Bound: The Mexican Immigrant Experience in Ballad and Song (1993); or on Paredes's life and work, for instance José Limόn’s Américo Paredes: Culture and Critique (2013); Ramόn Saldívar’s The Borderlands of Culture: Américo Paredes and the Transnational Imaginary (2006); José R. Lόpez Morín’s The Legacy of Américo Paredes (2006); and Manuel Medrano’s Américo Paredes: In His Own Words, an Authorized Biography (2010).
The deadline for a 250-word abstract is February 14, 2016. The submitted abstracts can be in Spanish or in English. Submissions will be peer-reviewed and their acceptance or rejection will be communicated by e-mail on or before February 21. Send abstracts to rcantu@calstatela.edu.
¡Gente! ¡Scholars! Dust off your guitar and begin practicing a couple of corridos.
Los Angeles Theatre Center Has A Seat With Your Name On It.
LATC's new season presents a diverse array of work, with artists from Los Angeles, Riverside, Chicago, and Spain. The stories on display include topics capturing the popular imagination such as women and sex; "machismo," and what makes a man; the challenges of interfaith romance; the use of deadly force by police; and the power of love against the effects of Alzheimer's.
Cultures from around the globe make contact this spring at LATC. You should too, according to LATC's website.
LATC's East of Broadway Spring Season kicks-off with Teatro Luna, as they bare it all without blushing in Generation Sex (April 17-May17), and Dreamscape's (April 16-May 17) reimagination of 1998 police-involved shooting in Riverside.
Tickets and schedules are conveniently available at LATC's website, with a click here.
Tía Chucha Soliciting Submissions
SanAnto
15 Poets Six Hours
La Bloga friend Gregg Barrios sends the following:
Back by community demand, Mega Corazon will return on Thursday, April 30—the closing day of National Poetry Month!
Celebrating a hybrid San Anto poetic tradition that combines street, classical, and slam performance styles, at times incorporating musical performance into spoken word. The result is frontal, improvisational, inspired, and often choreographed for a highly visual impact.
Poets Performing in the 2015 Mega Corazon Include:
∙ Lahab Assef Al-Jundi ∙ Gregg Barrios ∙Nephtali Deleon ∙ Amanda Flores ∙Anthony “The Poet” Flores ∙Fernando Flores ∙ Eduardo Garza ∙Andrea Greimel ∙ Bryce Milligan ∙Andrea "Vocab" Sanderson ∙ Carmen Tafolla ∙ Juan Tejeda ∙ Frances Trevino Santos ∙ Eddie Vega
Conjunto Fest Growing Faster Than You Can Say Juan Tejeda
From La Bloga friend Juan Tejeda:
Familia, Camaradas and Colleagues, just wanted to personally invite you and your familia to the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center's 34th Annual Tejano Conjunto Festival en San Antonio 2015 which will take place from May 13-17 at the Guadalupe Theater and Rosedale Park. Check out the complete schedule and musical line-up in the attached official poster of this year's Tejano Conjunto Festival, with the wild award-winning design by John Medina. Hope to see you here in San Anto in three weeks to witness the cucuy accordion invasion. Por favor spread the palabra and the poster. Gracias. Juan
Is Your Community Event Not Mentioned in La Bloga News & Notes?
Órale, it's not that we're stuck up. More likely, La Bloga hasn't been notified! Not that it's your fault or nothing, sabes, but marketing and outreach are the keys to getting La Bloga to soma pa'ca.
Email announcements to Labloga@readraza.com
Tuesday, April 22, 2014
Conference Time. News 'n notes.
Michael Sedano
University Conference on Latino Culture and Science Fiction April 30.
The University of California, Riverside hosts a trailblazing academic inquiry into science fiction and speculative fiction written by raza writers in a gathering of casí all the raza writers of science fiction and speculative literature.
The April 30 conference arrives at a time of literary ferment when writers and readers come to the book market with higher expectations than publishers can understand.
The conference explores how six writers get their books to market, the role of sci-fi and speclit genres in United States letters, the nature of literary exclusion, and stories about what each writer brings to readers.
The morning panel joins almost all raza published authors of the genres into the same room at the same time. Hosted by UCR’s Professor of Science Fiction Media Studies, Sherryl Vint, the discussions will be classics among literary conferences. Mario Acevedo’s vampires and Jésus Treviño’s zombie fiction meets Rudy Ch. García’s and Treviño’s dimensional surrealism. Rosaura Sánchez and Beatrice Pita’s lunar braceros meet el padrino of Chicano sci-fi Ernest Hogan’s mexicas in outerspace. Y más.
In the afternoon, Michael Sedano and UCR graduate students join the circle to include critical perspectives and readerly responses to these sci-fi and speclit genres, and to join the audience in speculation into what directions each sees raza speculative literature and science-fiction taking.
A grand event in the late afternoon, years in the making, puts a capstone on the conference.
See Rudy Ch. Garcia’s Saturday, April 26 column for building/meeting-room specifics. Here's a link also: http://ucrtoday.ucr.edu/21579
The beautiful Riverside campus is freeway convenient off the 60/215, in Susan Straight country.
Conference on Rudolfo Anaya: Tradition, Modernity, and the Literatures of the U.S. Southwest May 2-3.
La Bloga friend Roberto Cantú brings the most arrestingly interesting academic conferences to Southern California and the east side of the LA basin. May 2-3, Cantú surpasses himself with a conference dedicated to La Bloga friend Rudolfo Anaya and literature of the US Southwest.
Scholars from New Mexico to old Germany will lecture, moderate, and sit panel presentations.
Four keystone fiction writers take the lectern during the conference, Ana Castillo, Rolando Hinojosa-Smith, Reyna Grande, and Mario Acevedo, fresh from his stunning appearance UCR's raza in spec lit and sci-fi conference.
The Anaya conference on the campus of California State University Los Angeles in El Sereno is free and open to public visitors for just the cost of parking or a short walk from the bus station. There is no light rail serving this campus directly.
A word of caution: parking rules are posted so you can read them and avoid a ticket. Be assured local regulations are strictly enforced.
The conference is sponsored by Cal State L.A.'s Gigi Gaucher-Morales Memorial Conference Series, the College of Arts and Letters, the College of Natural and Social Sciences, the Department of Chicano Studies, the Department of English, the Barry Munitz Fund, and the Emeriti Association.
See the conference website for details.
Writing Workshop With Ana Castillo
Working with a seasoned writer to develop ideas, polish writing, glean insights from conversation often comes with the payoff of better writing, an improved attitude. This happens for beginners as well as polished authors.
The opportunity to work with one of Chicana Chicano Literature's most accomplished talents, Ana Castillo, should quickly fill the handful of seats available on May 3 through auspices of La Bloga friend Iris de Anda.
Visit the workshop Facebook page for your invitation. There is a fee for the workshop.
Writing Workshop for Newer Writers in East Los
La Bloga friend Sam Quinones organizes a writing workshop series for those who've never published before, Tell Your True Tale.
Students from recent workshops appear Saturday April 26 at the East L.A. Public Library at 2:30 pm. The East LA Public Library awaits your attendance at 4837 E 3rd St, LA, 323-264-0155.
Quinones' workshops revolve around insisting stories fit in limited space. Tell Your True Tale approach forces writers to hone their thoughts and imagination, eliminate unnecessary words, make the hard choices that are part of strong writing, no matter the genre.
The Saturday event showcases the students' work with, according to Quinones, stunning variety and quality of stories: A vet returning home from Vietnam; a janitor in Houston trying to find her children in Mexico; of braceros finding their way north and back home again; a man learning confidence as he woos a woman; a bus rider in Los Angeles; a mariachi singing for a heartbroken family on Christmas Eve.
Find details on the workshops here.
Free Poetry Column Follow-Up: Veterans Land.
I noted in La Bloga's coverage of the Grand Park Downtown Bookfest that one organization performs Shakespeare with kids on the grounds of the Veteran's Center and elsewhere. The observation draws a response from the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles Associate Director of Veteran Affairs Kellogg Brengel.
I receive Brengel's words with appreciation for his organization's role in the VA's efforts helping GIs. LA is the homeless GI capital of the world. It's a moral outrage that so many of these men and women are walking wounded soldiers not receiving the care we owe them. I am a Veteran of the US Army but no one needs to be a Veteran to be outraged by this crud.
For Veterans and supporters of Veterans, a critical issue simmers just at the surface of efforts like the Shakespeare Center and other companies. Many, if not all, private or non-Veteran users of the West LA Veterans home lost a federal case and will have to vacate VA land, absent some amicable resolution that benefits Veterans more than others. A commercial laundry, the UCLA baseball team, an exclusive Brentwood girls' school, a theatre, all don't want to leave low-cost Veteran land for market-rate facilities.
Mr. Brengel notes the program goes into its third year on the VA campus, he says, supported by a veteran workforce. Working with the VA's Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System, SCLA has hired a total of 61 veterans over the past two summers and because of our free admission policy for veterans, active military, their families, friends and caregivers/VA employees, SCLA has given away 5,665 tickets to our summer performances.
The veterans we hire are recruited from the VA's Veterans Community Employment Development program which helps find supported employment opportunities for veterans enrolled in VA services who are chronically unemployed, homeless, and/or receiving psycho-social rehabilitative treatment.
Veterans receive paid on-the-job training and work in all aspects of the production including: production and venue crews, audio engineer, wardrobe assistant, ushers, parking attendants, and site-specific marketing. The transitional work experience this program provides has been a great success and we are very much looking forward to being back in the Japanese Garden for the summer of 2014.
A ver.
La Bloga Welcomes Guest Columnists
Thank you for reading La Bloga. When you have a comment, a need to enlarge, clarify, or correct La Bloga's coverage of literatura, cultura, arte, o más, don't hide that light of yours under a bushel basket, dale shine. Contact La Bloga here for particulars of your Guest Column, or email labloga@readraza punto com. Of the eleven daily blogueras blogueros, eight began writing for La Bloga as Guest Columnists.
Late-arriving News
Just as I was putting La Bloga to bed, this opportunity pulls into sight.
University Conference on Latino Culture and Science Fiction April 30.
The University of California, Riverside hosts a trailblazing academic inquiry into science fiction and speculative fiction written by raza writers in a gathering of casí all the raza writers of science fiction and speculative literature.
The April 30 conference arrives at a time of literary ferment when writers and readers come to the book market with higher expectations than publishers can understand.
The conference explores how six writers get their books to market, the role of sci-fi and speclit genres in United States letters, the nature of literary exclusion, and stories about what each writer brings to readers.
The morning panel joins almost all raza published authors of the genres into the same room at the same time. Hosted by UCR’s Professor of Science Fiction Media Studies, Sherryl Vint, the discussions will be classics among literary conferences. Mario Acevedo’s vampires and Jésus Treviño’s zombie fiction meets Rudy Ch. García’s and Treviño’s dimensional surrealism. Rosaura Sánchez and Beatrice Pita’s lunar braceros meet el padrino of Chicano sci-fi Ernest Hogan’s mexicas in outerspace. Y más.
In the afternoon, Michael Sedano and UCR graduate students join the circle to include critical perspectives and readerly responses to these sci-fi and speclit genres, and to join the audience in speculation into what directions each sees raza speculative literature and science-fiction taking.
A grand event in the late afternoon, years in the making, puts a capstone on the conference.
See Rudy Ch. Garcia’s Saturday, April 26 column for building/meeting-room specifics. Here's a link also: http://ucrtoday.ucr.edu/21579
The beautiful Riverside campus is freeway convenient off the 60/215, in Susan Straight country.
Conference on Rudolfo Anaya: Tradition, Modernity, and the Literatures of the U.S. Southwest May 2-3.
La Bloga friend Roberto Cantú brings the most arrestingly interesting academic conferences to Southern California and the east side of the LA basin. May 2-3, Cantú surpasses himself with a conference dedicated to La Bloga friend Rudolfo Anaya and literature of the US Southwest.
Scholars from New Mexico to old Germany will lecture, moderate, and sit panel presentations.
Four keystone fiction writers take the lectern during the conference, Ana Castillo, Rolando Hinojosa-Smith, Reyna Grande, and Mario Acevedo, fresh from his stunning appearance UCR's raza in spec lit and sci-fi conference.
The Anaya conference on the campus of California State University Los Angeles in El Sereno is free and open to public visitors for just the cost of parking or a short walk from the bus station. There is no light rail serving this campus directly.
A word of caution: parking rules are posted so you can read them and avoid a ticket. Be assured local regulations are strictly enforced.
The conference is sponsored by Cal State L.A.'s Gigi Gaucher-Morales Memorial Conference Series, the College of Arts and Letters, the College of Natural and Social Sciences, the Department of Chicano Studies, the Department of English, the Barry Munitz Fund, and the Emeriti Association.
See the conference website for details.
Writing Workshop With Ana Castillo
 |
| © foto: workshop at NLWC in 2011 |
Working with a seasoned writer to develop ideas, polish writing, glean insights from conversation often comes with the payoff of better writing, an improved attitude. This happens for beginners as well as polished authors.
The opportunity to work with one of Chicana Chicano Literature's most accomplished talents, Ana Castillo, should quickly fill the handful of seats available on May 3 through auspices of La Bloga friend Iris de Anda.
Visit the workshop Facebook page for your invitation. There is a fee for the workshop.
Writing Workshop for Newer Writers in East Los
La Bloga friend Sam Quinones organizes a writing workshop series for those who've never published before, Tell Your True Tale.
Students from recent workshops appear Saturday April 26 at the East L.A. Public Library at 2:30 pm. The East LA Public Library awaits your attendance at 4837 E 3rd St, LA, 323-264-0155.
Quinones' workshops revolve around insisting stories fit in limited space. Tell Your True Tale approach forces writers to hone their thoughts and imagination, eliminate unnecessary words, make the hard choices that are part of strong writing, no matter the genre.
The Saturday event showcases the students' work with, according to Quinones, stunning variety and quality of stories: A vet returning home from Vietnam; a janitor in Houston trying to find her children in Mexico; of braceros finding their way north and back home again; a man learning confidence as he woos a woman; a bus rider in Los Angeles; a mariachi singing for a heartbroken family on Christmas Eve.
Find details on the workshops here.
Free Poetry Column Follow-Up: Veterans Land.
I noted in La Bloga's coverage of the Grand Park Downtown Bookfest that one organization performs Shakespeare with kids on the grounds of the Veteran's Center and elsewhere. The observation draws a response from the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles Associate Director of Veteran Affairs Kellogg Brengel.
I receive Brengel's words with appreciation for his organization's role in the VA's efforts helping GIs. LA is the homeless GI capital of the world. It's a moral outrage that so many of these men and women are walking wounded soldiers not receiving the care we owe them. I am a Veteran of the US Army but no one needs to be a Veteran to be outraged by this crud.
For Veterans and supporters of Veterans, a critical issue simmers just at the surface of efforts like the Shakespeare Center and other companies. Many, if not all, private or non-Veteran users of the West LA Veterans home lost a federal case and will have to vacate VA land, absent some amicable resolution that benefits Veterans more than others. A commercial laundry, the UCLA baseball team, an exclusive Brentwood girls' school, a theatre, all don't want to leave low-cost Veteran land for market-rate facilities.
Mr. Brengel notes the program goes into its third year on the VA campus, he says, supported by a veteran workforce. Working with the VA's Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System, SCLA has hired a total of 61 veterans over the past two summers and because of our free admission policy for veterans, active military, their families, friends and caregivers/VA employees, SCLA has given away 5,665 tickets to our summer performances.
The veterans we hire are recruited from the VA's Veterans Community Employment Development program which helps find supported employment opportunities for veterans enrolled in VA services who are chronically unemployed, homeless, and/or receiving psycho-social rehabilitative treatment.
Veterans receive paid on-the-job training and work in all aspects of the production including: production and venue crews, audio engineer, wardrobe assistant, ushers, parking attendants, and site-specific marketing. The transitional work experience this program provides has been a great success and we are very much looking forward to being back in the Japanese Garden for the summer of 2014.
A ver.
La Bloga Welcomes Guest Columnists
Thank you for reading La Bloga. When you have a comment, a need to enlarge, clarify, or correct La Bloga's coverage of literatura, cultura, arte, o más, don't hide that light of yours under a bushel basket, dale shine. Contact La Bloga here for particulars of your Guest Column, or email labloga@readraza punto com. Of the eleven daily blogueras blogueros, eight began writing for La Bloga as Guest Columnists.
Late-arriving News
Just as I was putting La Bloga to bed, this opportunity pulls into sight.
Tuesday, April 09, 2013
Women Writers At Work. Global Modernities Conference. Poetry Reader Contest. On-line Floricanto
Women Writers At Work Panel Discussion Fills Eastside Café
Michael Sedano
El Sereno's Eastside Café is one of those spots whose four walls define a space but more importantly, contains a spirit and energy that fills one's heart and makes one long for silly things like winning the lotto and lugging in a wheelbarrow of cash, dumping it on the floor, and seeing what the gente can do with unlimited funding that matches their unlimited ganas.
Saturday, April 6, brought me to Eastside Café for a thoroughly engaging afternoon with a panel of accomplished writers and a full house of eager ears. Most listened through their fingers, taking notes on consejos and anecdotes shared from the writers up front.
Organized in collaboration with Mujeres de Maíz, whose 2013 theme is "Identity Blinging," by Alejandra Sánchez for her Graduate Field Study at Antioch University Los Angeles, the discussion provided one of the capstones for a series of four workshops, platicas and readings curated by Sánchez and poets Olga García Echeverría and Iris de Anda.
Produced under the banner of "Weaving Words, Creating Worlds: Healing and Empowerment as Women Storytellers," the series clearly serves a strong writing community in this area of El Lay.
Sánchez prepared an extensive set of prompts that, initially, caught the panelists biting their tongues. Perhaps communication apprehension, or maybe the moderator did not provide advance copies to the panelists, but after a few moments of discomfited silence--who'll go first?--Fe Montes jumped in and got the panel moving in the right direction.
Subjects covered the usual for a writers panel: how do you: promote yourself as a writer; promote your your art; find publishing opportunity; find money; decide to self-publish; enter contests?
 |
| Alejandra Sánchez moderated the discussion. |
The prompts and questions worked. Saturday's audience sizzled with inspiration and the imperative to pursue the dream.
Sensing and sensitive to a generation gap, I asked Alejandra Sánchez about that "identity blinging" phrase. She replies, "my take on Identity Blinging is this: 'blinging' is like showing your shine. Bling is a word for jewels, diamonds, sparkle. When one "blings" their identity they show their identity, shine themselves brightly, stand strong in their power and beauty.
 |
| Felicia "Fe" Montes |
Strength. Power. Beauty. Indeed, the women shone brilliantly, stood tall, and exhibited the strength that comes of determination to pursue the writing dream.
Here are women. Here are writers. Here is the ongoing fulfillment of Mujeres de Maíz' mission statement: Our mission is to unite and empower women of all ages, colors, and sexualities by creating safe community spaces that provide art education, mentorship, art exhibition, and publishing opportunities.
 |
| Bloguera Olga García Echeverría |
The powerful message that no one makes a living from writing but that is no reason not to engage a passion for literary expression, energized the panelists. García, for example, told how she quit her job in California, pulled up stakes and headed to El Paso to join the University of Texas campus' frontera writing program.
García related the importance of asking about honoraria when organizations ask her to read or conduct writing workshops. She and the others often work for free, but must use their time judiciously and not hesitate to ask if there's compensation.
An alternative to a cash payout is getting a table. When doing a free reading, that table can pull in a couple hundred dollars.
 |
| Jenny Factor |
Jenny Factor offered the afternoon's most practical advice. While employed full-time in the dot com industry, Factor told the assembly she'd save a few dollars out of every paycheck, knowing that one day she would use the savings to support herself as she pursued her writing.
On the subject of entering contests--pay to play--Factor advocates prioritizing contests. Her "A" list included only her career-making opportunities: win one of these and the prize is a publication and notice from the big houses.
The "B" list is contests whose winning would bring acclaim, perhaps a few dollars, but to advance one's career requires winning a handful of "B" levels.
"C" list contests are the attractive-sounding, obscure, small prize--or none--offerings that one could use to practice entering contests.
Factor observed she budgets a certain amount of cash each year for contests (and magazine subscriptions) and when she reaches her limit, ceases her participation.
 |
| center, Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo |
Similarly superbly-organized, Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo talked about a reading series she organizes out of Venice's Beyond Baroque Literary | Arts Center in Venice, California, and how she manages a career teaching high school and her artistic career.
Serendipity comes into play. Bermejo recounted how she was semi-coerced into producing her first chapbook. She'd been invited to read at an important festival--by mistake. When Bermejo pointed that out, the organizers invited her anyway. Bermejo produced the chapbook in order to have something to show at the reading, giving her writing career an immediate boost.
Bermejo is not the only teacher on the panel. García, Montes, and Andrea García Mauk also work as school teachers, while Factor is on the Antioch faculty.
 |
| Andrea García Mauk |
Andrea García Mauk offered the entrepreneuse side of writing. A graduate of film school, Mauk knows the challenges of getting projects funded. To resolve the issue, Mauk launched her own company, Dancing Horse Media Group.
Mauk and Dancing Horse Media are nearing completion of their initial print output, a multimedia cookbook featuring healthy, gluten-free recipes.
Dancing Horse had a call for submissions in 2012. In a small world coincidence, Mauk told how an entry that arrived late was just the missing piece she wanted and accepted it for publication. Its writer is Sánchez.
Alejandra Sánchez will round out the event with a summary article and the book titles the panelists recommended. In addition, a Mujeres de Maíz videographer documented the full session. La Bloga will provide a follow-up when Sánchez' website goes live.
Cal State LA Hosts Conference on Global Modernities
Must bust in early May / Orders from the DA / Look out kid, you've done it again.
La Bloga friend Roberto Cantú isn't singing Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues," but in early May, Cantú and his colleagues in the Gigi Gaucher-Morales Memorial Conference Series, the College of Arts and Letters, the College of Natural and Social Sciences, the Department of Chicano Studies, the Department of English, the Barry Munitz Fund, and the Emeriti Association, again sponsor their annual Spring event on May 3-4, 2013, Conference on Global Modernities.
The event continues a conversation started at the 2011 edition of the Modernity, Critique, and Humanism conference. This year's focus falls on global demography, biodiversity, political and social movements in different parts of the world.
True to Cantú's dedication to scholarship, Conference on Global Modernities invites scholarly inspection of (a) practices of interaction in civic, communitarian, national, and global communication; (b) pedagogical forms of instruction that are emergent and innovative in the research and study of globalization; (c) challenges to our consumption habits by new research on endangered ecosystems and on the planet’s failing biodiversity; (d) theoretical innovations in the fields of literature and the arts, criticism, social theory, demographics, and philosophical and critical thought.
CSULA is not in Westwood but on the Eastside of town, where CSULA is the default election for students who cannot afford to go away to college. Home to a large population of "non-traditional" students like re-entry women, returning war Veterans, working full-time and going to school part-time gente, CSULA overlooks East Los from its hillside in El Sereno.
Find details on the Conference on Global Modernities website.
Mail Bag.
Musical Evening Fundraiser for Tarahumara
The musical program by harpist extraordinaire Xavier Montes and Trio de Colores is a darn good reason to attend this worthwhile event. The guest list already confirming their attendance--a montón of notable artists and writers--will be another highlight of what promises to be a delightful evening of chatter, chow, and cancíones.
I'll see you there.
Mail Bag, from Tim Z. Hernandez
Tell Us Their Names - The "Deportees"
Goodbye to my Juan, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won't have your names when you ride the big airplane,
All they will call you will be "deportees"
I don't know if their names were Juan, Rosaltia, Jésus and Maria, the deportees, but Tim Z. Hernandez' next novel will tell their stories and their names.
Indebted to the dead farmworkers for the novel, Hernandez has launched a project to erect a headstone bearing the names of the anonymous victims Unitedstatesian musical genius Woody Guthrie sings about in his song "Plane Wreck at Los Gatos."
The fundraiser for the headstone goes down in Fresno Califas. Click here for the venue's webpage.
Guthrie's son, Arlo, sings the song in this YouTube:
Mail Bag. From Gemini Ink and Carmen Tafolla:
La Voz de San Antonio
In the belief that poetry comes alive when spoken out loud, Carmen Tafolla invites members of the community to participate in La Voz de San Antonio...
Are you between five and ninety-five? Do you have a favorite poem of your own or a poem by a poet you love? It could be a poem your grandmother taught you in Spanish when you were five, something you recited in school 30 years ago, or something you wrote just last year. Come out and show the world your VOZ -- La Voz de San Antonio.
Abrazos,
Carment Tafolla
San Antonio Poet Laureate
To find out more, and to register online, click here for Gemini Ink's website.
On-line Floricanto: Second of Five for April Twenty-thirteen
Elena Díaz Bjorkquist, Tom Sheldon, Barrio Poet, Anne Karpiak, Elizabeth Cazessús
"We Stopped Talking" by Elena Díaz Bjorkquist
"Storytelling" by Tom Sheldon
"Oda para mi Madre" by Barrio Poet
"Shake the Web" by Anne Karpiak
“Caligrafía del milagro" por Elizabeth Cazessús
We Stopped Talking
by Elena Díaz Bjorkquist ©2013
She commandeered our group,
White woman on a mission
Shooting questions at us
About our projects.
We, a Pueblo Indian
A Chicana, and a Yaqui answered
Politely, kept our cool,
Dismissed her rudeness.
Just before time to report,
I asked about her project,
A movie about Tucson's
All Soul's Procession
She told us about people
Carrying giant puppets,
Painting their faces as skeletons,
Wearing costumes.
“More people are painting
Their faces the past few years.
It’s become
a new thing.”
I shook my head, "It's centuries
Old, came from Mexico."
"No,” she said, it's recent
Only in Tucson."
The others agreed with me.
I told her the procession
Was modeled after El Dia
De Los Muertos.
“No, it’s not,
Definitely not!”
“It’s a Tucson thing,
only in Tucson.”
She wouldn’t listen
So we stopped talking.
She reported for us
“Our group fell apart,” she said.
“These people
Refused to talk.”
The facilitator asked why.
“She wouldn’t listen to us,” I said.
“She was disrespectful,
So we stopped talking.”
Silence hung over the room
Like a heavy curtain,
A room full of Chicanos,
Native Americans, Asians.
No one talked
But we all knew.
When Folklore Field School
Was over, the facilitator asked
Our group to stay.
Only she stayed.
Next morning, she went
To each of us, apologized,
Said, “I don’t know what got in me,
Must have been my pain meds.”
Storytelling
by Tom Sheldon
The story circles
Searching for a center
A verbal shield
a mask a nimbus
Disclosing beyond appearances
Telling of a sacred mystery
Animals and warring twins
Sweeping Bajadass
And starry skies
con ursa major
Of shared beginnings
and told stories
Cool and delicate as snow melt
Legacies in a fragile web
Carried on voices
So that our children’s children
Become who they are intended to be
Oda para mi Madre
by Barrio Poet
I learned Spanish
reading your brown and white
paperback novels
with plump breasted
women
and square jawed romanticos
chaparrita con ojos verdes,
santaneca, güanaca,
madre eterna
your songs trailed through
the screen door
with the smell of roasted
chiles, disappearing
with the flight of pigeons
to rooftops with tiny rocks
Your voice, booming
still echoes
when I close my eyes
at mid afternoon as I try
to capture your sonnets
through memories of my juventud
your voice
a lullaby
a sigh
a jolt to the heart
for it stops at times
until you pray for me
clutching your rosario
y rezando un Padre Nuestro
SKAKE THE WEB
by Anne Karpiak
She opened the book..
they said it was medicine...
lines pulled from the earth...
each one patterning tomorrows yesterday..
I am acceptance...she felt...I am love...
another line whispered....
she left her offerings...
thank yous in the winds....
making medicine with medicine..the stickman said..
watching the spider weave it's web...
hatched weblings....scattering in every direction...
absorbed into the earth.....shaking the web...
CALIGRAFÍA DEL MILAGRO
por Elizabeth Cazessús
La ciudad se abre por la ventana y son tus gestos
Un corolario al sentimiento que desaparece en la lejania
El bullicio instrumentado: zumbido de autos y pregones
imitan garabatos que quedan en los márgenes de la odre.
Destila tu voz la revelación del sueño gota por gota
A la luz del poema que partió tu cuerpo con su rayo
Ese milagro nacido del río contenido de la pasión
Para cantarle al mes de abril su desesperada elegía.
Bios
"We Stopped Talking" by Elena Díaz Bjorkquist
"Storytelling" by Tom Sheldon
"Oda para mi Madre" by Barrio Poet
"Shake the Web" by Anne Karpiak
“Caligrafía del milagro" por Elizabeth Cazessús
A writer, historian, and artist from Tucson, Elena writes about Morenci, Arizona where she was born. She is the author of two books, Suffer Smoke and Water from the Moon. Elena is co-editor of Sowing the Seeds, una cosecha de recuerdos and Our Spirit, Our Reality; our life experiences in stories and poems, anthologies written by her writers collective Sowing the Seeds.
As an Arizona Humanities Council (AHC) Scholar, Elena has performed as Teresa Urrea in a Chautauqua living history presentation and done presentations about Morenci, Arizona for twelve years. She received the 2012 Arizona Commission on the Arts Bill Desmond Writing Award for excelling nonfiction writing and the 2012 Arizona Humanities Council Dan Schilling Public Humanities Scholar Award in recognition of her work to enhance public awareness and understanding of the role that the humanities play in transforming lives and strengthening communities. She was nominated for Tucson Poet Laureate in 2012.
Her website is at http://elenadiazbjorkquist.com/.
I am a self taught artist and have enjoyed a modicum of success, primarily in drawing and drafting. I have always utilized photography as a tool for composition and as an aid in drawing and painting, though recently I have begun to use photography as a medium in itself as well as a tool.
My work has been shown in local galleries, as well as the Museum of Natural History in Albuquerque. I have illustrated for Hawk Watch International (HWI) and have won art competitions at the State Fair level. I teach students on occasion as well.
In addition to drawing and painting, I write poetry, some of which has been featured in La Bloga,
Monique’s Passions e-magazine, Poets Supporting SB1070, Writers in the Storm, and Dreams and Divinities.
Vidaurre is the founder of Pasta, Poetry & Vino and Barrio Poet Productions. He has been nominated for a pushcart prize for his poem, "Lorca in the Barrio" and also is co-editing an anthology called "Twenty" for Newtown, CT through El Zarape Press with Daniel Garcia Ordaz and Katie Hoerth.
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