Sharon Hawley and Pete Justus, Featured Poets at Bolton Hall on May 25, 2014

Joined by the new Poet-Laureate, Elsa S. Frausto, the Village Poets invite all poets and lovers of poetry to the next Village Poets Reading at the Bolton Hall Museum in Tujunga. Scheduled for Sunday afternoon, May 25, 2014 at 4:30 p.m., the reading will feature two poets, Sharon Hawley and Pete Justus.  There will be two open mike segments for poets and refreshments will be provided. The two poets have a wealth of experience between them, both having retired from successful careers and both being avid cyclists. Should you bring your bike?

SHARON HAWLEY

Sharon Hawley is a poet, photographer, and adventurer from Pasadena.  When asked for information about herself she responded:

"As far as a bio goes, I avoid publishing, and pursue adventure.  As we speak, I’m in Alpine, Texas, riding a bicycle from Del Rio to San Diego.  I will return about a week before the May 25 feature at Bolton Hall.  I have added you to my mailing list, to which I send updates whenever I have internet, and refer to my blog at http://sharonbybicycle.blogspot.com/.  I send these almost daily, and you may find them too much.  If so, just ask to be removed.  On the blog you will find links to my other adventures.  For my feature at Bolton Hall in May, I have prepared a special poem for that occasion, and will read only that poem.  The poem is twenty minutes long and will be accompanied by projected pictures.  Perhaps Joe will have the projector and screen ready; I will use my computer.  I have spent quite a bit of time preparing this single poem, which I call “Wild Innocence.”  I don’t know how to put this into a bio, and I really have no credentials."

Her modesty is as amazing as her adventurous spirit - she published many poems in Poets on Site anthologies and other venues; she traveled to Death Valley in the summer, to the coldest city in the U.S. in the winter, to Pakistan and many other locations. Twice, she has bicycled across the continent of North America; the second adventure is approaching its end and we'll have her speak just a week after its completion.

PETE JUSTUS

Pete Justus is a retired history teacher and avid cyclist. He started writing poetry in 1972, when he was 26 while spending that summer backpacking through Europe. He kept writing when he returned and about 25 years later began to read his poetry at open mics around Southern California. Within a year he became the host of the then long running reading at the famed Midnight Special Bookstore in Santa Monica. A little over a year later he became the founder and the first host of the now nearly 14 year old reading at the Rapp Saloon in Santa Monica. Pete also organized a series of readings by established Southland poets at the school he taught at that at. Those readings called “The Pen is Mightier” attracted hundreds of students and encouraged many of them to begin writing their own poems. He has written two books of poetry, "The Edge of a Brighter Day" which is out of print and "Truths, Taps and Time." Pete has read at numerous venues throughout Southern California and has been the featured poet at various venues from Huntington Beach to Santa Barbara and as far north as San Luis Obispo. He was featured at the San Luis Obispo Poetry Festival and has read yearly with the “100,00 Poets For Change.” Over the years Pete has written nearly 600 poems.

Pete writes narrative poems from his wide range of experience. Using simple words and concrete moments he captures the truth of much larger human details. He has poems that everyone can identify with and a humble nature that surprises a listener with his insight. Pete's poetry is lyrical and deceptively simple, but sticks with an audience with an impact similar to a great rock song.  Many who have heard him read comment on his unique style and delivery. His poems range in subject matter from the deeply personal to the state of the world. He has a style that tends to wander through time as he incorporates his background as a history teacher and intertwines past events into poems on subjects ranging from personal struggles to world events. His poetry, although simple on one level, is wistful, poignant, analytical and reflective on another. Once you’ve heard him read you will always recognize his style and will always know, within seconds that you are hearing a Pete Justus’ poem.

Village Poets Extravaganza - March 25, 2012

John Steven McGroarty, California Poet Laureate, wrote "Just California" to celebrate the unique beauty of our part of the world. The poem has been published in a variety of venues and even became required reading for California school children. You can read it in an embroidered or crocheted form on display at the McGroarty Arts Center.

In response to the current California in the Arts Exhibition at the Center, Village Poets dedicate their March group reading, to be held on March 25, 2012 at 4:30 p.m. at Bolton Hall Museum, Tujunga, CA. The reading will feature their poetic responses to McGroarty's "Just California" and to newly written poems based on the themes of nature and the seasons.

Here's McGroarty's poem, "Just California"

JUST CALIFORNIA

When I am in California I am not in the West.
It is West of the West. It is just California.
—Theodore Roosevelt

'Twixt the seas and the deserts,
'Twixt the wastes and the waves,
Between the sands of buried lands
And ocean's coral caves;
It lies not East nor West,
But like a scroll unfurled,
Where the hand of God hath flung it
Down the middle of the world.

It lies where God hath spread it
In the gladness of His eyes,
Like a flame of jeweled tapestry
Beneath His shining skies;
With the green of woven meadows,
The hills in golden chains,
The light of leaping rivers,
And the flash of poppied plains.

Days rise that gleam in glory,
Days die with sunset's breeze,
While from Cathay that was of old
Sail countless argosies;
Morns break again in splendor
O'er the giant, new-born West,
But of all the lands God fashioned,
'Tis this land is the best.

Sun and dews that kiss it,
Balmy winds that blow,
The stars in clustered diadems
Upon its peaks of snow;
The mighty mountains o'er it,
Below, the white seas swirled—
Just California, stretching down
The middle of the world.




JOE DECENZO grew up in Los Angeles and majored in theater and English Literature. From 2004-06 he served as poet laureate of Sunland-Tujunga. He produced the “Shouting Coyote” performing arts festival and was a Department of Cultural Affairs grant recipient. His published works include The Ballad of Alley and Hawk and the Study Guide and Poetry Primer for the same collection. He currently serves on the planning committee for the Village Poets of Sunland-Tujunga and as Chair of Poet Laureate Search Committee.


MARLENE HITT is a Los Angeles poet, writer, and retired educator, a graduate of Occidental College who also studied at CSUN, UCLA and USC. A 26-year member of Chupa Rosa Writers of Sunland and of California Federation of Chaparral Poets, Ms. Hitt served as Poet-Laureate of Sunland-Tujunga in 1999-2001. Her poetry appeared in Eclipse, The Vineyard, Chopin with Cherries anthology and other publications. She published three books on local history, Sunland-Tujunga From Village to City (Arcadia Press, 2000 and 2005). She served as a columnist for The Foothill Leader, Glendale News-Press, and the Foothill Paper (since 1998). She currently writes for The Voice of The Village.


“Poetry has always been in my blood,” claims DOROTHY SKILES who has been writing poetry since her teenage years. A graduate of San Fernando Valley State College, and a retired social worker (after 34 years of public service), Dorothy published her first chapbook, The Sidewalk Gallery in 1979, while being married, raising twin boys, and managing a career. Other chapbooks followed: Ear to Earth (1996), Spine Flower Blues (1999) - a collaborative effort with fellow members of the Chuparosa Writers - and Riddle in the Rain (2003) - a joint venture with Marlene Hitt. Over the last 15 years, Dorothy has been involved in the local poetry scene and her poems appeared in a variety of community publications. The President of the Village Poets of Sunland-Tujunga organizing monthly readings at Bolton Hall Museum in Tujunga, she is also an active member of Chuparosa Writers and of SAGE, an educational program for seniors, managed jointly by CSUN and the Lutheran Church in the Foothills.

MAJA TROCHIMCZYK is a poet, music historian, photographer and translator born in Poland, educated in Warsaw and at McGill University in Canada (Ph.D., 1994), and living in California (www.trochimczyk.net). She received fellowships and awards from SSHRCC, ACLS, PAHA, USC. She published four books of music studies (After Chopin; The Music of Louis Andriessen; Polish Dance in Southern California, and A Romantic Century in Polish Music), two books of poetry illustrated with her photographs (Rose Always and Miriam’s Iris, 2008), the Chopin with Cherries: A Tribute in Verse (2010), as well as hundreds of peer-reviewed and popular articles on music and culture. Over 80 poems have appeared in such journals as the Epiphany Magazine, The Loch Raven Review, The Lily Review, Magnapoets, poeticdiversity, San Gabriel Valley Poetry Quarterly, Quill & Parchment, Ekprasis, and anthologies by Poets on Site and others. She taught music history at McGill University and USC, served as editor-in-chief for Polish Music Journal, the Poet-Laureate of Sunland-Tujunga, President of Modjeska Club and Founder/President of the Moonrise Press.

________________________________

Photos of Sunland (c) 2012 by Maja Trochimczyk.

Portrait of Maja with her artwork at the Scenic Drive Gallery, by Susan Dobay.

Alice Pero - Featured Poet on June 26, 2011

The next monthly Village Poets Reading at Bolton Hall Museum, Tujunga, on June 26, 2011 at 4:30 p.m. will feature our wonderful neighbor, poet and musician, Alice Pero. A co-founder and host of Moonday Poetry readings at Pacific Palisades, she recently started Moonday East in nearby La Canada Flintridge, but she is our neighbor in Sunland.

Alice Pero was born in New York City, the child of an electrical engineer and a housewife/editor. She graduated from Putney School in Vermont and The Manhattan School of Music in New York City. She received dance training at the Martha Graham School in New York and from many private teachers and studied flute with Harold Bennett. While a student she played with the National Orchestral Association in New York City and currently she is playing chamber music concerts, after a long hiatus from the flute. She is a member of the California Poets in the Schools, and was a workshop leader for the New York City Ballet Education Department Poetry Project for many years. Pero is also a teacher of poetry to grade school children and she has developed a unique curriculum that utilizes her experience with music. In October 2002, Pero founded a poetry reading, Moonday, at Village Books in Pacific Palisades, California, which she co-produces with Lois P. Jones. She recently inaugurated the Moonday East series at the newly constructed Flintridge Bookstore in La Cañada, while continuing the popular Pacific Palisades readings.

Pero discovered poetry after studying rhythm with the music educator, Jamie Faunt, and has been writing poetry seriously for 29 years. She has done many featured readings in New York and Los Angeles and has been published in over 60 small magazines and anthologies, including: North American Review, 13th Moon, The Alembic, North Dakota Quarterly, RiverSedge, New Delta Review, The Distillery, Lullwater Review, Poet Lore, River Oak Review, The Cape Rock, Fox Cry Review, The Griffin, G.W. Review, Main Street Rag, Quercus Review, Oregon East, The Pikeville Review, Xavier Review, Studio One, Three Mile Harbor, Salonika, San Gabriel Valley Quarterly, Soundings East, Spillway, Sulphur River Literary Review, Minnetonka Review, Word Thursday, Très diverse-city, Valley Contemporary Poetry Anthology, Albatross, Lummox, Bayou, Carquinez Poetry Review, Cadillac Cicatrix, California Quarterly, Cairn, The Old Red Kimono, and Sanskrit.

Her first book of poetry, Thawed Stars, published in 1999, was hailed by Kenneth Koch as having “clarity and surprises.”

Lyn Lifshin has said: "Alice Pero's poems are deliciously open, brimming with leaps, twists and surprises, often joyful and fizzy as a fireworks display." The book is available on Amazon.com:
Thawed Stars.

“The romance of discovery, the radiant brilliance, the surprise and laughter are all here in Alice Pero's deeply intelligent insights into the edge of things." ~The Book Reader~
________________________________________


RUMORS

They say that soon
the sun will be swept
into the sea
The moon will visit me
and tell me
how to rescue the sun

but I know these are only rumors

The sea keeps secrets in violent waves
and leaves me wondering

The sun burns alone
in scorching silence

but only I live to dream
_________________________

from Thawed Stars

© 2011 Alice Pero

____________________________________________________


The monthly Village Poets readings at the Bolton Hall Museum in Tujunga have been blessed with a number of impressive guest poets and regular visitors reading their work at the Open Mike segments. We are looking forward to hearing Alice's poetry next month.

Cindy Rinne's recent reading at Bolton Hall (May 22) was a popular success, not only because of the beauty and inspiration of her poetry, with a deeply personal, reflective tone, focusing on the beauty of nature. Cindy brought and shared with us a set of wonderful fiber art pieces, that she designed and made from pieces of fabric, embroidery, inscriptions of poems, etc. I particularly loved the beautiful blue piece with small houses on it, and the story about her house that burned down. We live in the wildfire zone, close to the mountains that are as beautiful as they are dangerous...

At the end of Cindy's "Earth Voices" presentation of her poetry and fiber art, the audience "dressed up" in her artwork and posed together. She wrote about this experience on her blog: FiberVerse. I took a couple of photos; here's a group shot of all poets holding Cindy's fiber artwork. Thank you, Cindy!



L to R: Jim Gibson, Dorothy Skiles, Marlene Hitt, Lloyd Hitt, Joe DeCenzo, xx, Lois P. Jones, Russell Salamon, Beverly Collins, Marcia Behar, Mari Werner, Deborah Marlow, and (seated) Maja Trochimczyk, xx, Barbara Brolin, Cindy Rinne and Mira Mataric.