Yesterday, I knew I had truly returned to New York City. It was cold. The trains were not running–turns out some guy who stole a cell phone was hit by an F Train (served him right) and I got home to an email telling me NO, you are not getting that Fellowship that you’ve applied for a gazillion times. Aah, but from last Wednesday to Sunday morning of week before I was in L.A. and I had a ball.
The Community of Writers at Squaw Valley had a party first day in Echo Park, a charming enclave with actual Victorian houses–some beautifully dressed up and appointed, others falling down, drunken ruins of buildings. Aah. The poets, writers, artists who gathered were charming and lively-the food delicious and I won a bottle of wine for coming the furthest (from Brooklyn) to this party. Thanks Brett Hall Jones, et al. I so look forward to serving as one of the staff poets with Kazim Ali who was there and Sharon Olds, Cathy Park Hong, Juan Felipe Herrera and Bob Hass, the director this June. I went to Squaw, 3 times during the 1990s and many of my best poems started there. To return as a teacher is really a blessing–I think Galway Kinnell is smiling about this.
AWP was held in the Convention Center and well I hung out in the Book fair and ran into good people I don’t get to see like Prageeta Sharma and people I see often like Reggie Harris. There were many major conversations about poets who are going through difficult times and how the community is poorly dealing with all the mess of it. Sad. Poets House presented a spectacular program on poetry and protest with Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Luis Javier Rodriguez and Naomi Shahib Nye. There was a lot of candy at many of booths and tables (I took as much chocolate as I could really take). I saw a good friend whom I need to reconcile with and we did. L. A. was good for that kind of thing.
I read with Black Earth Institute Fellows: Lauren Camp, Taylor Broby, Ann Fisher-Wirth, Marcella Durand (woo hoo) and Melissa Tuckey at this weird bookstore on Sunset Blvd. Getting there including getting the Uber driver to find us on Figuroa in front of the Convention Center–there are different kinds of blindness in L.A. and many one way streets.
I moderated Out of L.A.: A Tribute for Jayne Cortez that was organized by Laura Hinton who has done some serious scholarship on Cortez’ life in LA. as a young woman. Aldon Nielsen, Jennifer D. Ryan-Bright and Pam Ward were the other panelists and they all contributed deep understanding and knowledge about Cortez’ development, but it was Mel Edwards who flew into the L.A. to attend the panel who pointed out that Cortez was NOT a member of the Watts Writers Workshop which was started post the riots of 1965 and enhanced info about the artistic scene that Cortez was a significant member of. Love, courage and freedom–those are the words I think of when I think of Jayne and she is deeply missed. Latasha Diggs is organizing several programs in Cortez honor that will take place in New York City this April.
What I loved the most was moving about downtown–the roundabout way to get to the Double Tree Hotel to meet a filmmaker doing interviews with poets for an upcoming documentary and seeing a Hindu wedding procession at it’s start; looking at the stream of L.A. Kings fans in their sports gear; a handsome man (designer/carpenter/gorgeous guy) talking with clients/friends outside a beautiful Japanese restaurant; martinis with my one my best male friends at the pretty Noe’s bar at Omni California Plaza; bouganvilla on the side of massively ugly buildings; kissing a man I care about; running into a poet I’ve not seen since my first visit to Squaw. In weather warm enough for daytime roaming, but too cool for nighttime hanging w/out serious sweaters, clear skies, and massive billboards with moving parts trans human–Blade Runner with out the murkiness. Northern California was indeed cold and damp at night, but Southern California was simply cold.
I sold out my book, A Lucent Fire: New & Selected at the White Pine Table. I bought books by dear friends and new ones. And best of all I kept running into Patricia Jabbeh Wesley who is the most exuberant poet/scholar ever. You must read/hear her.
VIDA table. Melissa Studdard, Patricia J. Wesley
VCFA’s Table-everyone was great
Myra Shapiro bought my last book at White Pine Press Table
Black women make beautiful poets: E. Hunt, H. Mullen, T. Foster & E. J. Antonio
Crystal Williams & Matthew Shenoda in red lobby light
So many dear friends new friends so many poets and artists and writers and dreamers and hustlers and then at 5:30 or so on Saturday the EXODUS out of the Center began–I was waiting for a parting of the escalators.
This past week has been all about Resurrection, Renewal and Blessings. A Lucent Fire: New & Selected Poem is a finalist for the Poetry Society of America’s William Carlos Williams Award. The winner is Brian Shimoda.
And this past Thursday I was asked to join the faculty for the Summer Workshop at The Community of Writers at Squaw Valley. https://communityofwriters.org/workshops/poetry-workshop/ I attended two conferences and created some wonderful work. I so hope I will help other poets do when I am there.
So now I gear up for a day of teaching and then off again to California.
On Wednesday, I will join literally thousands of poets, writers, teachers, arts administrators, journalists (an occasional musician) and go Los Angeles for the 2016 AWP Conference. It will be enthralling, overwhelming, occasionally delightful and full of stress. All conventions are part professional networking, part party, part boredom–like why isn’t there downtown and where is the free coffee? L.A. is always an odd place to be. It is incredibly dense, but no one talks about that. The traffic is non stop–people do talk about that. It has wonderful bookstores, but you really have to search them out and places of powerful beauty and utterly awfulness. And sometimes it is very warm, but every once in a while it is as chilly as the Bay Area far far to its North.
I have the great pleasure of reading with Fellows from the Black Earth Institute on March 31; I will be doing a book signing for A Lucent Fire on Friday April 1 between 2-3 at the White Pine Press table; signing The Best of Cutthroat on the same day at 1. And on Saturday, Laura Hinton asked me to moderate the panel Out of L.A.: A Tribute to Jayne Cortez that will take place on Saturday, 3:15-4:30 with Aldon Nielsen, Jennifer Ryan, Pam Ward and of course Laura Hinton. There are reunions for the Community of Writers at Squaw Valley; VCCA: and Vermont College. And many readings that I may or may not make it too. These events are listed on my web sites: Readings & Events Page.
It will be slightly insane, useful, terrible, beautiful, slighty giddy and wearisome. Oh writers, oh conferences, Oh California!
But handle I must. Many readings and events for my new book A Lucent Fire: New and Selected Poems, starting with Women Writers in Bloom Poetry Salon on September 20. Cheryl Boyce-Taylor has asked me to feature at The Glitter Pomegranate new space at the Bedford Y with Gregory Pardlo and Lynne Procope on the 25th.
During that time I will be finishing up The Future Imagined Differently issue of About Place Journal. It is going to have interesting art, writing, music–it will go live the first week of October.
And starting on October 25, WORDS SUNDAY returns to Calabar Imports Bed-Stuy on Tompkins Avenue which is becoming a nice place to walk about –new bars, restaurants,boutiques, but I miss Mr. Jimmy’s wonderful old fashioned variety store which was hijacked by developers. Indeed, there has been a lot of developers hijacking of space and time and beauty in this neighborhood-the “new builds” are uniformly boring, bland, sad and they all charge too much. The mostly young White people who give away considerable chunks of change for these boring, bland buildings are not hipsters or particularly hip they just look sort of generic as a White guy I heard describe a White woman on the train the other day. I was surprised. But its 2015 and the ways in which things shape shift are definitely on the unexpected side. First up: JP Howard and Nicole Callihan.
WORDS SUNDAY has presented in Bed-Stuy: Pulitzer Prize winning poet Gregory Pardlo; brilliant poet/performers: Janice Lowe, Alexis DeVeaux and Tai Allen. Plus poets: Rachel Levitsky, Michael H. Broder, Terence Degnan, Soraya Shalforoosh; Ekere Talle, Jason Schneiderman, Jacqueline Jones LaMon, Robin Messing, Renato Rosaldo, LaToya Jordan, R. Erica Doyle, Alan Felsensthal, Jacqueline Johnson and Janet Kaplan. I love that all of them either currently do or have lived/worked in Brooklyn.
I hope to see all kinds of great people at events I participate in or curate–It is a blessing to make work that people want to read and hear.
And I am deeply pleased to have my work in the great mix of work that is out now. White Pine Press has done a great job with my book and Sandra Payne’s art work sets the tone.
This year has been one of my most productive and I am so pleased to have my newest full-length collection: A Lucent Fire: New and Selected Poems covering work from 1975 to the present! It’s been quite a trip. I am looking forward to getting this new book into the hands of readers. My publisher Dennis Maloney has created a wonderful promotion:
To celebrate the release of our latest volume in our Distinguished Poets Series, A Lucent Fire: New & Selected Poems by Patricia Spears Jones, if you order from the White Pine website we will include another White Pine title of our choosing with your order.
Rowan Ricardo Phillips says of this collection: “There is a wise and dangerous fire in Jones’ poetry that harkens back to James Baldwin and, further back to the Old Testament: the past–both a highly personal past and an expansive civic past–”
So check out my new book! Read, let e know what you think. Enjoy
On October 5, The Future Imagined Differently Imagined for About Place Journal went live at http://aboutplacejournal.org/
Poets, essayists, artists, composers are included from Myra Sklarew, Marcella Durand, Shelagh Patterson, Margo Berdeshevsky, Tony Medina, Purvi Shah, William Nixon, Ras Moshe Barnett, Jason Kao Hwang, Robbie McCauley, Beverly Naidus and the great Brasilian artist, Denise Milan.
I taught a poetry workshop for Poets House using “departure” as a way to allow writers to take a different direction; try new things. Everyone has certain ways of seeing, feeling–I know that I do. And any time I am asked to try something different, called to create from another vantage, I embrace the process. But I know it may not work. There is always risk in not making good or hopefully great work. Of having your writing in the company of others who have been deemed valuable. I know that my work is well-regarded and for some deeply admirable. But I am not a prize receiving poet. The New York Times does not know my name. My last book, Painkiller, of which I very proud received like 3 reviews. And yet, I am completing A Lucent Fire: New & Selected Poems for White Pine Press. I would love to get prizes and the monies attached. I would love to get the praise. But my work as a poet has been to keep going despite neglect or rejection–it is not about giving up hope. It is about thinking that maybe in the language I choose to work with, I bring something new, different, engaged to the discourse. I am not glib. I cannot reduce my work to a sound bite–that does not interest me. What does is that thrill of departure-the step towards something possibility familiar, but often completely unknown.
When Elizabeth Alexander asked me to write a poem in response to Jacob Lawrence Migrations series, I was deeply touched. This was not expected and I was not sure of what I’d do; how I’d do it. I had written a poem in response to Lawrence’s “Builders” series-a gorgeous, hopeful group of paintings. That poem was published in Black Renaissance Noire, thanks Quincy Troupe. But this was different and when I was at VCCA this past August, I was able to pull together the strands of thinking about Lawrence’s work and a panel in that celebrated series and make a poem. I will always be grateful to my fellow VCCA residents who heard the poem read aloud for the first time and my good friend Deborah Wood Holton for her insightful first reading. I will read the final version, May 1 at MOMA with Elizabeth, Yusef Komunyakaa, Rita Dove, Tyehimba Jess, Crystal Williams, Nathasa Tretheway, Terrence Hayes, and Kevin Young.
A few days ago I stood in the recording studio at MOMA holding the catalog and marveling at the hard work done to bring Lawrence’s work to a new generation; a large audience. From what I have heard from everyone who worked with him, he was a deeply kind, generous and hard working man. An artist whose gifts are giving with love and great honor to the ancestors. I am grateful to him for showing what vision and work whether quickly seen or gained over a lifetime means. It means that the thrills keep coming year after year after year. The show opens April 3. I hope you go see it and see the work of artists living and gone–depart from your own vision. See where the colors, lines, figures take you–the journey may be long or short, but it will be different.
At MOMA, with Jacob Lawrence catalog, January 2015
Music Now! At Poetry/Jazz
w/Spiritchild XspiritMental, Ras Moshe Burnett, et al & open mic
The Brooklyn Commons
388 Atlantic Ave. btwn Hoyt St. & Bond St.
Brooklyn.
A,C to Hoyt-Schemerhorn/Any train to Atlantic Ave.
February 5 RESPOND at Smack Mellon
DUMBO FIRST THURSDAY
“Don’t shoot” curated by Samuel Jablom
w/ Anomalous who, Steve Dalachinsky, Joyce LeeAnn Joseph,
Yuko Otomo, and Peter Rugh
7:30 p.m.
SMACK MELLON
92 Plymouth Street @ Washington
Brooklyn, NY 11201
Free
JANUARY 2015
January 1, The Poetry Project New Year’s Day Benefit
Organized by The Poetry Project
w/ a cast of hundreds
2 p.m. to midnight
St. Mark’s Church on the Bouwerie
131 E. 10th Street
Manhattan
Donation: $20
January 3, First Saturday at Brooklyn Museum
Poetry Popup in Crossing Brooklyn
Organized by Alan Felsenthal
w/ Corinna Copp, Ricky Laurentis, and Charles North
Eastern Parkway
Brooklyn
Free w/ Museum Admission
DECEMBER
December 1, KGB Monday Night Poetry Series
Organized by John Deming
w/ Shanna Compton
7:30 p.m.
E. 4th Street
Manhattan
NOVEMBER POETRY EVENTS
November 11, Poets@Pace
w/ Monica de la Torre
Organized by Charles North
Pace University
Once Pace Plaza
Manhattan
6-7:30 p.m.
FREE
OCTOBER POETRY EVENTS
October 12, AiPO POETRY SCULPTURE
w/Christine Malvasi, Sophie Malleret,Najee Omar, &Nikhil Melnechuk
Organized by Samuel Jablon
1-2 p.m. UNION SQUARE
Manhattan
FREE
SEPTEMBER POETRY EVENTS
September 13, Greenpoint Branch
Brooklyn Public Library
Organized by Melanie Nielsen
w/ Kristen Gallagher
107 Norman Ave @Leonard Street
Brooklyn, NY
718-349-8504
September 24-27, Furious Flower: Seeding the Future
Of African-American Poetry
James Madison University
Furious Flower Poetry Center
Organized by Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin
Harrisonburg, VA 22807
www.jmu.edu/furiousflower
JUNE POETRY EVENTS
June 19, Lunch Poems, Word for Word Series
Organized by Paul Romero
w/ Lydica Cortes, Jessica Greenbay, Jocelyn Lieu & Sharan Strange
12:30 p.m.
Free
BRYANT PARK Reading Room
Sixth Avenue and 42nd Street
Manhattan
June 29, Voices of Poetry
Organized by Neil Silberblatt
w/ Chivas Sandage, Vivian Shipley, Mark Statman & Bianca Stone
4 p.m.
$15/$10 students
26 Bedford Road
Katonah, NY.
Throughout this summer, I have been ridiculously busy. I taught summer school –I so needed the money. But it allowed me to stay very focused as well. But I am so pleased to have had the great gift of getting a sponsored residency at the Virginia Center for Creative Arts where I placed poems for A Lucent Fire: New and Selected for White Pine Press in one file. Dennis Maloney like every other editor and publisher had to put up with my kvelling (love that Yiddish word). Fortunately, I had my hard copy (books, etc.) because I lost 167 pages that I had worked on for about five-six hours before the cutting and pasting started. I think I cut and pasted over material, but that file DISAPPEARED. The staff at VCCA and the computer folk at Sweet Briar College really helped me. The file could not be recovered, but scanning and re-inputting (another four-five hours) and now the poems are in a word doc and pdf with Mr. Maloney. I also wrote some new poems and completed a commissioned work.
But the best thing about VCCA, about any artists colony is meeting fellow poets, writers, artists and composers. At VCCA, I met Kelle Groom a terrific poet and memoirist. She’s been visiting/living in colonies for over a year as she works on a second memoir. She read three of the memoir pieces that I have been working on and really gave me some wonderful advice. I hope that I will be able to take that advice. I also met two different Black American classical composers there–one lives in Brooklyn and I hope to hear his work in the near future. Nicole Parcher, Ann Ropp and other artists let me in on their process and work. Rod Val Moore and I read our works and drank very delicious gin and tonics on our last night at the Center. Two weeks in a place of mountains heat lightning bees butterflies good people good food hard work. #gratitude
And on September 13, Kristen Gallagher and I will read our works at the Greenpoint Branch of the Brooklyn Public Library noon-2:30 p.m. 107 Norman Ave Leonard Street Brooklyn, NY 718-349-8504
and for the first time I have been invited to participate at
Furious Flower: Seeding the Future Of African-American Poetry James Madison University
And as with many of you, I have been involved with the protests regarding the murders of young Black boys and men and girls and women, particularly at the hands of the police, who are “public servants”. Metta Sama started the Artists Against Police Brutality –a facebook group which has grown and one of the projects was a https://www.facebook.com/artistsforferguson with many art works, poems, reflections, etc. I strongly suggest you check out this work.
Like I said, this has been a very busy summer season for me and I know for you. I am grateful for all the opportunities I have received. I look forward to producing more (if my joints allow). I really do think my Mama is working double time on my behalf and I am so glad she is. She would be proud of the work I did with the commissioned poem.
THANKS TO SANDRA PAYNE for making work even while facing many personal and family challenges–through it all she focused on beauty and some of that became the cover for my poetry collection. I am blessed with brilliant, talented, dedicated friends.
Today started gloomy-as if Spring wanted to show that yes it can get chilly and gray and oh so not fun again. So what to do-well I had an appointment to see work by Sandra Payne. www.sandrapayne.com. I’ve known Sandra since the late 1970s’s/early 1980s and we’ve both seen NYC change in some ways for the good/in some ways for the bad. C’est la vie! One thing we have in common w/ a number of Black American and African Diasporic artists is Just Above Midtown Gallery run by the incomparable Linda Bryant, at one time the only contemporary art space devoted to Blacks and other people of color in Tribeca. David Hammons, Senga Nengundi, Lorraine O’Grady, all manner of later to be famous folk got their first major gallery shows there. There were sightings of DeNiro (never saw him), et al. But mostly there was a powerful committed to conceptualism by Blacks and installation work and stuff that wasn’t seen as “Black” i.e. THE AVANT GARDE. As someone who had been in the East Village from day one of my journey in NYC, I was used to Bohemia, to conceptualism, to installation, performance art–it was simply refreshing to see the artists be pretty much the same color as me!
So back to Sandra–she’s an artist who has been working in a combination of the accretted–elaborate manipulated sculpture pieces made of colored aluminum or collages that explore our fascination w/ luxery items: pearls, jewels in patterns and colors that seem like an explosion of displays from Cartier, Tiffany’s or DeBeers. And then there are the items from the natural world-driftwood and minerals and feathers–what she does with peacock feathers is magical. This in an apartment the size of a NYC EV studio, but one w/ high ceilings (thank God for height) so there are cabinets of wonders–each time she opened a drawer, it was a surprise. And she has collections of mid-century Americana; Black memorabilia; copper utensils; and beautiful boxes with items that will one day find a way to be exhibited in just the way she wants them to be. Years ago, I saw a work of hers which alas could not be reproduced for a book cover, but it was of a circle of black tulle with different hued gems–a kind of storm of desire. Her capacity to organize all of these materials and make a space that is comfortable and full of delight is why she is so very special to we who are her friends and admirers.
My visit was to see work that may (hopefully) adorn the cover of my new and selected which may be called The Perfect Lipstick or The City Proper or At the Fringe of Town–don’t know just yet. So today’s outside gloom was met with explosions of beauty, radiance, commentary on African American history–didn’t talk about her use of Black memoriabilia–and I am so grateful that she is one of the artists that were part of that unruly band that started out at Just Above Midtown. She may not be as known as many of her compadres from back in the day, but she is deeply committed to making work of intense beauty and wit. I am really looking forward to what is on that cover for my White Pine Press volume.
