New Book by Elizabeth Yahn Williams, Dr. Edith Jonsson-Devillers, and California Quarterly 47:1 edited by Bory Thach on July 25, 2021, 4:30pm Zoom

Yucca Whipplei photo by Maja Trochimczyk. 

Video Recording of the Reading on YouTube:

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raVsjZqb62c

For its July Monthly Reading on Zoom, the Village Poets of Sunland-Tujunga present a new book by Elizabeth Yahn Williams, Flourishing - Florescence,  including her poetry published with French translations by Dr. Edith Jonsson-Devillers. The reading will also feature poetry from the California Quarterly 47 no. 1, Spring 2021, edited by Bory Thach and published by the California State Poetry Society.  

The Monthly Reading will take place on Zoom, on Sunday, July 25, 2021 at 4:30 pm.  DMHSkiles@gmail.com will forward you the invitation, when requested.

Elizabeth Yahn Williams flourishes as a poet-playwright, educator, speaker, and emcee. A native Ohioan, she has earned grants for studies in several states and foreign countries. Through a Ford Foundation grant at UCLA, she became a California Lifetime credentialed English educator and was named a “most distinguished honorary lifetime member” of the Phi Theta Kappa Chapter at MiraCosta Community College in San Diego for mentoring their honor students.  A graduate of Loyola Law School,  Elizabeth is recognized as a Marquis WHO’S WHO Lifetime Achiever in law and writing. She has enjoyed an imaginative life, from directing in her community’s theatres to teaching creative problem-solving and poetry at  libraries, colleges, and churches. Often performing with Bob Lundy, her Partner-in-Rhyme, she can be reached at ElizabethYahn@gmail.com and seen on their site: www.HITHERandYAHN.com

Dr. Edith Jonsson-Devillers taught as a professor of French and Spanish at U.C. and other universities in the U.S. and Europe. She first came to this country on a Fulbright fellowship and eventually founded and ran her own language school and translation company. As a scholar in Comparative Literature, she wrote or translated and published many works in French, English, and Spanish. Her poetic translations include works by Mexico’s Octavio Paz and Guadeloupe’s French poet, St-John Perse, both Nobel prize winners. Her expansive interests have led her to translate Latin America’s Helena Araújo and Nela Rio, as well as works of Indian mystics.

Flourishing – Florescence by Elizabeth Yahn Williams with Art by Marion Wong and French Translation by Edith Jonsson-Devillers. Guidelights Productions, 2020. 130 pages. ISBN 978-0-9967170-4-5

About this book: "Poet and California State Poetry Society member Elizabeth Yahn Williams is premiering her new bilingual collection, written in English and French in collaboration with  her gifted translator Dr. Edith Jonsson-Devillers.  A display of the mastery of free verse and rhyme, Flourishing – Florescence includes evocative haiku and senryu, along with other poetic forms. Here, Elizabeth Yahn Williams investigates the many ways that life, enhanced by poetry, encourages each of us to FLOURISH. Whether, as a reader, you are looking for inspiration or for motivation, one or more of her offerings will speak to you in words both lyrical and stimulating. With vivid imagery Elizabeth creates poignant vignettes that will relate to your own life in unexpected ways. You will find humor in the rhymes of “Perusing the Parrot,” pathos in “Grand Piano,” and a mix of emotions from haiku that capture, with brevity, illusions of time and space. With haunting and vivid language, Williams  has a gift for choosing the right word for the right place."

(from a review by Kathy Lund Derengowski, published in CSPS Poetry Letter No. 2, 2021, reprinted on the CSPS blog.

https://www.californiastatepoetrysociety.com/2021/06/book-reviews-from-poetry-letter-2-2021.html

Chagall, "Peace" - stained glass at the United Nations, 1964

 Marc Chagall: One Man Opera

Chagall recalls history in rainbow-filled hues.

Above lovers’ heads, angels fly with acclaim.

His art reveals levels of multiple views.

To Homeland Russia he repays his dues.

Its churches and temples he paints into fame.

Chagall recalls history in rainbow-filled hues.

His fables, myths, scriptures, and circus revues

show farmlands and towns from where he came.

His art reveals levels of multiple views.

Always his brides are veiled in virtues

and, bearing Godivas, his burros are tame.

Chagall recalls history in rainbow-filled hues.

His acrobat-cocks wear little soft shoes

while tap dancing fiddlers invoke La Fontaine.

His art reveals levels of multiple views.

His works for great cities often début

in etchings, ceramics, and glass that is stained.

Chagall recalls history in rainbow-filled hues.

His art reveals levels of multiple views.

 Marc Chagall, l'opéra d'un seul homme 

Chagall rappelle une histoire aux couleurs d'arc-en-ciel.

Des anges volètent autour de la tête de ceux qui s'aiment.

Son art révèle les facettes d'un multiple regard.

Il rend un hommage légitime à sa Russie natale,

et rend célèbre ses églises et ses temples.

Chagall rappelle une histoire au couleurs d'arc-en-ciel.

Ses fables, ses mythes, ses sculptures, ses critiques de spectacles

représentent les terroirs et les villes natales.

Son art révèle les facettes d'un multiple regard.

Ses nouvelles mariées sont toujours voilées de vertus

et ses ânes porteurs de Godivas sont très doux.

Chagall rappelle une histoire au couleurs d'arc-en-ciel.

Ses coqs acrobatiques portent de petits chaussons

tandis que des violonistes faiseurs de claquettes invoquent La Fontaine.

Son art révèle les facettes d'un multiple regard.

Ses oeuvres pour grandes villes souvant débutent

par ses gravures, sa céramique, ses vitraux.

Chagall rappelle une histoire aux couleurs d'arc-en-ciel.

Son art révèle les facettes d'un multiple regard.

California Quarterly, Vol. 47, No. 1 (Spring 2021)

Cover Art: Harmony (ink and watercolor on paper, 11 by 15 inches) 

by Sylvia Van Nooten, Montrose, Colorado

Editor’s Note

Being a new member of CSPS I find that this is a learning experience for me. Maja Trochimczyk calls poetry a “cure for chaos” and I agree with her.  Many times we go through periods of difficulty and sadness, but it is important to remember that these dark times will eventually pass by like the seasons. With winter comes spring. The universe has a way of balancing itself out in the end. I, for one, have to remind myself constantly how lucky it is to be alive and every day is a new day to see the world differently. From the mundane to the extraordinary, each experience that we find ourselves learning whether it be through obstacles at work like in Richard Matta’s “Another Play Day” where he wishes that he could be a kid again, or the act of simply giving a little boy a bath before bed in “The Completeness” by Alice Pero, an insight into childhood innocence. The joy we find in our daily activities allows us to overcome grief with a brighter outlook when disaster strikes. It is a reminder to never give up hope no matter how difficult the loss. Therefore, nothing should be taken for granted not even our struggles. For the obstacles we defeat and the fears that die away become our strength, teaching us more about ourselves than any college or university.

After wildfires we can learn “To Plant A Tree” as a gift, to “put down roots” and “stand our ground” the way Miriam Aroner does because this is how the world grows anew. Mother Earth has a way of healing herself. Animals possess sacred knowledge in their simplicity, knowing what they know we too may survive the ravages of time. To live in the moment, that is true enlightenment through mindfulness. Claire Scott captures this in her poem “Cedar Waxwings” where hundreds of them are observed landing in the backyard. She describes watching the “show from the window, a kaleidoscope of colors, sound and motion.” Even after they have flown away, she continues to stare at the empty Privet tree in silent serenity. A journey of self-discovery, chaos and turmoil threaten us, but the wisdom of the ancients survive throughout the ages.  We live and learn from personal experiences.  What better way to discover one’s true self than to go through failure and heartbreak, reaching our breaking point and knowing that we can continue on further. I hope that you will also find these poems enjoyable and insightful to the soul.

Bory Thach

San Bernardino, California

Contents of the journal with the list of poets/poems is found on California State Poetry Society blog:

https://www.californiastatepoetrysociety.com/2021/03/california-quarterly-vol-47-no-1-spring.html

Bory Thach was born in a refugee camp located on the border between Thailand and Cambodia. His family immigrated to the United States when he was four years old. He served in the U.S. Army and deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He has an MFA from California State University San Bernardino. Fiction and creative nonfiction fall under the art of storytelling, while poetry for him is more of a study of language, an art form in itself. His work appeared or is forthcoming in: Pacific Review, Urban Ivy, Arteidolia, Sand Canyon Review and We Are Here: Village Poets Anthology. He recently completed a book of poetry dialogues with Cindy Rinne, Letters under Rock (2019) that has been presented as a quasi-theatrical performance in art galleries and museums in Southern California. He joined the Editorial Board in July 2020 and started his duties from volume 47 no. 1 of the California Quarterly.

Photos of Yucca Whipplei in Big Tujunga Wash (c) 2021 by Maja Trochimczyk 

Christine Jordan Features on June 24, 2018 and Village Poets Write About Love and Nature

Village Poets are pleased to present Christine Jordan as featured poet on Sunday, June 24, 2018 at 4:30 p.m. The Village Poets Monthly Readings are held at Bolton Hall Museum, 10110 Commerce Avenue, Tujunga, CA 91042. The readings include 30 min. for the featured poet, as well as two open mike segments. Refreshments are 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, named after the "little land" that each settler received in the Tujunga and Sunland foothills when the area was settled. The readings adhere to a self-imposed PG-13 rating, without extreme depictions of sex or violence, and with an air of gentility,  so poets use their words to bless the world, rather than curse it.

CHRISTINE JORDAN

CE (Christine) Jordan has performed and created unique dance/theatre work all her life. Her signature dance opus, ‘LA Breakdown’, a 6-part dance/theatre work, premiered in sections from 1984 to 1987 at Cal State LA, and came together in a complete showing at Fringe Festival LA in Fall 1987, entertaining folks for two weekends at the Mac Arthur Park Bandshell.  She was bitten by the poetry bug in 1982, and has subsequently had her work published in  Armchair/Shotgun, Blue Satellite, Rivertalk and other journals over the years.

Her true love, though, is blurring lines & meshing genres. She began staging her poetry and stories in 1996,  performing with The Nannette Brodie Dance Theatre in 1996-97.  Most notably, her signature theatre opus, ‘Notes on a Country Childhood’, an evening solo outing full of touching and entertaining stories and poems about her rural childhood in Ojai, CA, has been performed in parts and as a whole in various theatrical and non- traditional performing spaces since 2009. She edits, combines, and happily riffs on this material as part of the texts for many Story Chicks pieces, the two gal theatre company she began with Terri MartinLujan in 2013. This is yet another example of getting ‘bitten’ by a good idea!

Ms Jordan’s current solo work includes ‘Map to the Stars’ with live piano accompaniment by Craig Kupka, which debuted at ArtShare LA in March 2016, and its next incarnation, ’Tinsel Town, tall tales of a ballerina in Hollywood‘, which enchanted young and old at the Hollywood Ivar Branch of the LA Public Library in July 2017. ‘A Model Life’, her humorous run-down of life as a fashion model in the 70’s and 80‘s, debuted at The Coffee Gallery Backstage in Dec. 2016 and then was seen with new visuals as part of  Moda 360 at The New Mart downtown LA in Aug. 2017. Story Chicks’ newest opus, ‘Starstruck, your name in lights’ a show about young performer’s dreams and stumbles, is currently being developed to debut in early summer 2018. A cabaret version of the show debuted in March 2017 at The Padua Hills Theatre in Claremont.

CE has her BA in dance/UCLA and MA in Theatre/CSULA. She has studied ballet and tap intensively, danced with The Moving Co. a Pasadena-based modern dance company, part of the NEA Dance Touring program, from 1973-78, worked with Bella Lewitsky and Miriam Nelson on stage and in television, and with Debra DeLiso in acting and staging memoir.  She has also created costumes and props for local LA theatre companies, including her favorite company, The Foliage Theatre Project, throughout the 1990s. Ms Jordan spent 10 pretty marvelous years modeling on the runway, for TV, and editorial shoots, represented by Mary Webb Davis in LA and by Ellen Harth in NY. Her career teaching creative dance and theatre to children spans 25 years, and she continues to learn and create by the seat of her pants!

possum garden                  by C.E. Jordan

this living-space

out of doors, by

day, glows, shift-

ing its spotlights.

But by night to

night I found

all the familiar

places hording their

own kind of light.

Like my white x-

mas lights, strung

common, are now

as good as

steaming

searchlights, making

my pagoda’s ceiling

its own Hollywood

premier

and the latest

possum waddling

across the red

carpet, shining

his day-glo mime-

masque right straight

in my direction. Creatures

tame and not, natural

for the most part, go

phosphorescent, and

blink tidings from

white patches

here and there. And

Vinca and periwinkle-shaped

wheels of light,

teeming stars

in white crockery

whiter and still no

moon. Then

  

the sounds like heat

seem to rise and

float dismembered

in the semi-darkness.

Voices badgering, more

wild things whining low.

And crickets, I’m sorry,

but you have to hear

this tiny, squeaking

chorus, hallelujahs

& noir plots this

night, growing home-

made stories &

third man types

shadow-hopping,

wild life out

here.

VILLAGE POETS NEWS

The May 27, 2018 reading by Seven Dhar and presentation by Abby Diamond were full of inspirational moments and true poetic delights. 

Seven Dhar, Maja Trochimczyk, Abby Diamond

Abby Diamond presented an original torn-paper collage to Moonrise Press, for use in the press's publicity.

We decided to post some of the Village Poets recent verse and bring more love to the world from our foothill community.

 Love’s Cliche

by Joe DeCenzo

May the words of the tired uninspired hackneyed poets

Ring out louder than the bells of Westminster if those words be love

If love be cliché then let me soak in its ponderous rain.

Let its mundane repetition fill the tomes of mankind

Its every margin and indentation ‘til there is no blank space

Let it be the first word spoken at daybreak

The last word murmured at prayers

And the longest note sustained in every choral song

Let Love be the first ingredient of every recipe

The first provision of any contract

The last word uttered with my dying breath

Thorns

by Marlene Hitt


I know the rose
the splendid rose
I know the thorns
the tender skin
the gash
I know the gash
I know the fur
caught on the thorn
I know the fur
I know its warmth
I know the warmth
the noontime sun
the face of the rose
as it greets my eye
I know the rose
I know the thorn

the thorn I never touch.

Wash Wonderland

by Pamela Shea

Wash Wonderland

2/5/18 – Pamela Shea

Alice falls

Through the looking glass

Surfacing

In the wash

In the distance a dog howls

In trees birds flutter

She whistles

To her friends

Overhead

A flock of geese fly, fly, fly

They call, sing

Reconfiguring 

Hummingbird flits

From flower to flower

Mesmerizing

With the whir of wings

A crow caws, caws, caws

Seemingly scolding

In no hurry

To vacate its post

West to east

Sky pushes past moon

On its way

To golden sunrise

Indulge dear Alice

She is quite harmless

Carefully she steps 

Sauntering along, sauntering along, sauntering along 

In the past she ran

Trying to escape

Now she hops and skips

Into the future  

When she leaves

It will be blessing

She will fly, fly, fly

Somewhere far beyond

Perhaps north

To mountains

Or south

To deserts

Maybe east

To sunrise

Or west

To ocean sunset

Won’t you please join Alice

When you are able?

Wonderland exists

Wherever one chooses

Here, here, here

by Maja Trochimczyk

I love my mountains

blue and spring green still

under clear azure expanse,

their velvet pleats pile up

in layers above the valley

rock pathways in empty riverbed.

This is the Earth - naked

free of trees and houses, of rush

and pavement and cars on hot asphalt

in LA summers - this is

pure repose - serenely breathing

slowly, deeply - in the cycle of centuries

I love my mountains

the bluish shadows on distant slopes

manzanita and sage scattered 

on those close by- they open

like curtains into infinity - to let me in

beyond the next peak, the next canyon

into new worlds that grow within

in warm sunlight, under cool glow

of spiraling galaxies before dawn.

I'm here, I found my life

waiting for me under the indigo

cupola outlined with deep purple

at the ridges -  here crickets

measure the night as they sing

"we are here, here, here, here..." 

while birds sleep

hidden among branches.

Only the distant waves of truck noise

from the freeway remind me

that this paradise of mine

this magic, fluid, living 

folding and unfolding is my LA home

my own LA LA Land, of sweet

mountains under the brightest of Suns.

Unbridled

by Dorothy Skiles


Fond memory
ever so softly, quietly
calls to me…                                   

Monarch butterflies
in early summer’s flight
flutter through and beyond
mother’s morning glory vines
dressed in brilliant blues
and free to grow unbridled
along the chain link fence
of my childhood.

Butterfly by Bill Skiles (2013).

MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS MONTH

Since May is the Mental Health Awareness Month and in 2018 also the month of the "We Rise" campaign by the Department of Mental Health of Los Angeles County, some poets at the reading dedicated their work to increasing the awareness of mental health issues, and the importance of health and wellness.  

Dr. Maja Trochimczyk of Phoenix Houses of California, and Moonrise Press, read poems inspired by nature and reflections on finding and maintaining emotional well-being in life.  Other poets, like Pamela Shea, Dorothy Skiles, and Marlene Hitt, selected work inspired by the love of nature, reproduced above, as expressions of wisdom and beauty of the natural world and its soothing effect on human emotions and psychological well-being. 

Flyers about Phoenix House  behavioral health services in California were available during the event. More information about "We Rise" may be found on DMH website: http://whywerise.la/

Dorothy Skiles & Marlene Hitt, Saturday, 22 July 2017, Montrose - and Parade Photos with Pam

Due to an exhibition being held at Bolton Hall Museum, Village Poets' July meeting has been moved to nearby Montrose where the Library will present Dorothy Skiles and Marlene Hitt, in a double feature of Village Poets. The flyer for the event was produced by the Montrose Library, located at 2465 Honolulu Avenue, Montrose where the Village Poets reading will start at 3 p.m. on Saturday, July 22, 2017.  Two segments of open mike will also be available for those who wish to read their poems. See you all there!

Over the last eighteen years, Dorothy has been involved in the local poetry scene and her poems have appeared in a variety of community publications. She served as Poet Laureate of Sunland-Tujunga from 2012 to 2014 and since 2010, has been a member of the Village Poets of Sunland-TujungaPlanning Group who sponsor a well-established Monthly Poetry Series in the foothills.

Her chapbooks include:The Sidewalk Gallery (1979), Ear to Earth (1996), Spine Flower Blues (1999) - a collaborative work by the Chuparosa Writers, and Riddle in the Rain (2003) –a collaborative work with Marlene Hitt.

Dorothy Skiles and Joe DeCenzo at the Parade 2014

Dorothy’s poems appear in Meditation on Divine Names, edited by Maja Trochimczyk, Moonrise Press 2012, and From Benicia With Love, Edited by Don Peery, Accent Digital Publishing, Redding CA 2013. In July 2015, she was featured in Colorado Boulevard.net in Pasadena, Mapping the Artist - Dorothy Skiles by Kathabela Wilson.Her poems also appear in the Altadena Poetry Review - Anthology 2016, edited by Thelma T. Reyna, Golden Foothill Press,2016. Most recently, her poems were published in the Altadena Poetry Review -  Anthology 2017, edited by Elline Lipkin and Pauli Dutton, Altadena Library District, 2017.

Marlene and Lloyd Hitt, Grand Marshalls of the Independence Day Parade, 2017.

Marlene Hitt is a Los Angeles poet, writer and retired educator with local history as an avocation. She has served for many years as Archivist, Museum Director and Historian at the Bolton Hall Museum in Tujunga. She is a native Californian and a graduate of Occidental College. She also studied at CSUN, USC, UCLA, Glendale College and Trinity College in Ireland. As a member of the Chupa Rosa Writers of Sunland for nearly 30 years, she has worked with this small group of poets from whom has sprung readings at the local library, the Poet Laureate Program of Sunland-Tujunga, and the currently popular Village Poets. Her poetry received several first place prizes in annual competitions of the Women’s Club, San Fernando Valley, and many awards from the John Steven McGroarty Chapter of the California Chaparral Poets. Congressman Adam Schiff declared Marlene Hitt to be the Woman of the Year 2016 and her name was entered into the Congressional Record.

Her work appeared in Psychopoetica (UK), Chupa Rosa Diaries of the Chupa Rosa Writers, Sunland (2001-2003), Glendale College’s Eclipse anthologies, two Moonrise Press anthologies, Chopin With Cherries (2010) and Meditations on Divine Names (2012),Sometimes in the Open, a collection of verse by California Poets Laureate, and The Coiled Serpent, anthology of Los Angeles poets, edited by Poet Laureate, Luis Rodriguez (2016). She published chapbooks Sad with Cinnamon, Mint Leaves, and Bent Grass (all in 2001), as well as Riddle in the Rain with Dorothy Skiles, a stack of poetry booklets for friends and family, and most recently a critically acclaimed poetry volume, Clocks and Water Drops (Moonrise Press, 2015). 

More information: 

• Clocks and Water Drops: http://www.moonrisepress.com/clocks-and-water-drops-by-marlene-hitt.html
• Blog about Clocks and Water Drops: http://moonrisepress.blogspot.com/2015/01/
• Interview on Colorado Blvd. Blog: https://coloradoboulevard.net/mapping-the-artist-marlene-hitt/ 

ARRIVAL

Please, come home.

Walk into the door of the kitchen

where stew and wheaten bread

steam, where a fire warms.

Your father will tune the strings,

unwrap the bohdran.

I will uncover the harp.

The stew will simmer.

With hands wiped on my apron

I will open my arms

to you, my firstborn child

so long traveling. Your sisters 

will dance. The old ones will smile

through brown, gapped teeth,

will smile blue into your eyes.

Wrapped around you, the old songs,

the scent of turf fire, the smell

of our own wool and you will sing.

While you sleep

I will wrap around you a woven shawl

to shield you. Please come home

to bleating lambs,

to the resting place of love.

Marlene Hitt, published in Clocks and Water Drops (2015)  

ISBN 978-0-9819693-5-0

LOVE MENDED

That old threadbare word – love

flows in a fabric patterned

with shades of crimson colors,

whispers of mauve and the yellow of dry sun.

Chopin wove love into the air,

Monet stroked it onto canvas.

That word so often patched

nearly falls apart, its meaning frayed –

until a newborn cries 

or a daughter becomes a bride,

until the lace of fifty years together

fully knits. Love unravels

until a friend perceives and cherishes,

until there is an ear ready to listen, 

a shoulder to cry on. Love is repaired

with the consecration of all the threads.

Then, there is delight in love’s stitching,

the worn word renewed

into the One Love.

Mended.

Marlene Hitt, published in Clocks and Water Drops, 2015

VILLAGE POETS AT THE PARADE 2017

Marlene  and Lloyd Hitt were Grand Marshalls. Photo by Bill Skiles.

Pam Shea, Poet Laureate was the Star!

The Poets had a banner, carried by Spiderman and Auntie Sam.

The team is getting ready, minus the photographer and driver.

The hood was covered in stars, stripes and flowers.

Everyone wore their stars and stripes...

The Poet Laureate dressed up as Betsy Ross.

Joe DeCenzo was the driver and had lots of fun! 

The car of poets drove on...

Having fun in the sun! With stars all over (Maja)

Village Poets Present Marsha de la O and Jerry Garcia on May 22, 2016 at Bolton Hall

On Sunday, May 22, 2016, at 4:30 p.m. Village Poets will present two fascinating contemporary poets Jerry Garcia and Marsha de la O, in the monthly Open Mike Reading at Bolton Hall Museum in Tujunga (10110 Commerce Avenue). The reading will include two segments of Open Mike and refreshments - coffee, fruit, snacks or cakes - depending on the Village Poets' fancy.  This reading is one of "tenderness" - or "kindness" and "gentility" - because there's not enough of these three virtues in our world these days... 

The building, fascinating with is frontier beauty (facade and fireplace built of huge river-rocks) and storied history (Los Angeles's Historical Landmark No. 2, built in 1913), is managed by the Little Landers Historical Society that organizes events and quirky exhibits as well as invites the poets for their monthly feasts free of charge. Nonetheless, Village Poets do make donations to the LLHS, and for that purpose pass the hat, also historic - and formerly owned by the Bolton Hall builder, George Harris, to collect suggested donations of $3 per person that are then used to purchase refreshments for the poets and guests, and to donate funds to the Little Landers Historical Society.

 

Freshly squeezed orange juice was a must in mid-century California. 

Items from the current display at the Bolton Hall Museum in Tujunga. 

JERRY GARCIA

Jerry Garcia is a poet, photographer and filmmaker from Los Angeles who is too old to have been named after The Grateful Dead guitar hero.He has been a producer and editor of television commercials, documentaries and motion picture previews. He is currently producing Poetry Films based on his and the poetry of others. 

In 2006, Jerry was chosen by the L.A. Poetry Festival to participate in Newer Poets XI Series as part of the L.A. Central Library’s Aloud Series.  In April 2015 he was winner of Terry Wolverton’s dis•articulationsreader Poem series.

His poetry has been seen in Askew, Wide Awake: Poets of Los Angeles and Beyond, Chaparral, The Chiron Review, Palabra, Verdad Magazine, KCET’s Departures: Poetry L.A. Style, Tia Chucha’s Coiled Serpent Anthology and his chapbook Hitchhiking with the Guilty. 

Jerry is a past-director of the Valley Contemporary Poets and former president of Beyond Baroque’s Board of Trustees.


While Walking the Dog
Last Evening

I saw a falling star,
its tail so long,
its head so black,
surely it must rest this morning 
in a neighbor’s backyard, 
blackened rock, warm to the touch,
conspicuous on a thick bed
of blue grass.

If it struck like the truth
it could be the famous Boson
and if it had not been honest,
the prayers of many
would nod as they hold on to tomorrow
while the rest of us scramble
to keep the day intact.

Sometimes, what is visible in the black,
like reflected branches
and multi-galaxies of matter,
would support belief in substance,
while to others
the flickering sky expresses
the Divine.

(c) by Jerry Garcia 

MARSHA DE LA O

Marsha de la O was born and raised in Southern California. Both sides of her family arrived in the Los Angeles area before William Mulholland built the aqueduct that brought in water from the eastern Sierras. 

Her latest book, Antidote for Night, won the 2015 Isabella Gardner Award and was published by BOA Editions.  Her first book, Black Hope, was awarded the New Issues Press Poetry Prize. 


Summer

as far south as possible – to live – the ache  
on the edge of what can’t be endured, 
Monterey cypress on the spit, this remnant— 
when will longing be done with me—
parched, parched St. Catherine’s Lace 
fuming her last, and Sister Datura, 
mi loca, my girl, her closed mouth 
twisted like paper, horses in the 
shallows, piebald and panicked, rearing 
in the foam, ghost eyes wide, oh 
far-ranging roans, blue multitudes 
why oh why can’t I, rushing the horizon—  
naturally I dream the length of summer 
days & nights when the moon lives 
for weeks in my room, staggering in late 
every night drunk, slip sliding off her 
shoulders into an ivory pool on the carpet 
and still she will not ease me

(C) by Marsha de la O

___________________________________________


VILLAGE POETS WITH LOIS P. JONES AND ALICE PERO

The beautiful, inspired, whimsical, sensuous, and richly woven from a tapestry of words and images reading by featured poets Lois P. Jones and Alice Pero will remain among the highlights of the season. Not just the featured poets rose to the occasion, other readers celebrated the Earth Day of April 22 and commemorated the Armenian Genocide of April 24.

Poetry took us to the stars, inside a drawing by Leonardo, and on nature hikes, to see dragonflies in the Tujunga Wash. We learned how to eat a mountain and what Odysseus did when Sirens sang their irresistible song.  We listened, we thought, we laughed, we cried... 

Lois P. Jones thus summed up her experience: "The air was clean and crisp, the sunlight dappling, the poetry served al dente, warm and welcoming. There was humor and pathos (a powerful poem on the anniversary of the Armenian holocaust), odes to spring and renewal, the whimsical dynamism of Alice Pero and the welcoming light of MC, Maja Trochimczyk. A poet afterward offered something which I will take with me forever. "Your poetry opens the soul." Better than any awards or flashy publications. I must remember to keep my eye on the soul."

PHOTO L To R: Seated: Tim Callahan, Lida Abramian, Susan Rogers, Lois P. Jones, Alice Pero and Marlene Hitt . Standing: Maja Trochimczyk, Joe DeCenzo, Beverly M. Collins, Mark Evans, Bo Kyung Kim, Pam Shea, Elsa S. Frausto, Dorothy Skiles, Joe, Mira Mataric, Kathabela and Rick Wilson, and Janet Nippell.  Other photos are on Facebook and will find their way to an online album.