Village Poets of Sunland & Tujunga: Raphael Block - Featured Poet on April 24, 2022, at 4:30 pm on Zoom

YouTube Video from the Reading:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2T0yO4oT1I

On Sunday, April 24, 2022, at 4:30 pm, Village Poets of Sunland-Tujunga present their Monthly Poetry Reading on Zoom, featuring Northern California Poet, Raphael Block. The links are emailed to our email list by Dorothy Skiles, DMHSkiles@gmail.com.

April 22, 1970 was the first Earth Day to celebrate our planet and make sure it stays healthy and whole, by reducing human-caused pollution and damage to our environment and all living beings. Plastics and now, masks, fill the oceans and wash up on the beaches. The groundwaters are full of chemicals in many places. The air was so bad with smog in some areas, people were forced to stay home. Even "environmentally-friendly" wind turbines are massive killers of birds and their huge blades are not recyclable... Mr. Block is keenly interested in these topics, hence he is a great choice for our reading on April 24, 2022.

Raphael's Block's poetry, infused with spirit, speaks to earth's call for a heartfelt response to our ecological crisis. Born on a kibbutz, he spent his boyhood playing on the hills of Haifa. His family returned to London as he turned nine, where learning British English shaped his ear for sound. In 1993 he moved to Northern California with his American wife and their daughter. His wife died from cancer in 2002, and for the following years he feels it was his privilege to raise their child.

Raphael worked with children of all ages for almost 30 years. Since 2008, a life-threatening illness, Crohn's, has played a major role in intensifying his appreciation and gratitude for the moments of each day.

He is the author of Songs from a Small Universe (2009), Spangling Darkness (2014), Strings of Shining Silence: Earth-Love Poems (2017), and At This Table (2020).

Raphael produces the monthly Earth-Love Newsletter which can be viewed at raphaelblock.com along with a National Geographic selected 5-minute documentary.