Feb 27 5 PM Poet Alfred Nicol author of "Winter Light"

Alfred Nicol worked in the printing industry for twenty years after graduating from Dartmouth College, where he received the Academy of American Poets Prize. He now lives in Amesbury, Massachusetts and is a member of the Powow River Poets. He edited the Powow River Anthology, published by Ocean Publishing in 2006, and was the recipient of the 2004 Richard Wilbur Award for his first book of poems, Winter Light, published by The University of Evansville Press. His poems have appeared in Poetry, The Formalist, Measure, Commonweal, Verse Daily, The New England Review, Atlanta Review, and other journals. Several of his poems have been anthologized in Contemporary Poetry of New England, Sonnets: 150 Contemporary Sonnets, and Kiss and Part. The last of nine installments of his long poem, “Persnickety Ichabod’s Rhyming Diary” will appear in Light Quarterly, Vol. 52.


"Nicol is much more than a poet's poet; he is also a reader's poet, and his work, though dazzling, is not intended to simply dazzle but to convey, with charm and profundity, the experiences of our common life." -- Rhina P. Espaillat

"How different an aesthetic Nicol shows in the splendid Winter Light, as canny and moving a formalist collection as I have seen in years." -- Sydney Lea

"On every page Nicol exhibits a genuine largeness of spirit and grace of mind. His techniques are well-honed. This is certainly among the finest new volumes of poetry I have read in years." -- Jay Parini

Feb 13 2007 My guest will be John Hodgen

My guest Feb. 13 5PM will be poet John Hodgen. Hodgen will be reading from his new book, Grace.Winner of the 2005 Donald Hall Prize in Poetry. Hodgen, who teaches writing at Assumption College in Worcester, has two other prize-winning books, and his poems, according to Ha Jin, National Book Award winner and professor at Boston University, contain "a voice that speaks directly from the heart."His publications include the anthologies Witness and Wait: Thirteen Poets From New England and Something and We Teach Them All: Teachers Writing About Diversity. His other honors include the Grolier Prize in Poetry in 1980 and an Arvon Foundation Award (Kensington, England) in 1981.

Feb 6 2007 5PM: My guest will be Manisha Roy. Roy was born in Northeast Assam, India, and educated in Calcutta. Once an anthropologist, she is now a writer and lecturer of Jungian psychotherapy. She has been a practicing psychotherapist since 1985 in Boston. She is the author of "Bengali Woman" and " Cast The First Stone: Ethics in Analytic Practice" among other works.

Jan 16 5PM My guest will be the poet Martha Collins.

Martha Collins is the author, most recently, of Blue Front, a book-length poem based on a lynching her father witnessed when he was five years old in Cairo, Illinois, published May 2006 by Graywolf Press. She has also published four collections of poems, two books of co-translations from the Vietnamese, and a recent chapbook of poems, and has edited a collection of essays on the poet Louise Bogan.

Collins' awards include fellowships from the NEA, the Bunting Institute, the Ingram Merrill Foundation, and the Witter Bynner Foundation, as well as three Pushcart Prizes, the Alice Fay Di Castagnola Award, and a Lannan residency grant.

A selection of poems from Blue Front won the Laurence Goldstein Poetry Prize in 2005; other selections from the book appeared in Kenyon Review and Ploughshares.
Collins founded the Creative Writing Program at UMass-Boston, and since 1997 has taught at Oberlin College, where she is Pauline Delaney Professor of Creative Writing and one of the editors of FIELD magazine and Oberlin College Press.

Jan 9 2007 5PM My guest will be Nate Graziano.

Biography
I currently live in Manchester, New Hampshire with my beautiful wife Liz and two beautiful children, Paige and Owen. I teach writing at Pembroke Academy in Pembroke, New Hampshire.
In 2002, my first hardcover collection of fiction Frostbite was published by Green Bean Press. In October of 2003, my first full-length collection of poetry Not So Profound was also published by Green Bean Press. I'm the author of a number chapbooks and broadsides of poetry and fiction. In July, sunnyoutside will be publishing a new volume of poetry titled Honey, I'm Home.
I was born in 1975 and grew up in West Warwick, Rhode Island. I attended college at Plymouth State in New Hampshire, lived a year in Las Vegas, and have since been freezing my ass off here. I'm currently a part-time graduate student in the fiction writing program at the University of New Hampshire. For more information, read my books. They reveal a lot.
My work has been published by some of the following print journals, zines and organizations: Nerve Cowboy, Staplegun, The Black Bear Review, Way Station Magazine, Heeltap, The Owen Wister Review, Angelflesh, The Chiron Review, Unwound, Iodine, Poesy, Art:Mag, Blind Man's Rainbow, The Silt Reader, Heeltap, Gros Textes(Belgium), The Brobdingnagian Times(Ireland), Main Street Rag, Controlled Burn, Anthills, The Dublin Quarterly (Ireland) and Bottle 3.
Places To find my work on-line:http://www.sniffylinings.com/
http://www.thundersandwich.com/
http://www.the-hold.com/
www.openwidemagazine.co.uk/
http://www.myfavoritebullet.com/
http://www.remarkpoetry.net/
http://www.dublinquartlerly.com/

Jan 2 2007: 5PM My guest will be Somerville Poet Bert Stern:


Bert Stern was born in Buffalo, New York in 1930. He was educated at the University of Buffalo, Columbia,and at Indiana University, where he earned his Ph.D. in English.
Stern taught for forty years at Wabash College, where he is now Milligan Professor of English, Emeritus. He also taught from 1965-67 at the University of Thessaloniki and from 1984-85 at Peking University. He presently teaches in "Changing Life Through Literature," a program for men and women on probation.

His poems have been published in New Letters, The American Poetry Review, Indiana Review, Poetry, Spoon River Poetry Review, among others, and in a number of anthologies. His chapbook, Silk/The Ragpicker's Grandson, was published by Red Dust in 1998. His essays and reviews have appeared in Sewanee Review, Southern Review, Modern Language Review, The New Republic, Southern Review, Columbia Teachers’ College Record, Adirondack Life, and in a number of anthologies. His critical study, Wallace Stevens: Art of Uncertainty, was published by the University of Michigan Press in 1965

My guest Dec. 5 5PM will be Richard Wollman:

Evidence of Things Seen. Richard Wollman. ( The Sheep Meadow Press POBOX 1345 Riverdale-on-Hudson NY 10471)

Simmons College literature professor Richard Wollman in his new poetry collection: “Evidence Of Things Seen” writes of shucking clams, of Lester Young in a ruminating Paris, of a church that reflects the images of subverted and converted Jews, and he does it with elegiac and evocative language. In his poem “Pressure” Wollman describes his inept attempts to shuck clams. Here is a portrait of a poet who is just as shucked as his crustacean charges:

“but there was no remedy for dull knife slips in the flesh of my hand beneath the thumb where I’d slice myself open like an unprotected clam.I t was ruining my hands.The boss knew I didn’t have to do this for my living and waited for me to quit, baited me, making me stand on the bar to clean the grease…No one ever poured a drink until I dragged myself back there, the only one who could no longer smell the liquor of the fish all over us.”

I have always been a fan of the “ Pres” and “Lady Day,”. In “Lester Young in Paris” we have a portrait of the “Pres” (Young), the famous jazz saxophonist, as deadens his pain, and his ghosts with booze and his art. In some respects the poem reads like a haunting, late night jazz composition:

“In the studio he wore felt slippers. It was a way to live,deaden the noise of fists,the reedy wheeze of his breath stolen one night in a white barracks. And the squawk of hospital doors up north. In curved brass, pain takes the shape of song, the sense variously drawn out. What can be made of the low sounds of men? He drank deep until he finally drowned them.”

Recommended.

My Guest Nov 14 at 5PM will be poet Richard Moore:


Of Richard Moore's ten published volumes of poetry, one was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and another was a T. S. Eliot Prize finalist. He is also the author of a novel, The Investigator (Story Line Press, 1991), a collection of essays, The Rule That Liberates (University of South Dakota Press, 1994), and translations of Plautus' Captivi (in the Johns Hopkins University Complete Roman Drama in Translation series, 1995) and Euripedes' Hippolytus (in the Penn Greek Drama Series, U. of Pennsylvania, 1998). Moore's most recent poetry books include The Mouse Whole: An Epic (Negative Capability Press, 1996) and Pygmies and Pyramids (Orchises Press, 1998). His newest collection of poems, The Naked Scarecrow, was published by Truman State University Press, New Odyssey Editions, in the spring of 2000. He is listed in Who's Who In America, and articles on his work have appeared in The Dictionary Of Literary Biography and numerous newspapers and journals. His fiction, essays, and more than 500 of his poems, have been published in a great variety of magazines, including The New Yorker, Atlantic, Harper's, Poetry, The American Poetry Review, and The Nation. He has also published translations of poetry in German, French, and Italian. He gives frequent readings, lectures and dramatic performances in Boston, Washington, and other cities.

My Guest Oct 17 2006 5PM will be author and pilot Patrick Smith:


The 5X5 Interview: Patrick Smith, Ask The Pilot
Patrick Smith is sure one doggone aviator extraordinaire. In his "Ask the Pilot" column for Salon.com, he dispels common airline myths, explains the beauty of certain flight patterns, and tries to keep terrorist hysteria to a minimum. That's all well and good, but what about the mile-high club and how getting bumped to first-class simply ruins you for flying with the peons in steerage ever again? We asked the pilot these questions and more, and miraculously he answered without demanding security strip search us first.

Age: 38
Occupation: Patrick Smith is an erstwhile airline pilot and author of a popular weekly air travel column at Salon.com and a book author. Location: Somerville, Massachusetts, just outside Boston

1. The fan mail from your column: I bet you receive an inordinate amount from people wanting to discuss the "mile-high club." What would you like to say here to end this conversation once and for all (well, at least for me)?
That it's not worth the effort? Granted this is one of those for-the-sake-of-it thrills, but the novelty only goes so far. I mean, what could be a more erotic setting than the closet-sized lavatory of a jetliner, wedged between a chemical toilet and a filthy, napkin-clogged waste receptacle? But hey, knock yourself out.
That said, some airlines are installing lower-deck sleeping suites for premium class passengers. Those on Virgin Atlantic, I remember reading, will have full double beds and total privacy.
As for me I'll admit nothing, but, not for any reason, I'd like you to imagine three things: (1) A Swedish exchange student. (2) a four-seat Piper Cherokee (with no autopilot). (3) a lazy half-hour above the marshes and estuaries of Newburyport, Massachusetts.
2. Salon is rightfully proud of its independent-press status. Is it an ethical choice of yours to work for them or could you just as easily see yourself in an office in the towers of Conde Nast?
It's less a choice than an accidental fit. I'm a pretty liberal guy, politically, which lends itself nicely to Salon's leanings. Not sure how that happened; I grew up in a blue collar suburb and went to a Catholic high school. But during the mid-1980s, in my late teens, when most would-be pilots were enlisting for ROTC, I was hanging out in the hardcore punk rock scene, which, if you remember, was virulently leftist and anti-Reagan. Most of my ideological sensibilities probably owe to that period -- getting out of the suburbs and into the city.
But finding a home at Salon wasn't by design. I certainly don't *choose* to use credit cards to pay my rent, and a mainstream gig could make life a lot more comfortable.
I think (hope) Salon appreciates my ability to pull in readers from across the spectrum, at least when I stick to aviation's more nuts-and-bolts issues. You'd be surprised, though, how often ideology makes its way into a topic. As a general subject, air travel is seemingly apolitical -- at least the way others have covered it -- but there have been loads of partisan controversies: debates over security, racial profiling of passengers, cockpit guns and so forth. Some of my writing gets fairly provocative. Last winter, you might recall, a Christian pilot found himself in hot water after he evangelized to a planeload of people over the PA. So I went and looked at the way airlines around the world mix religion and flying. Those were two of my favorite columns.
3. I was once bumped up to first-class for a Virgin flight to the U.K. and I really don't know if I can fly in lesser accommodations again. The other half really does live quite a lot better. Can you dispel any of the wonderful feelings that remain from that flight, or is it really as good as it seemed for that one blissful trip?
You're screwed. There's no going back. It's funny though, your use of the phrase, "the other half." I used to have a girlfriend who was repulsed by the idea of separate classes on airplanes. Obviously she never had a sleeper seat on a 14-hour nonstop.
It's ironic, because while we whine about the worsening discomforts of economy class, things have never been more luxurious up front. (A sign of impending class warfare, my old friend would probably say.) Enclosed sleeper suites, 14-inch personal video screens, even a turndown service.
Now, don't confuse domestic first class with international. There's a world of difference, and carriers tailor their service to specific routes. Neither should you confuse most U.S. airlines with those overseas. The Asian and European carriers especially, have perfected the art of long-haul comfort. As I write in my book, the service levels aboard U.S. airlines aren't quite the laughing stock of the world, but it's something like that or well on its way. Singapore Airlines, perennial passenger service champ, hands out designer pajamas for each leg of your flight.
Even -- or especially -- in coach, the more prestigious foreign lines put U.S. standards to shame. I recently flew from Hong Kong to Bangkok aboard Emirates, the carrier of Dubai (United Arab Emirates), and it was fantastic. We had six-page menus, adjustable foot and head rests, personal videos, a crew that spoke 12 languages. In economy.
4. Columnists, whether they're sports or aviation columnists, usually have a much more well-rounded education/interest than just their column subject. How much of your other interests do you manage to slip into your column?
Whether I'm more cerebral or, as you say, "well-rounded" than other pilots is debatable, but it's always fun to venture off-topic, just to see who notices whatever reference you've chosen to slide in. Song lyrics, favorite authors or artists, and such. I love to travel, having been to fifty or so countries, and a few of my articles have veered almost into full-blown travelogues.
That's part of my schtick, though: I don't write about planes, I write about air travel. As a kid, it wasn't only flying, in and of itself, that infatuated me; rather the opportunities it presented. Aerobatics and fighter planes bored me, but I could spend hours studying the routes and timetables of the airlines. We've come to see flying as little more than an inconvenient means to an end, and I'm trying to reattach it to the greater realms of geography and culture -- not incidental to the journey, but part of it. In 2004 you can step aboard a plane in New York and fly nonstop to fucking Singapore! If that can't amaze and impress you, something's wrong.
5. How about word association? I say, "People who buy the dirty magazines at the airport newsstands are scary individuals." You say . . .
Only if they read them on board. Which brings up a possible and disturbing variation of the Mile High Club, above.

An adaptation of the columns, "Ask the Pilot," was recently published by Riverhead books. An index of Patrick's online articles can be viewed here. For more information on his book, check out Ask The Pilot.

My guest Oct 3 2006 5PM:
In Blind Spot, acclaimed local poet Eisenberg wrestles with the effort to break with the perceptions and behaviors dictated by one’s inherited place on the planet. The book includes a section of poems about the many hatreds of Eisenberg’s grandmother, poems which helped Susan to understand the impact of the truth her grandmother always hid about herself—that she was a refugee from the pogroms of Russia.

Co-sponsored by the Jewish Women’s Archive.

About Susan Eisenberg:Raised in a three-generation household in Cleveland, Susan Eisenberg lives in Boston. She is the author of the poetry book, Pioneering (1998), and the nonfiction book, We’ll Call You If We Need You: Experiences of Women Working Construction (1998), which was selected as a New York Times Book Review Notable Book and optioned by MGM for a feature film. Licensed as a master electrician, she helped shape the cultural expression and analytical thinking of the tradeswomen’s movement nationally and internationally. Currently she is developing Permanent Care, a photo-based exploration of the relationship of the chronically ill to medication. She travels widely as a poet and lecturer; and teaches at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

My guest Sept 12 at 5PM will be poet Cheryl Perreault

Hopkinton poet plays as ‘Artist for Alzheimer’s’

Hopkinton resident and poet Cheryl Perreault's recently performed for "Artists for Alzheimer’s," a non-profit organization that brings together volunteer artists and people with Alzheimer’s and related forms of dementia.

Perreault’s performance was at Hearthstone, an assisted living residence for people with Alzheimer’s disease, located at 50 West Main Street in Hopkinton.
Perreault read from many of her works, while accompanied on guitar by longtime collaborator Steve Rapson.

The spoken words of Perreault’s poetry, along with the melodies provided by Rapson, helped create a strong emotional connection with the audience. Perreault and Rapson introduced many works from their CD, entitled "On Ants, Sandwiches and The Meaning of It All." Carol Cahill of Hearthstone, who helped coordinate the event, had much praise for the performance. "This performance was a truly uplifting experience for everyone involved," said Cahill. "The responses and reactions by those in attendance was something to behold. Tears came to my eyes on more than one occasion."

Perreault and Rapson were presented with an award at the conclusion of their performance, which recognized their contribution to enhancing the cultural life of people living with Alzheimer’s disease. For more information on the artistry of Cheryl Perreault, and to learn about her CD, she has a website at http://www.CherylPerreault.com. For more information on "Artists for Alzheimer’s," visit their website at www.ArtistsForAlzheimers.org.

Sept 5. 5PM My guest will be Gloria Mindock, founder of the Cervena Barva Press in Somerville, Mass.

Gloria Mindock
Between 1984-1994, I was Editor of the BOSTON LITERARY REVIEW/BluR, Co-founder of THEATRE S. and S. PRESS INC., and ran a poetry reading series called, BluR Reads. S. PRESS published a chapbook of my poems called, DOPPELGANGER, in 1992. Its poems were a text of a theatre piece of the same name performed by THEATRE S. A review by STAGES stated I took great liberties with Poe and "captured the romantic desperation of "William Wilson," a tale of self-destructive double-identity."
I have been published in numerous journals including PHOEBE, RIVER STYX, POET LORE, FIRE, and BLACKBOX with poems forthcoming in BIG HAMMER, BOGG, and UNU Revista de Cultura in Romania with translations by Flavia Cosma. I have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and was awarded a Massachusetts Council Poetry Fellowship distributed by The Somerville Arts Council.Oh Angel, a chapbook, was published in January, 2006 and Nothing Divine Here is forthcoming.Both published by U ŠOKU ŠTAMPA publications.
For over 34 years, I have been involved in all aspects of the theatre, acting in plays, operas and musicals, writing text for original plays as well as music compositions. My favorite was writing the music for an adaptation of GILGAMESH, in which I sang 72 sections a capella.
My solo multi-media performance art pieces include, "BIG BOMB BUICKS, WHERE DID ALL THOSE BIRDS AND DOGS COME FROM?, I WISH FRANCISCO FRANCO WOULD LOVE ME, and SKIN CELLS, MAGGOTS, AND OTHER POINTS OF INTEREST."
While THEATRE S. was in existence, many grants were awarded to the theatre from The Polaroid Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation, The Globe Foundation, New England For the Arts, Massachusetts Cultural Council, and The Somerville Arts Council.
Support ?ervená Barva Press

Aug 15 5PM My guest will be Danielle Legros Georges.


Danielle Legros Georges was born in Haiti and raised in the U.S. Her poems have appeared in numerous magazines, including The American Poetry Review,and her work is widely anthologized. Her many awards for writing include a LEF Foundation Fellowship; and a MacDowell Fellowship. Maroon is her first book-length publication. She is on the faculty at Lesley University in Cambridge, Mass.

Aug 1 5PM My guest will be Bagel Bard Scribe, Wilderness House Literary Review Poetry editor, and artist: Irene Koronas.

Irene Koronas and the SPIRITUAL POWER OF ZERO
by Lo Galluccio
Experimental poet and painter Irene Koronas based in Cambridge began creating when she was 12-years-old.
She explored language by reading and writing poetry and eventually fell in love with Octavio Paz, Cavafy and Yannos Ritsos.
Her Orthodox Greek heritage led her to be inspired by these poets as opposed to many confessional American poets.
Her latest creative exploration Project Zero, has led her to contemplate the meaning, image and representation of zero in all its many forms.
You will find paper reinforcements in some of her artwork because they are, after all, little sticky zeros. The title painting of her exhibition up at the O’Neill branch of the public library this month is titled 1 with 0=10-0_1 full circle.
Looking for zero, word combinations (o)
Wording zero’s representation, round soundVoid of biology, creator of chaos. Who belongsOpen? O differentiation from others. O only aloneAllows alone. O look you fools collapse
So broken so whole so smooth, so longSo propitious to soothe to group to blockCombinations; odd one equation annoys power;Old power oppositions. Zero uncovers
Look how wantonly, look you opposites,come, come. One, one good to twoZero zero plus two, no additionOnly zero operates somehow out of thought,subtraction. Others also born from cosmos,from reason, from axiom of you.
And Project Zero is not the first time Koronas has looked at numbers for their spiritual and artistic value. Her father made lists of numbers –pages and pages- before going to the dogtracks to bet and her Aunt was a compulsive scratch ticket gambler.
For Irene the numbers have a mystical meaning, for instance 1+ 2 = 3, is like the trinity. Her cubist paintings could compare with Eucharistic bread, broken into pieces but always whole.
Indeed her paintings --which relate to her poems like abstract correspondences-- are usually made on a grid composed of squares, which like eyes have images (or pupils) at the center.
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In the poem 12 cubes, printed below, she said, “The idea for this poem came from a painting done in a 12 cube grid. The words are not confined within the cubes but the cubes allow the images to co-exist. Unlike formalist writings and the use of a single subject; theme; I imagine the many and the varied images from the many sources. So each image compliments the other in and only in the fact that it is an image. The words paint an image. The image holds the words.”
12 cubes
everything’s wild on the way, in theway it is explained, i discover eightcubes from the 12 cubes painted. Nakedas opposed to nude, i witness yourleaps off the page, fifteen months toolate. Setting shutter speed, flexible andgetting paid for the method lovers tonein early morning. please sit, gatherliquid appropriately then clap. all sky,all video stores so red, no concept iscomplimented, it is blurry around myneck. I understand your concise cheer,red lines. Both round houses aremetaphysical, probably just adjustingwith ease with passing through. whatwill you inherit? the holes wornbackwards? dark night or day, standingby fountains fulfilling wishes? i dreamhow to button-hole memory: run staplesuntil an ostrich with no arms, a doorthat opens on explanations as conceit listens, tacks their thumbs; that’s whathappens in triangles. my brother wasthere he was orange he put himself inboxes to preserve our mothers for wesoak them in rain, in the end there by arope called victor, for grass in august islovely, sometimes an embarassment.have you transcended, thrown nerve upfrom tooth, given a ram one morechance to decode the seven purpleswamps. please, mothers, propel usthrough clouds, understanding our needto break even; hawks folding space, long corners into square houses
That poem relates to a painting in her upcoming exhibit, and is taken from a handmade chapbook called, “species.”
It’s full title comes from a definition found in a 1947 dictionary that Irene likes to use in order to find archaic meanings.
7. obsolete: specie.
{latin species seeing,appearance, likeness, aparticular sort, kind,species, from specere,to look at}
She said, “Forming a grid becomes a spiritual exercise, a discipline, a daily stance of commitment to my own definitions of what it means to be part of a species; historically I bring myself to myself each and every day. The becoming is within each square and each square represents that becoming.”
The maker of many one-of-a-kind handmade books, Irene Koronas also suggests that the musicality of her poems comes from her Orthodox Christian heritage where almost all the liturgy is sung.
“This is my history. It is as important to hear the poem as to read it,” she said.
Her watercolor paintings exhibit will be on display at the O’Neill Branch of the Public Library in Cambridge, 70 Rindge Ave., for the rest of January.
She is an exciting, experimental artist who is still dedicated to evolving

July 25 5PM My Guest will be Jean Trounstine:


"I am a professor of humanities at Middlesex Community College in Lowell Massachusetts, and I specialize in writing, literature and theatre courses. I am never bored! I became a writer because of needing to write about working in prison. I needed to tell stories of the amazing women behind bars. At Framingham Women's Prison in Massachusetts, I directed eight productions, including THE MERCHANT OF VENICE. Drawing from music history, women's history, art, literature and drama, the program eventually earned college credit and was nominated for a prestigious Schwartz Award, considered by the Mass Foundation for Humanities as the most successful project funded in 1988. It is the basis of my first book SHAKESPEARE BEHIND BARS: THE POWER OF DRAMA IN A WOMEN'S PRISON, published by St. Martin's Press, 2001. Prison work changed me, and I've written many articles about teaching offenders and been featured on The Today Show, All Things Considered-NPR, and The Connection. I co-edited an anthology of writings used in the Changing Lives Through Literature Program, published by Notre Dame Press, a program I helped to establish for women in Massachusetts (see cltl.umassd.com), where criminals are sentenced to a literature seminar and probation instead of jail. Because of that work, I also coauthored FINDING A VOICE: THE PRACTICE OF CHANGING LIVES THROUGH LITERATURE, published by the University of Michigan Press (which also recently published the paperback of SBB). My first collection of poetry, ALMOST HOME FREE, a collection of poetry about the journey of cancer -- I'm a survivor -- was published by Pecan Grove Press in 2003 and received enthusiastically.Most recently I've co-edited a book with Karen Propp, WHY I'M STILL MARRIED, published by Hudson Street Press, an imprint of Penguin, 2006. Essayists include a slew of great writers! I live more happily than not with my husband in Massachusetts. "

July 18 5PM my guest will be Chiemi:

Chiemi is a singer, songwriter and performer in the Boston-area, and welcomes you to see her perform, download her music or buy her CDs, and enjoy her work.


Chiemi was born Ingrid Chiemi Schroffner on Halloween 1970 in Honolulu. Her Japanese middle name means blessed one. Chiemi was the reigning Miss Teen of Hawaii in 1987-88. As a 'teen queen', she performed, singing and dancing for and at many charitable functions and fundraisers. In 1988, Chiemi conducted her Punahou High School graduating class of over 400 to perform a rendition in four-part harmony of her first written piece, "Steps to Find." While a soloist and member of the 150 person Boston College Chorale under the direction of the late liturgical music composer Dr. C. Alexander Peloquin, Chiemi was graced with the part of the female angel in Haydn's "The Heavens Are Telling," which she performed with the Chorale in a special audience with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican in Rome. While in graduate school, Chiemi was a soloist and member of "The Wand'ring Mistrials," an acapella singing group covering various pop tunes for charitable and graduate student events. Chiemi's musical influences are Joan Baez, Suzanne Vega and Annie Lennox. She enjoys micing at The Burren for the experienced and interesting people she has met to learn from—so much friendly talent! She thanks God for giving her a voice and sends much Aloha to her family and friends for their love and support, especially to her husband, Josh...

View the new Chiemi Montage video here.

June 13 5PM My guest will be Patricia Brodie. Brodie is a poet with a new collection out: "The American Wives Club" ( Ibbetson, 2006) Here are some comments about her work:




Patricia Brodie's poetic knife is well honed as she pares down to theessence of what it means to be mother/wife/lover/friend/careerwoman/expatriate in today's world. She skillfully carves words intowell-crafted pieces to complete a work that both genders will want to viewagain and again. ‹Ellaraine Lockie, poet, nonfiction author, educator

Patricia Brodie's poems are warm and witty with wonderful surprises for theenchanted reader. Her poems reflect a life of love, friendship and travel,of eucalyptus trees, found treasures of the sea, and the bittersweetmemories of home and family. They sing.‹Victor Howes, past president, New England Poetry Club

Patricia Brodie's poems are sophisticated, warm, sardonic. Whether you are drawn to form or free, you will find much that will please in this variedand very readable collection. Her distinctive voice will linger afteryou've finished. ‹Dorothy Stone, poet

June 27 5PM: My guest: Tomas O'Leary is a poet, translator, musician, singer, artist and expressive therapist. His published books of poetry are "Fool at the Funeral" and "The Devil Take a Crooked House," both from Lynx House Press; his third, now ready for publication, is "A Prayer for Everyone." Also ready are a novel, "Portrait of the Artist as a Black Hole," and a brief fairy tale for eccentric adults, "Once Upon a Realm Just Forming," both books with illustrations by the author:
His book of off-the-wall doodles with captions (self-published) is "Olio of 'Toons." He is presently immersed in translations of the Cuban revolutionary/poet, José Martí, and will soon publish a 21-poem Spanish/English volume entitled "La poesía es sagrada/ Poetry Is Sacred."

O'Leary's poems have appeared in numerous literary magazines, including such well-named venues as Agora, Anathema, Arion's Dolphin, The Blacksmith, Choice, The Chowder Review, Colorado Review, Cow Creek Review, East Coast Poets, Hubbub, Lynx, Midwest Quarterly, Mississippi Mud, Niagara, Ploughshares, Poiesis, Scarab, Street Magazine, Willow Springs,The Worcester Review,Words, Working from Silence, etc., and in such vibrant news-sheets as The Cambridge Chronicle, The Somerville News, and the Royal Gazette of Bermuda.

O'Leary has taught literature, creative writing and journalism at the college level, creative writing and Spanish at the high school level, and basic Spanish to little kids. He has given numerous poetry readings and workshops over the decades. For the past 15 years he has worked in nursing homes, leading circles of the elderly in song and spirited exchange, accompanied by his German-make (Hohner) Irish accordion manufactured in China, and entertains occasionally at pubs and private parties.

M.F.A. in poetry from the writers' workshop, UMass/Amherst, and M.A. in expressive therapies, Lesley University, O'Leary has lived some of his years in Colombia and Mexico. Brought up in Somerville (Massachusetts) by Irish immigrant parents, he resides just over the line, in Cambridge, with his wife and two sons.

May 16 5PM: My guest will be "Hanging Loose Press" editor Mark Pawlak. Pawlak has a new book out:

OFFICIAL VERSIONS

This is Mark Pawlak’s fifth poetry collection, the other most recent titles being Special Handling: Newspaper Poems New and Selected and All the News. His poetry and prose have appeared in The Best American Poetry 2006 (Billy Collins, ed.), New American Writing, Off the Coast, Pemmican, and The Saint Ann’s Review, among other places. In addition, he is editor of four anthologies, most recently, Present/Tense: Poets in the World, a collection of contemporary American political poetry, featuring work from some of the country’s best-known writers. Pawlak is Director of Academic Support Programs at the University of Massachusetts Boston, where he also teaches mathematics. He has been the recipient of two Massachusetts Artist Fellowship awards. He lives in Cambridge with his wife and his teenage son.

"Mark Pawlak...reminds me of a lyrical "junk," man-and I mean this in the best sense of the word. He collects phrases, archaic songs, ephemera from the past, and makes a strong poetic statement....Pawlak has a very quirky, engaging and unique style. Recommended."--Doug Holder, Boston Area Small Press Poetry Scene Read the full article>>

“Mark Pawlak’s poems document a literary journey charged with the sheer joy of words and often with fierce irony. He finds poetry in day-to-day common language, and makes his poems from snippets of remembered conversation and comment, from restaurant serving mats, the phone book and, most pointedly, from the news. Pawlak’s sophisticated use of irony allows him to precisely slice through governmental double-talk and the slanted reportage of our time to expose the contradictions, errors and lies inherent in the rhetoric of power brokers and political spin doctors. He is our most politically conscious poet and, as such, puts conscience back into poetry where it is sorely needed.” -—Michael Basinski, Curator, The Poetry Room, SUNY Buffalo

“Narrative? Kind of. Lyric? Sort of. Mark Pawlak takes his own versions (found and otherwise) and has turned them inside-out to celebrate how insane and touching language can be: from ‘perks’ to ‘Pappa Oom Mow Mow’—go on and shake it, baby!”—Kimiko Hahn

Praise for Mark Pawlak’s previous books:
SPECIAL HANDLING: NEWSPAPER POEMS NEW AND SELECTED“At a time when many Americans are too demoralized or too confused, as Gore Vidal says, to remember anything past last Tuesday, Pawlak names things accurately, jogs our memory and sharpens our wit.”—Michael True, Worcester Magazine

“Poetry and politics do mix—rather like nitrogen and glycerin—in Mark Pawlak’s explosive verse.” -—Kristin Aronson

ALL THE NEWS“It is wonderful to find a book as serious and witty as this…one of the best of the year and of the times.”—Thomas McGrath

May 2 5PM My guest will be thr Rev. Steve Edington, the author of the "Beat Face of God..."


This book is an exploration of some of the underlying spiritual and religious currents found in the writings and lives of a loose constellation of writers and poets who came together in America after World War II, and came to be known as the Beat Generation writers. Among their more prominent figures were Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, Gary Snyder, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti, to name just a few.

Writing from the perspective of a liberal religious minister (Unitarian Universalist) and a Beat Generation scholar, Rev. Stephen Edington expands upon, and delves into, Jack Kerouac's contention that the Beat Generation was a religious generation. These writers and poets, each in his or her own way, were articulating and setting forth an "alternative spirituality" in the face of the prevailing cultural ethos of the America of the 1950s.

This is not primarily, however, a literary review of a group of writers from over a half-century ago. Their work is as powerful today as it was in their day, especially for those pursuing a spiritual path of their own. Edington weaves much of the spiritual journeys of the Beats into the evolution of his own spirituality.

Also, the ways in which the Beats challenged the culture and politics of America in the 1950s resonates strongly in today's post-9/11 America as well, as this book's concluding chapter demonstrates.

About the Author

Rev. Stephen Edington is the minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church in Nashua, New Hampshire. He is a member of the Lowell Celebrates Kerouac Committee and an adjunct faculty member of the University of Massachusetts at Lowell. His previous book is Kerouac's Nashua Connection.

March 7 2006: My guest will be comedian Emily Singer. We will discuss her creative life as a performer and comedy writer. Here is an article about Emily in "The Somerville News."

by Karmyn E. Guthrie

Emily Singer, local comedian and spokesperson for Jimmy Tingle’s Off-Broadway, spoke at the Somerville News contributors meeting February 18thSinger does public relations and marketing for the Davis Square theater, a job that utilizes her genuine passion for comedy, in general, and Jimmy Tingle’s, in particular.
“Comedy is extremely addictive,” said Singer. And she’d like to help all of us get our fix. “We’d like to reach out to the community so they feel like they have a place to go every night of the week.”
Jimmy Tingle’s, a 200-seat theater, was founded by its namesake in November of 2002. Already, some of the biggest names in comedy have graced its stage, including the founder himself. Tingle, who you may have seen on just about any of the late night talk show, 60 Minutes II, or his HBO special has
become one of the most well-respected comedians around, choosing to keep this lively yet intimate Somerville venue as his home theater.
“Jimmy is one of the most creative people I’ve ever met,” said Singer, who opened for him recently. She credits him, as well as the other top-of-their-game performers at the theater, as a valuable influence on her own career. “It’s a wonderful opportunity to learn from the masters,” she said.
Singer has been doing stand-up since 1997, gravitating to it from acting then improv. “Comedy is so multifaceted. “ she said, “I see how people can spend their whole lives doing it.”
With her soft voice and gentle, unassuming manner, she doesn’t strike one as typical for someone in her field. “When people find out I’m a comedian they’re really shocked, “ she said.
But after watching her act, it makes sense. Her routine, which incorporates everything from massage parlors to speed dating to getting organized, works well with her personality, and her jokes are both offbeat and natural.
“It’s best to start from something natural then spin it,” Singer said. “My favorite jokes are things that just happen to me. She savors little absurdities of life, such as riding a bus to New York and noticing a fellow passenger who was, inexplicably, wearing a gorilla suit.
Singer also said that humor can also come from the tragedies and annoyances of life. “Comedy is a great healer, “ she said. She said that live comedy is a good way for audiences to put everything else behind, and that at Jimmy Tingle’s the audiences have been great. “The thing that everyone says about the theater is that it’s got great vibes, “ she said.


Emily Singer has performed throughout the New England area and in Los Angeles, New York and Madison, entertaining audiences with her unique comedic view of the world. For four years in a row (thru 2005), she has been picked to play The Boston International Comedy & Movie Festival. She has also performed in the 2003 California New Talent Comedy Contest, and the 2003 London New Talent Comedy Contest. She has hosted the Women In Comedy series at Jimmy Tingle’s OFF BROADWAY Theater.

She has performed at benefit shows for causes such as The Emerson Baseball Team, Habitat for Humanity and The Advent School. She is among several comedians who share their memories of children’s television pioneer Rex Trailer in the documentary “Rex Trailer’s Boomtown” which aired on CBS-TV 4 in June 2005 and is archived in the Museum of TV and Radio in NYC. She has performed comedy at numerous venues, including Bradley Playhouse, Putnam CT, The Improv Comedy Club, New York, NY, The Comedy Club, Madison WI, and Stand Up-NY, New York, NY. For more info please visit: www.emilysinger.com

Emily teaches acting at Brookline Adult & Community Education (since 1997), where she has at times taught Stand-Up Comedy and Improv. Since Fall 2003 she has worked as a teacher’s assistant to Bronia Wheeler in Acting classes at Harvard University Extension School and Harvard University Summer School.
http://emilysinger.com

Feb. 28 2006: My Guests will be Grey Held and Shelby Allen

From Grey Held:

I co-teach a poetry workshop with Shelby Allen at the Northeastern
Correctional Center in Concord.
Before that I volunteered in a program at Baystate Correctional Center in
Norfolk, MA.
I enjoy teaching poetry in prison. The guys in the class are eager to tell
their stories and are quite talented.
I'm continually moved by how smart these guys are--about themselves and
about connecting with others.
Some of them did something stupid under the influence of drugs twenty years
ago and have had twenty years to think and reflect on their actions.

April 18 2006: My guest will be David McNamara. McNamara founded and operates sunnyoutside, an independent press, in Somerville, Massachusetts. He studied literature at Long Island University, Ohio State University, the Poets' House in Ireland, Wroxton College (England), and Fairleigh Dickinson University, where he earned his BA in English Language. He also holds a graduate certificate in Publishing from Emerson College. Widely published in the small press, he was the director of )ism(, based in Seattle, in the late 1990s, before moving to Massachusetts and launching sunnyoutside. Still writing and submitting occasionally, his collection Or is forthcoming from Hemispherical Press.

My guest April 11,2006: Sarah Getty is an award-winning poet and fiction writer living near Boston, Mass. Her second book of poems, Bring Me Her Heart, will be published by Higganum Hill Press in March 2006. Her first collection, The Land of Milk and Honey, was published by the University of South Carolina Press as part of the James Dickey Contemporary Poetry Series. It won the Cambridge Poetry Prize in the Publication category in March, 2002. Sarah’s poem “That Woman” is included in the anthology Birds in the Hand, published in April, 2004 by Farrar, Straus, Giroux. In 2004 she received the Barbara Bradley Prize from the New England Poetry Club and was one of five finalists in the grub street, inc. poetry contest.
In July of 2006, Sarah will lead a 10-day poetry workshop at the Villa Virgiliana on the Bay of Naples in Italy. More details can be found in the Workshops section of this web site.
Sarah Getty’s poetry can also be found in magazines such as The Paris Review, The Western Humanities Review, and The Massachusetts Review. Her poem “Ciphers” has been set to music by Adam Grossman in a piece for mixed chorus and flute choir.
Getty’s short fiction has been published in the Iowa Review and the Larcom Review. Her story “Forces” will appear in the anthology Great Old Broads, forthcoming from Haworth Press in 2005.
"Makes radiant the role of women over more than a century of physical and metaphysical voyaging. Here, poignantly, are "mortals, telling their stories."
--Maxine Kumin
"Plain statements, everyday situations, ordinary American lives, yet suddenly with a last image, or a final line of great beauty and transcendence, and you realize that you are in the presence of a poet. Like Oliver's these poems have that weird, exhilarating combination of clarity of statement, story, or situation, with depth of feeling that reveals the mystery beneath the everyday."
-- The Virginia Quarterly Review
more about Sarah Getty>>
home • poetry • fiction • readings workshops • links • guestbook • email

March 28 2006 5 PM My guest will be: Edward J. Carvalho. Ed is a twice-nominated Pushcart Prize writer (2004-2005) who has been writing poetry for over 20 years. A persona who is very much like part Dimebag Darrell Abbott and part Walt Whitman, his poetry is often described as having a style that is 'original, innovative, imaginative and brutal.' Sometimes filled with satire and other times lyrical poignancy, Carvalho's work is always teeming with the unexpected. He is the author of several self-published chapbooks and full-length collections of poetry, including the latest manuscript, "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short", which is currently being shopped to publishers around the United States. His poetry - lauded by Nobel laureate, Elie Wiesel and poet, Martin Espada - has appeared in various national journals around the country. Mr. Carvalho holds an M.F.A. in creative writing from Goddard College with future academic plans that include the pursuit of a doctorate in literature and criticism focusing on Walt Whitman. He currently resides in Boston, MA. For more information, please visit http://www.edwardjcarvalho.com"

Jan. 24 2006 : My Guests will be Lee Kidd and Jessa Lynne, founders of the "Squawk Coffeehouse" in Harvard Square.









Somerville News
On any given day, at the Sherman Cafe, in Union Square, you are bound to run into any number of poets, writers, and artists nursing their respective cups of java.
On this particular Saturday I ran into the former owner of House of Sarah Books in Inman Sq. and June Gross who co-wrote the play “The Dangers of Empathy.” But, who I was really waiting for was Lee Kidd and Jessa Lynne, of the “Squawk Coffeehouse,” a long-time venue of music, poetry and performance housed at the Harvard Epworth Methodist Church just outside Harvard Square.
Since 1988, the coffeehouse has presented such folks as the poet/writer Ed Sanders, the singer and 60’s activist John Sinclair, the jazz musician and Kerouac confidant David Amram, and a host of local poets and musicians. Their other brainchild is “Squawk Magazine” an art and poetry journal that they have put out with artist/poet Mick Cusimano and others. There are 57 issues of the print magazine, and now “Squawk” is solely online, but a new print run may be in the works.
Lee Kidd, one of the founders of the “Squawk” enterprise, is decidedly a Renaissance man. Since 1976, he has owned and operated a language school in Harvard Square that specializes in foreign language immersion. Kidd is not just a self-educated bohemian. He attended Harvard Divinity School; he is a Fulbright scholar, and has been published in “The New Yorker.”
Jessa Lynne has an equally fascinating background. Originally from the Milwaukee area; she moved here looking for a counterculture venue when she heard of the “Naked City,” an earlier incarnation of “Squawk,” which was located at the “Allston Mall” in Allston. “I was impressed with the warm and open environment,” she said. Since then, she has graced the stage at “Squawk.” She has performed skits, political satire, dance and other modes of expression.
Lynne works at Harvard, and also has a gig where she portrays historical figures like Susan B. Anthony, Emilia Earhart, and other notable women, at libraries and schools in the area. Kidd said that “Squawk” has changed a lot from 1988 to 2005. Before it was basically music and poetry, now there is anything from jugglers to book signings, he said. “We are more eclectic now. We have a coffeehouse consciousness, a mix of people from the homeless to Harvard professors,” he said. Kidd and Lynne are optimistic for the future of “Squawk.” Kidd said, “There will a great golden age of music and poetry in the third millennium, and we'll be part of it.” “Squawk” meets every Thursday night at 9 p.m. at the Harvard Epworth Methodist Church, 1555 Mass. Ave., Harvard Square, Cambridge. More information is available at www.angelfire.com/music/squawk.

Feb 14 2006 5PM : My guest will be
poet Sarah Hannah.


Sarah Hannah
sarahhannah@writersartists.net


Sarah Hannah received a B.A. from Wesleyan University and an M.F.A. from Columbia University. She is currently completing her doctorate in English Literature at Columbia University's Graduate School of the Arts and Sciences. Her poems have appeared in Parnassus, The Southern Review, Pivot, Barrow Street, Michigan Quarterly Review, Crab Orchard Review, Gulf Coast, and other journals. She was awarded a Governor's Fellowship for residencies at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts for summer 2001 and 2002. The original manuscript which became Longing Distance was a semi-finalist for the Yale Younger Poets Prize in 2002.

Governor's Fellowship, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts
Davidoff Fellowship, Wesleyan Writers' Conference
Semi-finalist, Yale Younger Poets Prize, 2002

Sarah Hannah has taught creative writing and composition at Wesleyan University, Columbia University, the 92nd Street Y, and in private workshops in New York City.
She currently teaches a poetry workshop at the Makor Center of the 92nd Street Y.
AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) convention in Chicago, April 2004.


Longing Distance, Tupelo Press 2004.


This is an extremely moving work. I'm struck by her intelligence of emotion, and her unmistakable voice. These poems are at once determined, vulnerable, and fierce; she looks it all straight in the eye. Shadow and lover beware: these poems will fix you. Sarah Hannah is a true original. I love this book. —Annie Dillard

The distance of longing, the proximity of oblivion: the motives that animate these poems are the contours of perception in a mortal coil. Sarah Hannah is a physiologist of sight, devoutest scribe to the almost-seen, the intimated world, even, or especially, as that world is about to be lost. She is also a worker of wonders. See how, in her hands, the sonnet becomes an instrument of twenty-first-century meditation. See how the fish in the marketplace "in greens and ices swimming" suddenly brings to life again the "river lined with briars." —Linda Gregerson

Sarah Hannah's poems are subtly alive to the many ways the natural world interpenetrates and informs and interprets human experience. But what impresses me most about them is their engagement with language itself—words and the forms they assume—as the link between us and the circumambient universe. Her work says something at once new and very old, and something we badly need to hear. —James Olney

Jan 10 2006 5PM: My guest will be Tufts University Lecturer and poet Rebecca Kaiser Gibson. Gibson, a Somerville resident, has an eclectic background in the Arts, and she will talk about her creative life and energies.

Oberlin College, BA; Teachers College, Columbia University, MAT (Theatre); University of Pittsburgh, MA, (Theatre Directing); Boston University, MA (Creative Writing: Poetry)


Background

Major Awards:
MacDowell Colony, writing residency

rebecca.kaisergibson@tufts.edu

Poetry:Northwest Review, "Inside the Church" (forthcoming publication) Field, Number 70: “Global Warming”Northwest Review, XXXVIII-1: “Fever Passage” ”Mothering, No. 68: “When He Carried His Baby Across the Hall” Agni, 42: “The Loomfixer” The Boston Phoenix: “Sacrificial” The Boston Review, Volume XXI, Number 5: “Dunkin’ Donuts --Somerville, Mass.”The Antigonish Review, Number 93-94: “Lester and Martha” Fiction, Essays and Reviews:Pleiades, review of Anne Winters’ “The Displaced of Capital”Harvard Review, Number 17: “Of Paradise”Northwest Review, Vol 41, No. 3: "Why He Calls”Pleiades, 24:2: review of “The Unexpected Aviary” by L.R. Berger The Boston Book Review, Vol. 6, issue 2 “It Was Proper Form”: review of Martha Collins’ “Some Things Words Can Do.”Radio Broadcast:Radio for the Blind TIC, Marshfield, MA 2003

My guest Dec. 6 2005 will be poet and host of the Poet's Theatre at the Club Passim (Harvard Square), Richard Cambridge.

Interview
with
Richard Cambridge
by
Jessa Piaia
[excerpted from SQUAWKMagazine, Issue #46]
June 1991
Jessa: Richard, what poets have influenced you most?

Richard: Certainly everything in Elliot's poem, "The Love Song of J. Alfred PruFrock," speaks to me how I feel as a poet. Written in rhyme and free verse, it's a combination that has always attracted me. I'm never quite happy in either form, and his was such a perfect blending. The poem itself just blew me away. I thought, "If I can write like that, that's a yardstick to measure myself against."
Leonard Cohen really opened me up the widest, through his songs, poetry, and novel, Beautiful Flowers. He has the ability of combining the sacred and the profane, by elevating the profane as to make it beautiful and holy. His theory of being an artist, a poet, a creative person was to be totally vulnerable, dwelling in this openness, allowing it to run through you, and then working it out from there. One of his sayings was, "Openness is our art form; spontaneity is genius." I said, "Okay, no matter what happens, I'm going to do this. No matter where it takes me, I'll follow it."
Also in Beautiful Flowers, Cohen defines a saint, not the old-Christian type, but a 20th century one. He says, "A saint is someone who has achieved a remote human possibility. It is impossible to say what that possibility is. I think it has something to do with the energy of LOVE. Contact with this energy results in the exercise of a kind of balance in the chaos of existence. I do not think the saint dissolves the chaos even for himself, for there is something arrogant and warlike in the notion of a man setting the universe in order. It is a kind of balance that is his glory. He rides the drifts like an 'escaped ski.' His course is a caress of the hill; something in him so loves the world that he gives himself to the laws of gravity and chance." Just the whole notion of being an 'escaped ski,' like a ski run wild, wherever the curve of the mountain rut takes you is where you go. You're totally given over. This just blew me away!
More than other poets, Keats and Yeats both impressed me as poets who wrote from the inside out; they expressed the inner understanding and knowledge that comes when you've in touch with the truth of something, because you've identified internally and have become empathic, in a sense.

Jessa: What have been your sources of inspiration?Richard: Nature, relationship, political struggles, including the Native American movement, and the struggle of women expressed in my Halloween poem.

My poem, "The Life of a Man," is autobiographic. It details my passage of starting off as a poet, but then having to put down the pen, to participate in the fight for both civil rights and to end the war in Southeast Asia. The last line, "What is a twist of rhyme to a Black man doing time?" questions the significance of poetry if people are unjustly imprisoned or getting blown away in foreign countries in wars that we have no business participating in. I've always had that struggle of social conscience.

Jessa: Tell us more about your philosophy of poetry.

Richard: I think as artists we have to speak for our time and for what is eternal. All great art transcends its time, while speaking for its time. It's not a matter of tripping out to do a retro thing of sheer romanticism. We have to deal with the hard issues of the day: AIDS, the S & L mess, the Gulf War. The Gulf War was wrong; and all war, eternally, is wrong. That's our challenge and responsibility as artists, to be part of the greater community, to address our present reality, as we weave in timelessness to transcend the human condition. Bob Dylan approached this in his song, "Blowing in the Wind."

Nov. 1 2005 5PM: My guest will be Timothy Gager cofounder of
“The Somerville News Writers Festival”

Three years. In the world of literary ventures, venues, etc.... this can seem like a lifetime. Tim Gager and I started “The Somerville News Writers festival,” a few years ago, when “The Somerville News,” was undergoing big changes with new ownership and staffing. I asked Tim to join me in this venture because of his reputation for running an excellent reading series for fiction writers, “Dire Reader,” at the “ Out of the Blue Art Gallery,” in Cambridge. Since then Tim and I have presented poets and writers like Andre Dubus lll, Tom Perrotta, Jack Powers, Marc Goldfinger, Deborah Priestly, Robert K. Johnson, Steve Almond, and others, at the “Jimmy Tingle Theatre,” in Davis square.
To tell you the truth, I am surprised that we lasted this long. It takes a lot of work, and a cadre of loyal interns, not to mention money, to put on these literary gigs. There is always the clash of personalities and considerable egos, along with the attempts to attract an often indifferent media to contend with. But with the backing of “The Somerville News,” both owners and board of directors, we have presented what we believe is fitting for the impressive literary community Somerville has become.
This year, Nov. 13 2005, to be exact, we are moving to a larger space at the historic “Somerville Theatre,” in Davis Square. We will be housed in a 900 seat theatre, and have an impressive roster of readers. On board will be two Pulitzer Prize winners poet Franz Wright and novelist Robert Olen Butler. Louisa Solano, owner of the famed “Grolier Poetry Book Shop,” will be presented with the “Ibbetson Street Press Life Time Achievement Award,” and poets and writers such as Sue Miller (“The Good Mother”), Alex Beam (“Gracefully Insane”), Lan Samantha Chang, the new head of the “Iowa Writers Workshop,” Susie Davidson (“I Refused to Die...”), Steve Almond (“My Life in Heavy Metal”), Afaa Michael Weaver ( “These Hands I Know), Tim Gager (“Short Street), Hallie Ephron and Donald Davidoff ( “Delusion,”), will read from their impressive body of work.
The music will provided by that gifted poet/singer/ songwriter Jennifer Matthews. Matthews is a published poet, who has just released a critically acclaimed CD “The Wheel,” (Thunda Moon Records).
We are keeping the ticket prices low at $9, to make this an accessible festival. Both Tim and I feel strongly that the rich artistic milieu of Somerville, Mass. should have a festival that aspires for national recognition, but still stays true to its local roots.
*For info. About tickets contact

Nov. 29 2005: 5PM My guest will be poet Michael Brown.


Biography
Michael R. Brown

"the Jerry Garcia of performance poetry" --WBUR/NPR"ein Dichter und Weltenbummler" --Die Welt"rascal-artist-angel-wonder...at the same time" -- Paul Stokstad, "Poets at 8"
Along with Finnish performance poet Erkki Lappalainen, President of the International Organization of Performance Poets, Michael Brown, the organization's General Secretary, produced the first Poetry Olympics held October 1998 in Stockholm, Europe's Cultural Capital. Poets from twelve countries competed in four separate categories. Plans are underway for a larger Olympics during the next several years in another European country.
Michael Brown's first book of poetry, Falling Wallendas (Chicago: Tia Chucha, 1994) resulted from a performance piece presented around the USA for the previous three years. The point of view is that of someone who has lived a full life and finds it too easy to look back in comfortable memory and not too difficult to look ahead. Much of the political attitude stems from a quote from an old organizer, "The most radical thing you can have in America is a long memory." In 1995 Brown's new performance piece, Prof. Perfpo lectures on performing poetry, premiered at Passim's in Cambridge. Susquehanna, his new book-length poetry manuscript, presents persona poems from small town life. He is currently working on two more poetry books, one of which is The Martin Bormann Dog Care Book containing political poems.
Michael Brown's first published poem appeared in the premiere issue of Beyond Baroque in 1968. Over the past 30 years his poems have been in (among others) Amandla Ngewethu!, Another Chicago Magazine, Blue Cloud, Defined Providence, Galley Sail, Greenfield Review, Kudzu, Oyez, On the Bus, Pembroke, Red Brick Review, West Coast Poetry Review, and in Since Feeling Is First (Scott, Foresman, 1972), The Vagaries of Invention (Sidewinder, 1982) and Stray Bullets: Chicago Saloon Poets 1991 (Tia Chucha, 1992). He has also had travel articles in The Chicago Tribune, "Homage to Robert Hayden" in Commentary (1980), fiction in Wormwood, feature articles in The Chicago Reader, and occasional columns in The Korea Times.
An itinerant professor, Brown has been teaching for 39 years, including five years of high school and stints at Michigan, East Texas State, Central (Ohio) State, Western Michigan, Illinois-Chicago, the Uptown Chicago Center of Elmhurst and North Park, Roosevelt, Rhode Island, Suffolk, and his best-loved of all, Chicago State. Currently Professor of Communications at Mount Ida College, he teaches writing, Intercultural Communications, and English as a Second Language.
Brown holds a Ph.D. in English and Education from the University of Michigan. His dissertation, directed by Robert Hayden, was a literary history of the poetry of the Harlem Renaissance. In 1986 and 1987 Brown taught at Suwon University in South Korea and traveled extensively in Asia. In 1988 he lectured on English as a second language at the National Normal University in Taipeh. In 1991 he lectured at the University of Stockholm on African American literature and performed his poetry at Kaffe 44. In 1998 he lectured on performance poetry at Hamburg University and performed in London, England; Halmstad, Umea and Stockholm, Sweden; Dusseldorf and Hamburg, Germany; Amsterdam, Netherlands; and Jerusalem.
Brown began doing slam and performance poetry when he returned from Korea. After honing his skills in the bars of Chicago, including the infamous Weeds, he and his wife brought competitive poetry to the Northeast. They co-hosted the Boston slam, and they were members of the 1993 National Championship team from Boston. Brown organized the 1992 International Poetry Slam Championships. He founded Slam! the International Performance Poetry Newsletter, official publication of the Poetry Olympics and the US national slam, and he is creator of for international poetry news. He has several times performed his poem "Chorus" as part of Beat Cafe, an original ballet choreographed by former Joffrey dancer Anthony Williams. He recently completed a play , The Duchess of York. He appeared in the documentary film SlamNation. He continues to write, teach, perform, plan, and dream.

Oct 11 2005: 5PM My guest will be storyteller Judah LeBlang.


Judah Leblang is a writer, teacher and storyteller based in Boston, MA. His written and audio pieces combine reflection, keen observation, and humor.

Oct 18, 2005 5PM: My guest will be poet Ifeanyi Menkiti

Born in Onitsha, Nigeria, Ifeanyi Menkiti first came to the United States to attend Pomona College from which he received his undergraduate degree. Later he went on to Columbia University and New York University for further studies. He received his Ph.D in Philosophy from Harvard University. He has taught Philosophy at Wellesley College for more than 30 years.


Ifeanyi Menkiti is the author of two previous collections of poetry, Affirmations (1971) and The Jubilation of Falling Bodies (1978). Other poems have appeared in journals and periodicals such as the Sewanee Review, Ploughshares, New Directions, New Letters, the Massachusetts Review. In addition, such other publications as the Evergreen Review, Stony Brook, Bitterroot, the Southwest Review, Chelsea and theAfrican journals Okike, Transition and Nigeria Magazine have also carried his work. In 1975, he was honored with a fellowship in poetry from Massachusetts Council on the Arts and Humanities through the Artists Foundation, followed in 1978 by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Menkiti's poetry has also been aired on National Public Radio and he has given public readings in the New York City public schools under the auspices of the Academy of American Poets as well as for radio stations WBAI (NYC) and WGBH (Boston).
Ifeanyi Menkiti's new edition of poetry, Of Altair, the Bright Light has been published by Earthwinds Editions Spring 2005.

Dec 13 2005 5PM: My guest will be Tam Lin Neville.

Tam Lin Neville, (like myself) was born in New York City, but now after stints in Philadelphia, Indiana, China and Japan she has made the 'Ville her home. Neville's poetry has appeared in such respected journals as the American Poetry Review, The Massachusetts Review, Crazyhorse and others. She has worked as a creative writing teaching fellow at Butler University in Indianapolis, and her chapbook, "Dreaming in Chinese," won the Calypso Press' first chapbook competition in the Spring of 1995. Neville uses striking imagery from nature to illuminate personal intimacy and the intricacies of the soul. Her poems have been described as, "...profoundly original in their way of being moral, mysterious and intimate, all at once." Her most recent poetry collection is "Journey Cake," that deals with her experiences in China.

My guest Nov 8 2005 5PM will be Naomi F. Chase:

Author of three books of poetry, two nonfiction titles, numerous short stories, and articles for the The Village Voice, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, Naomi Feigelson Chase will be at Porter Square Books to read from her "novel in verse," Gittel, the Would-Be Messiah, which was nominated for the Turning Point Press Award of 2005. In 2003, she won the 2003 Flume Press Poetry Chapbook Award for One Blue Thread.

Sept 13- 5PM We will rebroadcast an interview with Hallie Ephron, and Doc. Donald Davidoff, the co-authors of the Peter Zak mystery series. They will both be reading at The Somerville News Writers Festival 3 Nov. 13 2005 7PM The Somerville Theatre Davis Sq. Somerville http://somervillenewswritersfestival.com

Sept 6 2005: Susie Davidson. We will rebroadcast an earlier interview with Davidson concerning her Holocaust compliation "I Refused to Die...." http://www.irefusedtodie.com

8/30 5PM Channel 3 SCAT: This will be a re-broadcast of an earlier interview with poet and singer/songwriter Jennifer Matthews. http://jennifermatthews.com Matthews has a new CD out "The Wheel," and she will be performing at "The Somerville News Writers Festival" Nov 13 2005 7PM at The Somerville Theatre. http://somervillenewswritersfestival.com

Sept 20 5PM: My guest will be Jim Kates, publisher of Zephyr Press of Brookline, Mass.

Zephyr Press, a non-profit arts and education 501(c)(3) organization, publishes literary titles that foster deeper understanding of cultures and languages.
Since its first forays into American poetry and prose in 1980, Zephyr has expanded its list to include a series of Russian and Slavic literature, and most recently an East Asian line of books. Zephyr has also initiated a collaborative venture with the series Adventures in Poetry—a small press with a thirty-year history.
To further our commitment to cross-cultural exchange, we organize bilingual readings, translation workshops in schools, and other educational and cultural events.

My guest on Sept 27 2005 5PM will be:

Aldo Tambellini was born in Syracuse, New York in 1930 and was taken to Italy at the age of eighteen months where he lived in Lucca (Tuscany), Italy. At the age of ten he was enrolled in the Scuola D’Arte, Augusto Passaglia and studied there until he was sixteen. His neighborhood was bombed during World War II (21 of his friends and neighbors died). In 1946, Aldo returned to the United States. For his artistic talents, he received a full scholarship to study Art at the University of Syracuse where he earned his B.F.A. in Painting in 1954. Subsequently, Aldo was awarded aTeaching Fellowship at the University of Notre Dame studying under World–renowned artist, Ivan Mastrovic graduating with a Master Degree in Sculpture in 1959. Aldo moved to New York City at the end of 1959. He was the founder of the artistic group called "Group Center", an active counter-culture movement organizing group exhibitions, anti-Vietnam demonstrations, multi-media events and collaborative performances. While interacting with other artists, Aldo continued to exhibit as a painter and a sculptor. He founded the Gate Theatre the only daily public theatre showing avant-garde independent filmmakers in New York City. He, also, co-founded with Otto Piene the Black Gate, a second theatre, which held live multi-media performances and installations. In the late ’60s he was a pioneer of the movement of alternative video (non-broadcast TV). Aldo won the International Grand Prix, Oberhausen Film Festival, 1969 for his "Black TV" now in a collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, where he held a One-Man Film Show. Recognition for his avant-garde work led Aldo to be in the First Video as Art Form Exhibition at Brandeis University Museum, Massachusetts and the First Video Art Gallery Show at Howard Wise Gallery, New York City. With Otto Piene, Aldo Tambellini created the first ever National Television Broadcast by Artists in 1968 in Cologne, Germany and participated in the First Broadcast by Video Artists on WBGH, Boston. For his media work, he was awarded several grants from the New York State Council of the Arts. From 1976-84, Aldo was a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Visual Studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. There, he worked with Arts, Media and Communication conducting courses, workshops and participated in events in the United States, Europe, Japan and Australia. He organized a group called "Communicationsphere". His Media and Communication work was exhibited at the Bienale ‘83, Sao Paolo, Brazil and at the Sogetzu, Japan. Since 1984, his artistic activities have concentrated on writing and performing poetry in many venues in Massachusetts and Connecticut. In 1998 he founded and hosted a venue "The People’s Poetry" in Cambridge, MA. His poetry deals with the effect of technology on our lives, the issues of poverty, the alienation of humans in our society, the destructive aspect of war, and the neglect of the poor and the elderly. His vision has been described as "dark". Using a style that is sometimes tough, humorous, sarcastic, tragic and metaphorical most of his themes are contemporary and brutally raw. In contrast, Aldo is gentle and sensitive in his poems dedicated to children. He has performed his poetry with music; video projection; participated in many radio shows and countless poetry venues. Aldo was first published in the Syracuse University Literary Journal in 1952. Subsequently, he has been published in several journals and publications including "Center Poems", CAVS, MIT, "Black Rose Magazine", Boston, "Spare Change Newspaper", "Ibbetson Street Press", in the most recent book City of Poets, 18 Boston Voices , and in the Spring Issue 2002 of "Voices of Italian Americana" (VIA). These photos were taken by Anna Salamone(C) 2003, including, one with Daniela Gioseffi at the American Italian Roundtable Book Fair at Fordham University in New York City, December 2003.

Aug. 2 2005: My guest will be Susie Davidson, author of " I Refused to Die: Stories of Boston Area Holocaust Survivors and Soldiers Who Liberated The Concentration Camps of World War ll." ( Ibbetson 2005) "The words of Holocaust survivors and their liberators mark the end of an unspeakable world war and the beginning of new life for those who endured. Susie Davidson has done a remarkable job in capturing the depths of despair and the joys of salvation. The act of liberation will always be seared in the minds and hearts of those inside and outside the gates of the camps." Thomas G. Kelley, Secretary Commonwealth of Massachusetts Department of Veterans' Services “Sixty years ago, in the spring of 1945, Allied soldiers entered Nazi concentration camps and found evidence of an almost incomprehensible evil. But they also found survivors. In this volume, Susie Davidson gives us the testimony of both survivors and liberators: encounters between those who had defied death and those who had risked death in the same cause, to preserve human freedom and human dignity. We must honor them by carrying on their struggle to defend life, liberty, and justice for all persons.” Michael E. Capuano, Member of Congress "In writing this book, Susie Davidson is advancing the eternal message of the most significant event in Jewish history. In doing so, she is fulfilling a most important service to the entire community. The Holocaust was an essential element in the establishment of the State of Israel, which reserves an official national day for honoring its memory. Its lessons are the most profound and the most crucial in the creation of our modern Jewish identity. Susie's effort to document the story of these remarkable survivors and the brave soldiers who liberated the camps is to be supported and is greatly appreciated." Hillel Newman Consul of Israel to New England “’I Refused to Die’ provides Boston's Jewish community with a fitting testimony to mankind's darkest hour. It is overwhelming to read how each individual life was so brutally stripped bare. The author allows readers, who have neither the experience nor the language to truly understand such levels of horror, a chance to empathize with the unique plight of the victims.” Richard Ferrer Editor, The Jewish Advocate

July 12 2005 5PM: Joan Houlihan



Joan Houlihan is the director of the Concord Poetry Center, author of Hand-Held Executions, Poems & Essays and of the chapbook Our New and Smaller Lives. She is editor-in-chief of Perihelion, a nationally lauded poetry magazine, as well as the senior poetry editor of Del Sol Review, both published at webdelsol.com. She writes a column on contemporary poetry, Boston Comment, and she is staff reviewer for the Contemporary Poetry Review.
Ms. Houlihan's work has appeared or is forthcoming in many journals and magazines, including Boston Review, Harvard Review, The Gettysburg Review, Poetry International, Fulcrum, Passages North, Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Arts, Gulf Coast, VOLT and is anthologized in the upcoming Iowa Anthology of New American Poetries (University of Iowa Press, December 2004). She has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize.

July 19 5PM My guest will be: Lois Ames. Ames is a poet, biographer and psychotherapist. Born in Boston,she graduated from Smith College,and from the University of Chicago with a Master of Arts degree in psychiatric social work. She has published many biographical essays on Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath, including "A Biographical Note" in The Bell Tar (Harper & Row) and Anne Sexton: A Self Portrait in Letters (Houghton Mifflin). She has received, among other awards and citations, a gold medal from The University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration Alumni Association, "For Outstanding Achievements in Education & Human Welfare." She is Lectuter on Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.

My guest will be Manson Kennedy, program director of the "Books of Hope"project.

With both an academic and fine arts education, from Harvard and the Kansas City Art Institute, Manson is a professional photographer and filmmaker. Since the 1960's, he has periodically taught and worked with college-level art students, penitentiary inmates, and inner-city youth.
For thirteen years, Mr. Kennedy was a trustee at the Catlin Gabel School in Oregon. He served on the board there in several capacities: as head of the recruitment committee; as a member of the executive committee; as vice president; as head of annual giving for the school; and as a member of a headmaster search committee. As part of an advisory team for the NAIS, he also evaluated boards of trustees at other independent schools in the Pacific Northwest.
As Program Manager, Manson helps to plan and coordinate the activities and curriculum for Books of Hope sessions and does the grantwriting for the BOH program. He designed the activities and curriculum for the sessions at Clarendon Hill Community Center and Mystic Learning Center. In 2004, he designed and managed a successful summer writing/performing program for Boston youth at the Strand Theater. He was recently invited to give a youth writing workshop at the Camile Cosby Girls’ Program at Harvard’s Judge Baker Children’s Center. He has been with BOH for four years.June 14 2005 5PM: "The Books of Hope" Project:

A joint program of the Somerville Arts Council and the Mystic Learning Center, Books of Hope (BOH) seeks to create opportunities for self-expression and advocacy through creative writing, so that young people can reach out to each other, to their neighbors, and to others around the world. This creative writing program for teens is held at the Mystic Learning Center. The BOH authors are involved in the publishing process from start to finish – from formulating an idea and writing and editing multiple drafts to publishing the book and selling the finished project. Since 1999, over fifty youth have produced over 75 books. Almost all authors have returned to publish again and again, some now working on their third and fourth books

April 26 2005 5PM: My guests will be Samuel J. Scott editor of "Spare Change News" http://www.homelessempowerment.org and Kate E. Bush, poetry editor.



The mission of Spare Change and the Homeless Empowerment Project (HEP) is to play a role in
ending homelessness in our community by providing income, skill development and self-advocacy opportunities to people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.
While providing these opportunities we encourage all who participate in our programs to become involved in the governance of our community-led organization. It is our belief that people who are experiencing homelessness, when provided with encouragement and accessible opportunities for self-advancement, have the ability to create lasting and positive change for ourselves and our community.

May 10 2005 5PM: My guest will be poet Doug Worth. Worth has recently completed a poetry collection "Catch the Light." ( Higganum Hill Books) Worth's poetry has been published widely in periodicals and anthologies, and he has received a number of fellowships, grants and prizes, and has been profiled in "Who's Who in America," "Contemporary Authors," and the "International Who's Who in Poetry." Hailed by historian Howard Zinn as a "visionary dream-weaver of the future global tribe;" Worth is also the author of a young adult novella, and an illustrated children's book.

On Tuesday March 22 5PM : My guest will be: CHARLES COE. Charles Coe is a Coordinator for the Massachusetts Cultural Council'sOrganizational Support Program, overseeing the grant programs for music andliterature organizations. Before joining the Council, Charles was awardedthe council's Artists Fellowship in Poetry. Charles's work has beenpublished in numerous magazines, newspapers, anthologies and literaryreviews, such as the Boston Globe, Boston Phoenix, Atelier, The Journal ofModern Writing and Poesis."Picnic on the Moon," a volume of his poetry, has been published by LeapfrogPress of Wellfleet, Massachusetts. Charles is also featured on two spokenword CDs: "Get Ready for Boston," a collection of stories and songs aboutBoston neighborhoods, and "One Side of the River," an anthology of Cambridgeand Somerville poets including Robert Pinsky, Frank Bidart, Liam Rector andGail Mazur. In addition to poetry, Charles is a journalist and book reviewerHe is also a long-time activist with the National Writers Union, a laborunion that serves freelance writers. He has served on the union's NationalExecutive Board, is co-chair of the Boston Chapter Steering Committee, andco-founded the union's National Diversity Committee. In addition to his work as a writer, Charles has an extensive background asa jazz vocalist and has performed and recorded with numerous musicians inthe Boston area and throughout New England, including Stan Strickland,Semenya McCord and Avery Sharpe.

April 5 2005: 5PM SCAT : My guests will be June Gross and Viesia Novosielski. This mother and daughter team have written a book and a play "The Dangers of Empathy," that deals with a Gross' and Novosielski's experience with mental illness. Join me as I talk with these intriguing
Somerville artists. http://www.lipstickwarrior.com

March 8 2005-- My guest will be poets Harris Gardner and Lainie Senechal. Senechal is a published poet, and an accomplished painter with many exhibits to her credit. Gardner is a published poet, and founder of the "Tapestry of Voices" poetry venue, probably one of the most successful poetry organizations in the region. 5PM SCAT

Feb 22--My guest will be "Mothra" a video editor and Mass. College of Art film student, who is spearheading a drive to establish a "zine" library in Boston. 5PM Channel 3 SCAT.

Feb 8 2005 My guest will be Chad Parenteau. Chad won a "Cambridge Poetry Award" for his collection of poetry: "Self Portrait in Fire." Chad's work has appeared in the "Ibbetson Street Press," "Boston Poet.com," and other print and online publications. He has read extensively throughout the Boston area.

Tues Jan 25th 2005 my guest will be Somerville poet, singer, and writer C.D. Collins. C.D. has a new CD out "Subtracting Down," that is a combination of music and spoken word. C.D. is a member of "The Writer's Room" of Boston, and the winner of a Cambridge Poetry Award. Her poetry, short stories, etc... have been widely published. http://www.cdcollins.com

Jan 4th 2005 at 5PM my guest will be Somerville poet Gary Duehr. Duehr has just released a poetry collection:" potato chips for dinner." Duehr is an NEA grant winner, a writer for Art/New England, director of the "Invisible Cities Group,", and he teaches at Boston University, Bunker Hill Community College and Lesley University.

Tuesday Dec 11 5PM my guest will be Deborah Priestly, author of the critically acclaimed poetry collection "The Woman Has A Voice." ( Ibbetson 2004) Deborah is the cofounder of the "Out of the Blue Art Gallery" http://www.outoftheblueartgallery.com and has been widely published in the small press.

On Dec 7 at 5PM my guest will be poet, writer, and editor Maria McCarthy. McCarthy is the founder of the online journal: " Heat City Review." http://heatcityreview.com and is editing poet Hugh Fox's memoir "Our Gang," for the Ibbetson Street Press. McCarthy is a Somerville, Mass. native, and has had her poetry and fiction published in various online and print journals.

On Nov 9 at 5PM my guests will be Tim Gager author of "Short Street" and cofounder of "The Somerville News Writers Festival," and Neil McCabe, editor of "The Somerville News" http://thesomervillenews.com My guests will discuss the festival, and their "creative" lives.

Tuesday Nov 23 our guest will be Somerville playwright and poet Mary Mccullough. Mary's play "Summer Breeze" was performed at the "Our Place Theatre Project" in Roxbury, and she has a new piece coming up at the "African American Theatre Festival" in Jan. 2005.

On Oct. 19 Somerville Poet / Musician Dick Lourie, and founding member of the legendary small press "Hanging Loose" will be my guest. Dick will talk about his own work, "Hanging Loose" and the death of the beloved poet and "Hanging Loose" editor Ron Schrieber.