Orange Blosoms by Maja Trochimczyk
Toti O'Brien will be featured poets at the
Village Poets Monthly Reading are held on Sunday, February 24, 2019 at 4:30 p.m., at
Bolton
Hall Museum, 10110 Commerce Avenue, Tujunga, CA 91042. The reading
will include two open
mike segments; refreshments will be served and $3 donations collected for
the cost of the
venue, the second historical landmark in the City of Los Angeles, that
celebrated its centennial in 2013. The Museum is managed by the Little
Landers Historical Society.
TOTI O'BRIEN
Toti O'Brien is the Italian Accordionist
with the Irish Last Name. She was born in Rome, Italy, raised in Sicily and France.
After touring Europe and Brazil with her itinerant theater, in the early
nineties, she established herself in Los Angeles where she makes a living as a
self-employed artist, performing musician and professional dancer.
O’Brien’s first book of stories, Africa, was published in 1990. It was followed
by another short story collection, Reversed
Memories, two illustrated children books and an essay collection, Lanterna Magica, gathering selected work
out of her long-term collaboration with Italian journals and magazines.
O’Brien started writing in English language in 2004. Since, her poetry, fiction and non fiction were published in hundreds of journals and anthologies in the US, UK, Ireland, Canada, India, Australia, and all over the world. Her most recent appearances include CultureCult, Metafore, Gyroscope and the Mizmor Anthology. Her work was nominated for Best of the Net, Best Small Fiction, Best American Essay, the Pushcart, and various other prizes. Her memoir ‘Nicotine’ won a nonfiction prose award in 2018. Her essay ‘Blur In The Front Line’ won the Anthony Award for inspiring and revolutionary work in nonfiction prose in 2016. Besides her creative writing, she contributes articles and reviews about art, music, film, literature and civilization to several magazines. She also translates poetry and prose from the Italian, the Spanish, and the French.
O’Brien’s multimedia artwork was exhibited in group and solo shows in Europe and the US, since the early nineties. Her paintings, sculptures, collages and textiles were featured in many publications, and she has produced book covers and illustrations. She majored in Music, specializing in Vocal Performance. She currently performs classical and popular music as a vocalist and an instrumentalist, both solo and as a member of several groups. She was trained in contemporary dance and acrobatics, and she is currently a member of two dance companies.
Aprile by Toti O'Brien.
ALIEN ALIEN
If belong is something
to be built
and believed
before
clouds of insularity
conceal chronic solitudes
deep bites of separation
bleed themselves to the bone
nailing upon flipped chessboards
dried up postures
unmovable
oppositions
finallyripped away
en
route towards liberty
old flags float
unanchored
squinting at promised lands
seeking for ground
improbable
Alter, Alter by Toti O'Brien
MIGRATION
As you
vanish, unchecked
grasping
frantically
at
denial
(your
trusted safety belt)
trying
to resist sinking
noticing
on a
glimpse of consciousness
you
cannot tell your age
or
mine, or today’s date
‘then’
you say
‘we
should say farewell.
I might
not recognize you
the
next time around.’
‘Chances
are you won’t, Mom.’
‘But
you’ll love me nevertheless’
I would
like to add.
Tears
choke me.
‘You’ll
love me’
my mind
whispers
‘because
of the cormorants
we
watched from the riverbank.’
Your
arm weighing over mine
as I
pointed at dark silhouettes
long
necks
wide
wingspans.
You
were all there, were you?
Enjoying
the breeze
and my
words.
When
you’ll recognize me
no
more, your body
—your
nameless soul—
will
recall the cormorants
and the
afternoon sun.
Your
arm will seek mine.
You’ll
know I am a good thing
you can
lean on.
Cassandra by Toti O'Brien
MOTHER
TONGUE
How it
crumbles
like
pebbles slipping between your fingers.
Oh, the
number of rings you possess.
Aren’t
jewels stones?
Only
when
your brain has scattered
like
beads on a carpet
you
start marveling at the uselessness
of
redundant adornment.
Gold is
dust
swallowed
by lazy waters.
After a
long season of draught
riverbanks
are sunken
and a
reek of mud fills our nostrils
as we
walk.
Your
step has become unsteady
one of
your feet, askew
skids
on its own course.
Mother
tongue
as you
lose it
the
universe falls apart.
All of
my past implodes
as its
vessel gives in.
Cracks,
leakage
infiltration
were bearable.
Now
this rupturing ends the empire.
Such
sadness.
Like a
flight of swallows
headed
to Neverland.
With
your silence
long-lasting
spells will subside
something
whispers into my ear.
Not a
comforting sound
but the
metallic utterance of a toy frog
whose
mechanics are breaking
as your
lips harden.
If the
spell will dissolve
what
will remain?
A dryness of bones
A dryness of bones
a
flayed snake
as
defenseless as a severed length
of
garden hose.
I’ll
become an alphabet
unknown
to myself
a
satchel of un-deciphered symbols
yet
another story untold.
Toti O'Brien with her artwork, 2016.
VILLAGE POETS NEWS
The January 2019 reading included a wealth of verse by local and faraway poets, including a presentation of a new anthology edited by Kathabela Wilson, based on meetings in Japanese Stearns Garden in Pasadena; as well as Lloyd Hitt's collection of poems, work in Japanese and English by Mariko Kitakubo, commemoration of the International Holocaust Memorial Day by Maja Trochimczyk, poetry about foster youth by Cile Borman, and many other fascinating works of verse.
Poets L to R: Seated. Cile Borman, Mr. Borman, Gabriel Meyer, Mariko Kitakubo, Kathabela Wilson, Rick Wilson. Standing L to R: Maja Trochimczyk, Mr. Foster, Jan King, Jonathan Vos Pos, Marlene Hitt, Jackie Chang, Kathleen Travers, Joe DeCenzo, Elsa Frausto, Bo Kim, Dorothy Skiles, Charles Harmon.
Gabriel Meyer with Maja Trochimczyk with rosemary and camellia from Maja's garden.
Poets L to R: Seated. Cile Borman, Mr. Borman, Gabriel Meyer, Mariko Kitakubo, Kathabela Wilson, Rick Wilson. Standing L to R: Maja Trochimczyk, Mr. Foster, Jan King, Jonathan Vos Pos, Marlene Hitt, Jackie Chang, Kathleen Travers, Joe DeCenzo, Elsa Frausto, Bo Kim, Dorothy Skiles, Charles Harmon.
