"I will take a paragraph..."

You already know this, folk, but I'ma say it again.

Love me some Arthur Rickydoc Flowers!

Arthur and another fave writer, George Saunders, are up at Syracuse guiding new generations of wordsmiths. Arthur, a word wizard in a category all by himself and one of the few practicing Hoodoofolk in Higher Education, also blogs about being in and out of the woodshed, revising his novel, Rest for the Weary, while teaching in Syracuse's MFA program, caring for loved ones, and traveling all over God's Green Earth, including sojourns to Kenya, Ghana, and India to nurture new writers there. Talk about gettin' yo' lesson... He recently posted this bit of bliss on the importance of remaining focused and positive during all the cycles of your creative work:

"...focus flowers focus, step by step and inch by inch, spent last two days focused and got maybe a page out of it but im satisfied, i will take anything, i will take a paragraph if i worked hard for it and thats what i got thats what i got"

=Arthur Flowers, Rootwork the Rootsblog, a Cyberhoodoo Webspace

"i will take a paragraph if i worked hard for it..." Indeed!

I'ma take this as good gospel and spread it all around. The writers I know can get religion 'bout a paragraph. These days, we getting religious about a line. Every word must conjure, true, but if you ain't been writing since 1499, then you better believe, every word counts, even the 'tow down sucky ones.

I, for one, have been silent in this space for so long, I forgot my own password, but Black Pot Mojo is back and percolatin' a bit. And why?

Got my Firstborn womanchile in college, thank you! and didn't lose but a lil bit of my mind, a tiny chunk, during the process. Shoutouts to all the mama and daddy artists out there, doin' the same.

Also taught my first workshop session of the new cycle at the Center last night. Seven folk round a table, looking slightly vulnerable, but excited. Always an interesting group of writers, some with stories they have been waiting for years to tell. Mostly trying to grapple with what I'm grappling with now on this crazy new story that keeps bumrushin' my dreams - writing a dang beginning, middle, and end, in that order, please. ;-)

And process. Creative process. They are trying to figure out how best to carve up their day a bit so they can nurture that story spark. You know, create a writing life, in which actual writing gets down. How do you nurture the spark inside you when the world blowin' up all 'round yo' head?

Well now, you write.

I used to hate it when the veterans I spoke with would say this. They'd throw out some do's and don'ts but most of it amounted to the same command, "Read," and that other ominous one, "Write." Then I would turn away, all downtrodden and dejected, with another ton of books to add to my list, and even more unanswered questions.

What I was waiting for was the Key. Somehow, I thought, if I could just get my hands on that Key, I could jettison myself from novice writer with two credits to her misspelled name, to the latest and greatest Anointed One. I wasn't much like my mainstream comrades. I didn't dream of Oprah or the New Yorker. I dreamed of Callaloo. Rather than flatout subscribing, I'd pieced together a collection of volumes from library sales and independent online booksellers around the nation, and every lone volume was like discovering a nugget of gold in a grand river of words. You couldn't go wrong with an issue, any Callaloo issue, and I wanted to someday have my work published there, right there, folks.

Well, it took me some time before I even had the courage to submit, and when I did have that honor, when it did come, I can honestly say, I would not have had it any other way. I didn't find the Key, but I found something else, something more valuable.

I know some folk still think somebody is going to give them the Big Secret Key to Publishing, like published authors carry it around in their back pockets as they float through life. As if they can simply raise a well manicured hand and place you promptly in the Pantheon.

When they come smiling at me with that subconscious Key mess, I have to tell them, kindly as possibly, that there ain't no Key.

Just sit your butt down and write.

Or wash some dishes. Then write.

Twist your locks, oil your scalp, and write.

Raise a child, make a friend, change a career, write.

And when you finish, read a book, read another book, live your life, and write.

Then read this and this, re-read this and ask yourself that, consider how... then write some more.

Folk roll up in workshops like they comin' in out the rain. I know, 'cuz I did. They been in the desert so long, they thirsty, wondering in the wilderness, waiting on somebody to deliver them to the Promised Land of Publication, preferably with an awesome agent and a hefty advance. Good folk can and may help you along the way, but at the end of the day, can't nobody write for you but you. (Okay, we are not going to talk about ghostwriting here.)

Workshops are designed to temporarily get you out of the wilderness for a while, to pull you out of that lonely, vaccuum that is your own critical (or in some cases, not critical enough) self, and offer you a whole new set of eyes and ears, to experience your work. You write and read and share, exchange resources, experiment with techniques, and hopefully gain new insights and inspiration from each other that will help you get closer to crafting the work you most want to see in the world.

You may not agree with everything said, you may not be able to try your hand at every new strategy offered, but you take what works well for you. You take what you need. And when you don't need the workshop no more, then you sit yourself down somewhere and write.

Howard Waldrop told us at Clarion West '99 that "writing is hard."

He ain't never lied, but I think when it is hardest, that is when you have to hang in there and focus as Arthur says, "step by step, inch by inch," celebrating every hard won paragraph, even if that's all you got.

Staying in the game and knowing what you've got, that's the real key.

Wanganegresse
uplift, engage, and enlighten

Belladona's ELDER SERIES @ Dixon Place

Belladonna* Celebrates the Elders with readings and events guest-hosted by some of our favorite writers who've invited writers who influence and inspire them Tuesday, APRIL 14 Kate Eichhorn hosts Gail Scott & M. NourbeSe Philip 7:30PM SHARP! (doors at 7PM) @ Dixon Place (161 Chrystie Street) Admission is $6 at the Door. Kate Eichhorn is the author of Fond (BookThug, 2008) and the co-editor of Innovative Canadian Women's Poetry and Poetics (Coach House Books, 2009) and a forthcoming issue of Open Letter on feminist poetics. As a curator, she has worked with reading series and literary festivals to stage multidisciplinary collaborations between poets, visual artists and composers. She is an assistant professor of Culture and Media Studies at The New School. Gail Scott is current recipient of the Quebec Arts Council New York Studio grant. She is the suthor of 7 books, including the anthology Biting The Error edited with Bob Gluck et al, Coach House, 2004, shortlisted for a Lambda award. Her other books include her novel, My Paris, about a sad diarist in conversation with Gertrude Stein and Walter Benjamin in contemporary Paris, Dalkey Archive [Normal, Ill] September, 2003; the story collection Spare Parts Plus Two [Coach House, 2002]. The novels Main Brides and Heroine, and the essay collections Spaces Like Stairs and la théorie, un dimanche [with Nicole Brossard et al]. She has just finished a new novel, The Obituary, forthcoming. Her translation of Michael Delisle's Le Déasarroi du matelot was shortlisted for the Governor General's award in translation [2001]. She has been named one of the 10 best one of the 10 best Canadian novellists of the year 1999 by the trade magazine Quill + Quire. She is co-founder of the critical journal Spirale (Montréal) and Tessera (new writing by women). She teaches Creative Writing at Université de Montréal. M. NourbeSe Philip is a poet, writer, and lawyer. She was born in Tobago and now lives in Toronto. She received her B.S. from the University of the West Indies and her M.S. and law degree from the University of Western Ontario. In l983 she gave up the practice of law to devote more time to writing. Although primarily a poet, Nourbese Philip also writes both fiction and non-fiction. She has published three books of poetry, Thorns, Salmon Courage, and She Tries Her Tongue; Her Silence Softly Breaks. She has been the recipient of Canada Council awards, numerous Ontario Arts Council grants and was the recipient of a Toronto Arts Council award in l989. Philip's first novel, Harriet's Daughter, was published in l988. Her second novel, Looking For Livingstone: An Odyssey of Silence, was published in l991. In 1990, Philip was made a Guggenheim Fellow in poetry and in 1991 became a McDowell Fellow. M. Nourbese Philip's short stories, essays, reviews, and articles have appeared in magazines and journals in North America and England, and her poetry has been extensively anthologized. Her work is taught widely at the university level and is the subject of much academic writing and critique. Two collections of Philip's essays, Frontiers: Essays and Writings on Racism and Culture and Showing Grit: Showboating North of the 44th Parallel, were published in November l992 and June l993, followed by a third essay collection, Genealogy of Resistance and Other Essays in 1997. Philip's first play, Coups and Calypsos, was produced in both London and Toronto during 1999. A Short Note About The Elders Series: Belladonna* began as a reading and salon series at Bluestocking's Women's Bookstore on New York City's Lower East Side, in August 1999. In June 2000, in collaboration with Boog Literature, Belladonna* began to publish commemorative 'chaplets' of the readers work. This year marks the tenth anniversary of our mission to: promote the work of women writers who are adventurous, experimental, politically involved, multi-form, multicultural, multi-gendered, impossible to define, delicious to talk about, unpredictable, and dangerous with language. Belladonna* has by now featured over 150 writers of wildly diverse age and origin, writers who work in conversation and collaboration in and between multiple forms, languages, critical fields. As performance and as printed text the work collects, gathers over time and space, and forms a kind of conversation about the feminist avant-garde, what it is and how it comes to be. Our anniversary Elders Series is a continuation of this conversation, which highlights the fact of influence and continuity of the ideas, poetics, and concerns we circle through. And it is a way to honor those without whom we'd be nowhere. UPCOMING EVENTS: April 28 Cara Benson hosts Jayne Cortez and Anne Waldman June 9 Jane Sprague hosts Tina Darragh and Diane Ward *a reading series and small press that promotes the work of women writers who are adventurous, experimental, politically involved, multi-form, multicultural, multi-gendered, impossible to define, delicious to talk about, unpredictable, dangerous with language. *deadly nightshade, a cardiac and respiratory stimulant, having purplish-red flowers and black berries Belladonna* readings happen monthly between September and June. We are grateful for funding by Poets and Writers, CLMP, NYSCA, and Dixon Place. www.BelladonnaSeries.org

The James Tiptree, Jr. Award

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog....

Well, I missed WisCon and I was totally bummed out, especially since I was a Tiptree Award juror this year (a very cool experience), but I'm glad to hear that folk had a rockin' good time despite the stomach bug goin' round. Here's a post from Nnedimma Okorafor-Mbachu on her novel, THE SHADOW SPEAKER being a Tiptree Honor Book (yay!).

All Best,
SRT

The James Tiptree, Jr. Literary Award Council
http://www.tiptree.org/

A gender-exploring science fiction award is presented to Sarah Hall for The Carhullan Army (Daughters of the North).

The James Tiptree, Jr. Literary Award Council is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2007 Tiptree Award is The Carhullan Army by Sarah Hall (published in the United States as Daughters of the North). The British edition was published in 2007 by Faber & Faber; the American edition in 2008 by HarperCollins.

The Tiptree Award will be celebrated on May 25, 2008 at WisCon in Madison, Wisconsin. The winner of the Tiptree Award receives $1000 in prize money, an original artwork created specifically for the winning novel or story, and (as always) chocolate.

Each year, a panel of five jurors selects the Tiptree Award winners and compiles an Honor List of other works that they find interesting, relevant to the award, and worthy of note. The 2007 jurors were Charlie Anders, Gwenda Bond (chair), Meghan McCarron, Geoff Ryman, and Sheree Renee Thomas.

The Carhullan Army elicited strong praise from the jurors. Gwenda Bond said, Hall does so many things well in this book - writing female aggression in a believable way, dealing with real bodies in a way that makes sense, and getting right to the heart of the contradictions that violence brings out in people, but particularly in women in ways we still don't see explored that often. I found the writing entrancing and exactly what it needed to be for the story; lean, but well-turned. Geoff Ryman said, It faces up to our current grim future (something too few SF novels have done) and seems to go harder and darker into war, violence, and revolution. Meghan McCarron said, I found the book to be subtle and ambiguous in terms of its portrayal of the Army, and its utopia. The book became, ultimately, an examination of what it means to attain physical, violent power as defined by a male-dominated world. And it asserted that it could be claimed by anyone, regardless of physical sex, provided they were willing to pay the price.

The book, which is Hall's third novel, also won the 2007 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize for the best work of literature (fiction, non-fiction, poetry, drama) from Britain or the Commonwealth written by an author of 35 or under.

The Tiptree Award Honor List is a strong part of the award's identity and is used by many readers as a recommended reading list for the rest of the year. The 2007 Honor List is:

• "Dangerous Space" by Kelley Eskridge, in the author's collection Dangerous Space (Aqueduct Press, 2007)
• Water Logic by Laurie Marks (Small Beer Press, 2007)
• Empress of Mijak and The Riven Kingdom by Karen Miller (HarperCollins, Australia, 2007)
• The Shadow Speaker by Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu (Hyperion, 2007)
• Interfictions, edited by Delia Sherman and Theodora Goss (Interstitial Arts Foundation/Small Beer Press, 2007)
• Glasshouse by Charles Stross (Ace, 2006)
• The Margarets by Sheri S. Tepper (Harper Collins 2007)
• Y: The Last Man, written by Brian K. Vaughan, art by Pia Guerra (available in 60 issues or 10 volumes from DC/Vertigo Comics, 2002-2008)
• Flora Segunda by Ysabeau Wilce (Harcourt, 2007)

Reading for the 2008 Tiptree Award will soon begin, with jurors K. Tempest Bradford, Gavin Grant (chair), Leslie Howle, Roz Kaveney, and Catherynne M. Valente. As always, the Tiptree Award invites all to recommend works for the award.

The Word in Color

Nikky Finney

Poetry reviews are rare, and having one's work mentioned in a poetry review is even rarer still. I was delighted to see this recent bit of ink in the SAN ANTONIO CURRENT.

4/9/2008

Art

The word in color

A poetry fan challenges John Hollander’s white might

Asian American Poetry: The Next Generation Victoria Chang, ed. University of Illinois Pres $19.95, 232 pages

The Wind Shifts: New Latino Poetry Francisco Aragón, ed. University of Arizona Press $17.95, 272 pages

The Ringing Ear: Black Poets Lean South Nikky Finney University of Georgia Press $18.95, 432 pages

courtesy
Nikky Finney edited The Ringing Ear, which includes scorching and inspiring poetry by Sonia Sanchez and Richard Blanco(below).


By Pablo Miguel Martínez

April, T.S. Eliot famously wrote, is the cruelest month; it mixes memory and desire — a reminder of things lost and a yearning for things yet to be. It’s entirely appropriate, then, that April is National Poetry Month. After all, poetry has long been the form of choice for lament, tribute, revelation, and meditation, whether in the voice of public address or private utterance. Long before country music, poetry was lyric.

As a faithful reader of poetry (it always feels as if I’m cheating on a gorgeous lover when I pick up a book of fiction), I’ve long been interested in the work of poets whose voices move the art form to the next stage of its evolutionary chain. Until recently, it was the poetry of a generation steeped in identity and movement politics that stirred the tranquil waters that were Poetry. Not surprisingly, it’s the work of poets of color that has regularly infused American poetry (in the hemispheric sense) with a striking urgency, as well as new ways of saying what must be said. But the leather-bound, hermetic world of mainstream publishing is still uncomfortable with certain forms of otherness; it still believes that this literature, which speaks to the universal through the specific, is not economically viable. And since the economic stakes are abysmally low in publishing poetry, we’re rarely introduced to these voices. It’s been racially and ethnically specific publishing contests, as well as competitions for women, and a number of university and small presses that have ardently championed poets of color.

A cursory glance at the contributors’ bios of most U.S. poetry anthologies will underscore the imbalance. This in no way reflects a dearth of such voices, but rather a manifestation of what Adrienne Rich has referred to as a form of cultural apartheid.

Last fall, the usually staid Poetry Society of America generated a storm of controversy when it awarded its Frost Medal to John Hollander, a highly acclaimed poet and influential critic, who also wields enormous power as an editor of poetry anthologies. The award resulted in the resignation of Walter Mosley, and poets Elizabeth Alexander and Rafael Campo, among others, from the Society’s Board of Governors. Why the shake-up?

Hollander, in a review published in The New York Times Book Review, wrote about “cultures without literatures — West African, Mexican, and Central American.” Apparently, Hollander couldn’t leave it at that. In an interview on National Public Radio, it was reported that Hollander believes “there isn’t much quality work coming from non-white poets today.” Scholar Adrienne McCormick notes that “with its focus on form and aesthetics and its long history of lyric reflection, poetry is often seen as the last bastion of a high-art sensibility. On the other hand, poetry is also a genre frequently utilized by contemporary American movements for social and political change.” The PSA’s Board President accused Mosley, Alexander, Campo, et al., of McCarthyism.

With this in mind, I pulled three relatively recent titles — anthologies of work by poets of color — off the shelf as my personal challenge to Hollander’s ignorance.

Here’s what I found: two of the three collections, Asian American Poetry: The Next Generation and The Wind Shifts: New Latino Poetry, were compiled by editors who struggled honorably with the anxiety of authenticity (Is the work Asian enough? Latina/o enough?). These anthologies, each of which presents several poems by a couple dozen “new generation” poets, leave the reader with the sense of similar landscapes, both shaped to a large extent by the MFA phenomenon ( i.e., by poets who trained within the confines of the academy). In her introduction, Victoria Chang writes that the volume “reflects a shift away from [the] ideal of a ‘recognizable Asian voice’ and toward poetry that transcends racial, gender, and cultural boundaries.” In a similar vein, Aragón succinctly explains: “The ‘new Latino poetry’ is simply poetry written by Latinos and Latinas.”

The third, and in many ways the most satisfying of the three, The Ringing Ear: Black Poets Lean South, is an intergenerational sampling that is arranged thematically. The effect is that of eavesdropping on a thoughtful, candid, provocative conversation among the poets in each section.

However these editors and poets might indeed be moving toward a poetics of flattened identity, there’s no denying that people of color are different, dammit.

In his poem “Earth Cafeteria,” Linh Dinh writes: “To eat stinky food/ is a sign of savagery, humility, / identification with the earth.” The poem quotes Lin Yutang and Mikhail Bakhtin; it ends with lines that suggest the straddling of customs that recent immigrants confront daily, a reality that beautifully complicates U.S. identity, but one which the likes of Hollander do not regard as desirable DNA for poetry. Dinh’s poem ends: “To eat with a three-pronged spear and a knife./ To eat with two wooden sticks./ To eat with the hands.// Boiling vs. broiling.// To snack on a tub of roasted grasshoppers at the movies.”

In “Female Infanticide: A Guide for Mothers,” the speaker of Adrienne Su’s searing list-poem offers, “in order of expediency,” ways to banish unwanted daughters. It begins: “I: Ultrasound, abortion.// II: Drowning; asphyxiation.// III: Hilltop abandonment.// IV: Automobile accident.” It ends:
“XI: Raise her as one of her brother’s servants;/ marry her off at your convenience.// XII: Keep her unwed (use psychological torture)./ In old age a daughter is fine good fortune.”

There is, in poems like these and others, a stunning movement from the devastation of cultural alienation to quiet resignation, anger, or, in some cases, wholeness. While they may have the same outlines of angst shared by other poets, the cultural specificity adds a compelling texture to the language and its effects. Genuinely innovative? No. But these poems definitely expand the relatively restrictive boundaries of contemporary U.S. poetry. And that is cause for celebration.

María Meléndez, a standout in The Wind Shifts, also tugs at the borders, aesthetic and otherwise, rendering them elastic and more complex. In “Remedio,” Meléndez’ speaker, using the direct address so favored by many of the poets in these collections, exhorts her reader: “Take wolves, each with a soul full of scents:// asperine willow leaves/ and damp earth, willow-rooted. [ ... ] Recuerda…from the Spanish recordar/ which is at root not remember or re-mind,// but pass back through the heart—//let her pass back through your heart again,/ this wolf.”

Firmly rooted in the earth, Meléndez’s poems exist in a clearly defined cultural context. “Tonacacihuatl: Lady of Our Flesh” begins: “Fragrance of the rain in her breath. The dampness/ at the back of her knees smells like rain also [ ... ] Thirteen mirrors spangle her dress. For those sun-round mirrors,/ praises are chanted by thirteen thousand red-legged hoppers. [ ... ] So she is, Lady of Our Flesh, who is what is./ Is she not here, who is our mother?/ Huffing, with matted hair, she stamps a shovel blade/ to begin a small grave.

The music in these poems is intoxicating. Ditto much of the language in Richard Blanco’s work. Here are the opening lines of his “Varadero en Alba”: “ven/ tus olas roncas murmuran entre ellas/ las luciérnagas se han cansado/ las gaviotas esperan como ansiosas reinas// We gypsy through the island’s north ridge/ ripe with villages cradled in cane and palms,/ the raw harmony of fireflies circling about/ amber faces like dewed fruit in the dawn.”

The Ringing Ear is filled with a chorus of diverse voices that come together to talk story. Like the two other anthologies, the contents include various forms and plenty of free verse. (In an interesting example of cross-cultural exchange, where Asian American Poetry does not include even one haiku, The Ringing Ear is dotted with captivating examples, such as Sheree Renée Thomas’s: “lightning bug reflects/ a mason jar of silence/ gold dust in my hand.”)

Editor Nikky Finney’s challenge to poets in her collection was to write about the locus of much black history and culture, the South. But there’s little, if any, easy romanticizing. The inimitable Sonia Sanchez’ “On Passing thru Morgantown,” imagines difficult beauty: “i saw you/ vincent van/ gogh perched/ on those pennsylvania/ cornfields communing/ amid secret black/ bird societies. yes.”

The oral tradition is also carried on, and transformed, by poets such as Holly Bass (“seven crown man”) and Forrest Hamer (“Middle Ear”). Historical names tether many poems in The Ringing Ear to painful memories: Addie Mae Collins, Amadou Diallo, Susan Smith. There are, as well, names that evoke music — music that wails and rings eternally in the eager, hospitable ear: Marian Anderson, Dinah Washington, Duke, Coltrane, Nina Simone. Many poets sample extant texts to astonishing effect; others take received forms and restyle them.

In her introduction to The Ringing Ear, Finney writes: “‘Melting pot’ is a loose American term. The Black community has never melted. We have marched. We have organized. We have fought. We have been shot at, fired at, and spit at. We have been abandoned on rooftops in the middle of a devastating hurricane. We have migrated away and intermarried. We have been hanged for sport. We have stayed on these shores kicking, screaming, loving, forgiving, and writing, but we have never melted in this or any other country.”

In her scorching testimonial poem, “I Have Walked a Long Time,” Sonia Sanchez writes: “i have walked a long time/ much longer than death that splinters/ wid her innuendos. […] i have walked by memory of others/ between the blood night/ and twilights/ i have lived in tunnels/ and fed the bloodless fish/ […] you, man, will you remember me when i die?/ will you stare and stain my death and say/ i saw her applauden suns/ far from the grandiose audience?/ you, man will you remember and cry?”

You, John Hollander, will you remember and cry?

Here’s wishing you and yours an audacious National Poetry Month. •

Camille Yarbrough's ANCESTOR HOUSE

I just returned from being a special guest at Camille Yarbrough's ANCESTOR HOUSE. The show aired live at 6 pm on MNN (Manhattan Neighborhood Network) Channel 34. Many thanks to co-editors Dr. Brenda Greene and Fred Beauford and Herb Boyd (BALDWIN'S HARLEM). We were gathered to discuss the publication of Greene and Beauford's recent collaboration, MEDITATIONS AND ASCENSIONS: Black Writers on Writing. The collection covers the dynamic panels that were featured at the Eighth Annual National Black Writers Conference hosted by Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn in '06. The chapter in which I'm featured is the Speculative Fiction panel including science fiction pioneer Samuel R. Delany, the incomparable Walter Mosley, and Tananarive Due (MY SOUL TO KEEP...and yes, I know she's written several novels since that one, but it IS STILL my favorite! Check out her the latest volume in this remarkable triology exploring an Ethiopian sect of immortals in modern times...). Our panel was moderated by Robert Reid-Pharr.

If you don't know Nana Yarbrough, then you better ask somebody. She bad.
I first encountered her work as a child and later as a mother...perhaps you too have enjoyed her book, CORNROWS, illustrated by Tom Feelings. Or perhaps you've had a chance to hear her critically acclaimed album, THE IRON POT COOKER. Nana Yarbrough so bad she's been all over the world with her wisdom and art, journeying through Africa like a queen comin' home, and her poetry and song, "Take Yo Praise," was sampled and featured by FatBoy Slim among many others.

After we left the studio which is down by the West Side highway, I headed over to Jazz at Lincoln Center with the very prolific Herb Boyd--one of the fly folk who inspired me to become an anthologist and edit my own books--and Dr. Greene, Executive Director of the Center for Black Literature and mother of Talib Kweli. Brenda is one of several dedicated people who are continuing the work of novelist and educator John Oliver Killens, founder of the National Black Writers Conference. Herb is working on some amazing projects with the History Channel in addition to who knows how many other equally significant forthcoming works, so he gave us some suga' after guiding us toward the elevators. This was Brenda's first visit to Dizzy's, the fab jazz joint with the dazzling view of Columbus Circle and Central Park South. The band hadn't started yet when we arrived, but of course, the drinks and the gumbo was making rounds. Brenda had the crab cakes and you know I had to get me some jambalya, served in the cutest little cast iron black pot. Yeah, I had my mojo and mojito workin'!

It's a gorgeous piece of jazzy heaven in a very jampacked space. When we rolled out (just in time to duck the $35 cover!) we stumbled upon some mile high Romare Bearden reproductions and yet another musical celebration. In the lobby, folks were getting their samba on because Brazil was in the house! I watched a lone couple steal spotlight as they worked it to a band that sounded good but looked anything but Brazillian (e.g., the pianist was Japanese...) but you know how we do. Sampled SOME MO' food from Cuba (how they get up in the mixit?), skipped the sweet sangria, collected some business cards, then headed over to the tiny Jazz gift shop where your charming Negresse managed to convince the equally charming M. Thomas (a cuz perhaps?) to purchase one of our books, while Brenda scored big time with some wonderful Father's Day presents--all signed by the artists! A return trip may be required.

And, almost forgot, that I got a cool new gig, thanks to Ancestor House. Serendipity and all that. Channeling the changes. Mo' details to come.

All Best,
SRT

PS - Will let you know when the video is up.

MEDITATIONS AND ASCENSIONS

Published by Medgar Evers College and Third World Press in Chicago, MEDITATIONS AND ASCENSIONS edited by Brenda M. Greene and Fred Beauford focuses on the literary panels held in Brooklyn at the 2006 National Black Writers Conference. I was honored to appear on the Speculative Fiction panel with Samuel R. Delany, Tananarive Due, and Walter Mosley. Our panel was moderated by Robert Reid-Pharr and was dedicated in memory of Octavia E. Butler. Needless to say it was a great discussion, and I was thrilled to meet Mrs. Myrlie Evers-Williams and her daughter, Reena.

..

Join US

Friday May 30th - 6 pm

FOR A PANEL Discussion on

the recently released book

MEDITATIONS AND ASCENSIONS

Black Writers on Writing

at

Hue-Man Bookstore & Café

2319 Frederick Douglass Blvd.

New York, NY 10027 - 212.665.7400

Open Admission

With Brenda M. Greene & Fred Beauford, Editors

including Herb Boyd, Manie Baron, Emily Raboteau, Mohammed N. Ali, Adam McKible, Sheree Renée Thomas, and Camille Yarbrough.

Meditations and Ascensions: Black Writers on Writing represents conversations from the 8th National Black Writers Conference. This collection provides in-depth meditations and analyses of literature by black writers.

Published by Third World Press.

..

Brought to you in part by the National Black Writers Conference and

the Center for Black Literature at Medgar Evers College, CUNY.

To learn more or to find out how to get the proceedings from the 2008 NBWC,

call 718.270.6983 –or visit www.mec.cuny.edu/blacklitcenter

Purchase your copy now at amazon.com!

www.huemanbookstore.com

..

Maēshay k. Lewis

Program Director

Center for Black Literature

Medgar Evers College, CUNY

1650 Bedford Avenue

Brooklyn, NY 11225

Phone: 718.270.6976

Fax: 718.270.6916 - temp

mlewis@mec.cuny.edu

www.mec.cuny.edu/blacklitcenter

I AM A MAN...and a woman and a child and...

Lupus Foundation of America

http://www.lupus.org/newsite/index.html

Global Fund for Women

http://www.globalfundforwomen.org/cms/our-work/grantee-partners/

Women for Women International

http://www.womenforwomen.org/

WomenArts Network - Fund for Women Artists

http://www.womenarts.org/network/

GREEN FOR ALL'S DREAM REBORN

Friend and "Slammingest" Poet Aya de Leon and the Applied Research Center are there right now, among many others. If you missed this year's conference, do check out the conference website for links on a broad coalition of Green activists across the nation.

The ARC, based in Oakland, CA, also publishes ColorLines: the national magazine on race and politics. My short story, "Bender's Bow," is in the new March/April 2008 issue.

The cover story, "Who Gain's from the Green Economy" by Preeti Mangala Shekar and Tram Nguyen (We Are All Suspects Now) spotlights Van Jones of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights who is committed to making sure that the "Green Wave" doesn't sweep past communities of color.