With a double shot of the empty light
The
[painter asked, is that a poem or a letter?]
I have three sound tracks in my head—
Punk and the diva
And jazz, jazz, jazz...
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/24/2009 03:17AM by petersz.
I sat with Ignatius Mabasa
IGNATIUS MABASA is known as being a “top new voice” of the people of Zimbabwe. He is a performing poet, novelist and storyteller. He has published two collections of poems in Shona, Tipeiwo Dariro and Muchinokoro Kunaka, as well as a satirical novel, Mapenzi. He works as a deputy director for the British Council in Zimbabwe. “The result,” he says, of the promotion of English in Zimbabwean schools, “is a sad one where we deny ourselves and end up talking to our children in a foreign language in our very own homes.”
and Menna Elfyn
MENNA ELFYN is, according to Tony Conran, “the first Welsh poet in 1,500 years
to have her work known outside Wales.” She is also a playwright, a columnist and editor of The Bloodaxe Book of Modern Welsh Poetry. She has written eight plays for the stage and two for television. Her latest volumes of poems are Perffaith Nam/Perfect Blemish and IN PERSON. She has worked as a poet and/or teacher in the Philippines, Zimbabwe and the Middle East, as well as in the U.S. Her work has been translated into 18 languages including Italian and Lithuanian. She is the Director of Creative Writing at University College, Trinity, in Wales, and a fellow at Swansea University.
and, as I say, I sat and talked with Ignatius and Menna and a third poet [I think Tasmila Nasrin from Bangladesh, tonight at Vesuvio’s. I read this poem to them.
Peter, I envy your opportunity to rub elbows with so many diverse artists. What an audience!
As to the poem, I like it.
A technical note: I'm glad you're not afraid to use the "pre" tags that allow us to keep some of the formatting that is intended by the author. If I can find the correct html tags that can either change the formatting of this phorum, or that will allow us to individually post our work without the annoying spaces between the paragraphs, I will pass those tags along to anyone who's interested.
Les
That'd be helpful for us all, Les.
And yes, Sf is a great place for meeting people different from oneself, which is part of why I stayed here. Living in the country was ok when I live there, and I can understand why some people never get used to being away from the country life, but the fact is we are a diverse species and there's no where like the city to stay alive to that aspect of humanity which is one of its saving graces.
amo,
Peter
As usual, the poem itself is experimental. I was tracing how experience is often interrupted and truncated and how we still manage some kind of continuity in the midst of all the interruptions.