Saturday, March 29, 2008

APRIL IS NATIONAL POETRY MONTH

Come celebrate with us!


The turnout for the last meeting was fantastic. The "Munnsville Poets" and writers east contributed a stimualating timed exercise. It was so much fun that even the folks who came just to listen participated and had a great time.

April Events:

April 14th, 7:30 pm - ???

Monday Night Poetry at Sushi Blues, includes open mic! Remember, get 10% any menu item for anyone who has the courage to stand up and read their work (or someone elses!)


April 18th, Birthday of Canastota Writers Group Moderator, Tish Demauro-Dickenson. We wish her a GREAT one. We thank her for her efforts in coordinating with me a poetry soiree at Sushi Blues that will showcase the combined talents of the Canastota Writers & the Monday Night Poetry forum.



April 19th, 2:00 pm, Award presentation of the 2008 National Penwomen Art & Poetry contest at May Memorial Unitarian Church, E. Genesee St., Syracuse, 13214. The winning entries will appear in the Syracuse Post-Standard, this contest includes writers and artists of all ages. The National Penwomen of America is the oldest womens writing organization in the United States. It has over 200 chapters, nationwide. I will be reading my first prize poem "Deja Vu" and my honorable mention poem "A Summer's Grief".



Currently on display at the Downtown YMCA 2nd Floor Gallery on Montgomery St. in Syracuse, is the monotype exhibit of artist Matt Morris "TV Dinners". A call for submissions was issued for any genre of writing on the topic of TV Dinners. My poem, "Book Club" was among those chosen as well as Canastota Writer Olin Davis' story, "What Would Grandma Say". Downtown writers friends, Noni Bristol and Sally Lloyd also read their works at the Artists reception. The artwork and writings will be on display through April.


Book Club


Thursday nights, when
my father went to Rotary club,
Mom and I ate TV dinners.
Sometimes frozen pizza or Mexican,
sometimes Stouffers Mac & Cheese
balancing on knees. Dented tray,
my brother and I in front of Sesame Street
re-runs, his small heels pushing his rocker
slightly backward to gaze at Kermit
as he chewed Mrs. Swanson’s chicken pot pie.

I never liked mixed peas and carrots.
Don’t like 6 p.m. TV. I love books.
Loved Thursday Night Specials.
My mother’s shoulders huddled illicitly as
she and Hercule Poirot hunched over the body,
her ash-tailed cigarette lying limp in a lumpy creation
my brother brought home from art class next to her fork.
Me, co-conspirator with my best pal Nancy Drew,
Or wandering beside Gandalf…Reading aloud
To my brother the adventures of Richard Scarry

Dad’s rule at our house: “No reading at supper.” Nor
elbows-on-placemats, no open-mouthed chewing. (No
conversation these Thursday jubilations) just our rustling
Infidelities! Reading at the table.




April 28th, 7:30 pm - ???
Monday Night Poetry at Sushi Blues.


We are thrilled to welcome our first guest speaker, poet Philip Memmer. He will read from a selection of his works. To learn more about him, read on...



Philip Memmer is the author of the poetry collections Sweetheart, Baby, Darling (Word Press, 2004) and Threat of Pleasure (Word Press, July 2008), as well as three chapbooks. His work has appeared in such journals as Poetry, Poetry Northwest, and Southern Poetry Review, and in several anthologies, including 180 More: Extraordinary Poems for Every Day. He is the poetry editor for the journal Stone Canoe, associate editor for Tiger Bark Press, and director of the YMCA’s Downtown Writer’s Center in Syracuse. He lives in Deansboro.



A closing contribution from Adam of the Monday Night Poetry Group:

s.p.s.p.s "only the poet, disdaing to be tied to any such subjection, lifted up with the vigor of his own invention, doth grow in effect another nature, in making things either better than nature bringeth forth, or quite anew, forms such as never were in nature, as Heroes, Demigods, Cyclops, Chimeras, Furies, and such like; so as he goeth hand in hand with nature, not enclosed within the narrow warrant of her gifts, but freely ranging only within the zodiac of his own wit."

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