 I'm glad you're all here because actually you're going to hear the poets of San Francisco. That is what this poets 11 is about. This is the, from all the districts of the city, you're going to hear the poetry of this town with all its variations from the political to the love dimensions and other aspects of social life. So I'm really pleased that you found your way here today. I'm going to call up the names of the district. We'll go by districts. I'll call up the three names and Byron has provided yes. The first poets are going to be called up. We'll be from district one. Each poet will read one of the three poems that they submitted. The three poems are of course published in the anthology. Before that I'd just like to mention a great thanks to Byron Spooner, Judy Bernhardt, Sarah Rosdale, Julianne Wen, and Wayne Schelabarga, who did that crazy illustration. Vis-a-vis the anthology. Okay, so let's begin. I'll call the names of the three poets from district one. They are Romeo, Alcala, Cruz, Kathleen McClung, and Susan Terence, and also because he's got another engagement earlier from another district, Dee Allen will read also with after the first three read in the first section. So would you come up please? Congratulations. Hi, hi, hi, hi. And Dee? Dee is not here? Okay, we'll begin with Romeo, Alcala, Cruz. Diary of Ferguson September 10, 2014. In response to the police with their tear gas, yes, yes, no, no, no. Only I was just trying to sate the anger of summer with rain. In response to the question, did Byron really started the whole commotion? Basically I stayed home all night without work. Who else is working nowadays after the shot down the factories at this Midwest town? Still waiting for the turnaround for the recession. Jobs are coming, they say. Jobs are wilting like grass I waited and waited, armed with prayers. At least I will get a runaway bullet from the Panicky police who are blessed with new work and salaries to keep this town from blacks and more impatient protesters. I've been watching television all day long. Enforced to spend the last remaining months after the after the late be off in this broken annex with my cousins, father, mother, sisters and another another couple, their son and their dogs. Nobody cares. After all the smoke and commotion and shooting. My cop, my wife keeps a video diary. The chronicle, the chronic call our hopes and dreams and post them on YouTube, hoping for some people at least to know. We are still barely surviving, but we cannot breathe. Barely. Thank you. Thank you very much, Jack. Thanks to tenant activists and rent control laws. I've had the pleasure of living in the same San Francisco apartment for over 20 years. And for most of those years, I've had the same mailman. My poem is titled Anticipators and it's dedicated to Edsel. Next spring or sooner Saturday delivery will end. Reduce to five our days to speak in passing, you and I of how our years speed by and how your shoulder bag grows thin hangs lighter now. How you anticipate new luxuries ahead. Pleasure reading at last Cervantes, Melville, Proust. No more reading zip codes through window envelopes, deliveries of birthday dollars, get well cards, unpaid gas bills, taxes. In July fog, we speak with awe of gulls, enormous crows on thin black wires above the blocks you've walked for years. And we agree. These flocks in recent years have multiplied have honed their skills in reading us and all we carry all we drop thin stuff, transfers, toothpicks, gum, deliveries from mouths or pockets straight to gutters, beaks. No wonder white and black they lurk anticipate our moves are scattered crumbs anticipate jackpots from Tinkerbell backpacks six year old girls adore. Dear courier, you speak of daughters grown in cubicles reading sleek screens phoning across time zones delivering their news quick bursts of syllables adduce and then silence for weeks sometimes perhaps a thin dribble of lines emailed attention paid elsewhere. We nod we know deliveries wane cease as seasons alternate and years like crows fly past we carry on reading you bring the bundles to my door and speak of days to come days full of books that speak a language almost lost deep stillness then deep clarity a trance only reading calm hours will weave we each anticipate a lightning of load unhurrying of years time ripe for reverence deliveries within unpackaged vast special deliveries so to speak birthed by doorstep years reading and sorting the quotidian signed sealed. Thank you. Hi everybody. Nice to see you here. Thanks Jack. This poem is about a fellow performer a puppeteer who is from El Salvador. It's called El Quinto de comandante tomate the story of comandante tomate. So I wrote it in his words. I wrote the bus or train all by myself six years old. It's why I can never sit still. I've been everywhere by the time I was six only one of my family to boys school. It's why I'm still shy with girls always in the company of older boys prickly cacti I had to scale. My mother always said you must play with younger boys. You are growing up too quickly. Older boys are just poisoned to you. At eight they lured me to the house of ill repute. I told them I'd already been hope that would get me off the hook. But they were 14 eager to reinitiate an eight year old. They stuck to colonis in my hand. It became a black snake coffee candy. I thought of how to colonis would be fun for an entire week. Plastic cars mumbo gum rights to the city and new books. A bony finger pulled me into a room. I saw rivulets oceans. The woman began to undress. I shook mechanically in tears. The woman grabbed money from my hand. Now get out of here you big baby. I stepped out the door tried my tears waited in the hallway for the other boys. How was it they asked good good I said and you. I wanted to be outside in the air a Picasso a clown and astronaut. I read everything. I read flyers on the street. I read billboards. I read labels on foods. No words escape me. I learned English at seven in school the colors the numbers. My father bought me a book of colors. I learned it. I memorized it in three days. I lost it. I was overcome with sadness. My father beat me 12 colonis of $5 book a day's work and I had not finished coloring the colors yet. The science of military fascinated me. My teachers thought I was crazy. I idolized general Douglas MacArthur and Gregory Peck who played him. At 15 I joined the militia. We were young. No Polly spoke behind the ears. But we tried so hard to use a gun. My Gregory Peck fascination subsided. The pistol pulsed on its own had its own ambulances and mourners. It was dark and had teeth. A relative of the ghost of Hustesia judgment who were passed by you in the city growing to seven feet tall in front of you and just walk past walk into water and never drown even in the middle of the ocean or was the headless pre-sort was I was afraid to use a gun when new spirits would shoot out. I shot at my feet. I did puppetry in the city for children. It was the man who stole a sausage from the butcher but blamed it on a dog because everyone knows dogs love sausage. So the dog went to prison La Carcelle. But the kids knew really who stole the sausage and begged us to flee free El Perrito the little dog. They wanted to tear down the paper jail until the real culprit. A thin man with big mustache appeared admiring he stole the sausage because he was hungry and had no colonis in his pocket. Nobody invited us to the factories but we went the National Guard marching outside with long rifles. There was not enough fabric for many characters the bird La Pajrita with the prettiest voice in the countryside saying to the other seamstresses about not having enough colonis for tortillas salt, salt, frijoles and pan bread. The phantom a white love figure with black eyes took the Pajrita, the little bird from her factory for organizing a strike of seamstresses and broke her neck with his white hands. Scars became the other birds in the factory and flew at the throats of the guard. Sometimes I lose my voice. I never had any training. One year at the university till it closed. Militarized. Guard the phantoms. Students in hiding. All blood leaves your face and your veins when you carry off someone shot in the street or when you find someone buried or thrown soft sloppily in the dirt a finger missing tongue absent private parts gone. It is that introduction to death which is the true induction. Everything once in you washed out. Any blood in the veins dried and you have to reinvent your whole circulatory system. How the blood moving makes your fingers move. How your heart feels the rivers fear is the antidote fear is the medicine that makes you lean that makes you listen better than to any lesson in high school to a bullet cutting the air cleanly to someone walking behind you to your own breath afraid to come out. With this introduction it's easier to measure the speed of a new bullet how fast the belly can flop to the earth. On the two dogs if the dark one crossed your path bad luck we all had it everyone I knew even if we walked in the other direction I had to leave my boyhood friends now in the mountains or imprisoned everyone off the streets by dusk. I left my family my partner the fur animal puppets and the paharita. Two weeks ago my partner was captured. I imagine the wardia threw the puppets away or shot them. I am a printer now have two boys six and two they play with their plastic cars toy men no one is hurrying them to grow up but they see different spirits than the ones I bring them and the elder one wants to read everything and believes nothing. I'm D. Allen from district nine for at least one more day I'm going to be moving from San Francisco for good tomorrow I've been in this city for 12 years and it's been very good to me but all that comes to an end when I put everything that I own including the books including books that my work has appeared in into totes and boxes onto a moving van and all that is because district nine is undergoing further and I do mean further redevelopment and every single week I see like a like two or three u-haul vans per week in my neighborhood alone of just somebody just packing up their personal possessions and leaving the city because the real estate the regular rents have gone through the roof around here no thanks to entry of the information technology industry that mayor ed lee is invited into this town and I'm one of the casualties I have three poems published in this book I'm going to read you one of them on page 136 of poets 11 2015 this is an elegy to a poet who inspired me to pick up the pen and write my own work this is for a mary baraka this is called shining star I don't have too much time to just sitting around counting stars I have to be in another part of town to accomplish that alone hiking around a dark burnal hill with a flashlight I could see the stars above much better than I could in the mission's drastic urban change below one shining star is missing from the ebony sky the hole it left isn't untraceable I followed that star's brilliant shine for over 20 years caught by its halogen luminance that star inspired me to craft poems that kill wrestle cops and alleys make me feel and be me shake off to the best of my ability madness and dead skull songs transform my homespun writing into implements that splinter fire encourage me to keep keep throwing hard keep on punching and never let my enemies dodge once use my scrawl verses in a daily struggle that transcends class as my beautiful people would Africanize nose and arms half a centuries wanting sun to plenty in a vast land where he thens think fascism is civilization and luxury is an everyday comfortable ignorance in the slums projects and blue collar suburbs there's always a railroad made of hella human bones black ivory black ivory black ivory when the situation worsens lovers and warriors and their sons should unite and come out fighting its conditions even when the devil with the blue uniform a bad shows up in a hot harlem minute it's nation time it's nation time it's nation time one shining star is missing from the ebony sky the hole it left is untraceable that star disappeared joining shining stars of the past and the endless void a parallel sky of sorts like others that came before that's that star unique newark street kid beatnik kawada communist not anti-semitic anti-zionist more spirit than ghost born evryt leroy jones renamed blessed prince inspired me to pick up the pen and fill notebooks with words that still move the people that poem was called shining star on page 136 of poets 11 2015 i'm d allen you're the first thank you we'll continue now with the the second group district two william barton christie delahanti steven gray and we're going to also hear from someone who has to go to work yes it's sunday but you know uh and that's from district 11 katie wheeler dubin so welcome them all katie is where katie oh oh she's not here then this evening this day christie is not here all right hello this is called the mothership you were lost asking how you got to be so rusted crusty fat cold and moldy just at the age of 22 it was the freeways the varicose vein vipers that said you could learn coke at mcd's doling flesh or you could learn it somewhere else but find your own damn money and leave me alone and i found you in a supermarket aisle draped in leopard print tired painted face and you'd give in life ketchup bottle the baby boy sucked the bottle you never were taken out to dinner and now the boy is two or three you save the candlelight for vigils it's called a luxury apartment i live in an apartment with amenities and not so many enemies amen it is a luxury apartment for the following reasons it is quiet in the middle of the night and light is coming through the window in the morning i'm lining it with my privacy protected by the trees i have the luxury of living with a woman who is in love with me the luxury of books and periodicals and other information at my fingertips and no one breaking down the door to ask me questions i'm dialing up ethereal voices and emphatic sound effects my mind is floating on the sound waves in another room there is an apple and i have the luxury of living in a building full of waterfalls they're hot and cold a wood guitar a few rugs from the middle east an old arabian respect for running water a proximity to infinite dimensions like the constellations on the roof i am a few blocks from the ocean would you say a foghorn is luxurious or living with electric currents running through the building we are inhabiting the futurism of an Edison hot tea and honey in a humming typewriter with the leisure time afforded by the rent control i have opinions and the luxury of living in a country with the working constitution i'm luxuriating in the fact i'm not in jail and hardly ever have insomnia and winter never makes it here i have a glass of wine a loaf of bread and my erectile function for a happy ending thank you this is called my hunger poem please eat this cut of meat eat your fill your will of me your eyes such kind knives i ask you this so vulnerably my heart is a lion a labyrinth a liar i got matadors and griffin doors and sphinxes within it and depending on the time of day or shade of thunder's gray how the rain drums or how recently i've come my monsters and beasts spare their throats or their teeth or their tits my heart's a mosh pit red light solid sometimes too much salted grit other times so wired babe i'm a vampire searching for love in the internal organs of a morning dove bothered and hot displays can't stop mothered as it is in the belly of a screaming teapot make my stove groan until i moan growl perl or snarl from horrible to hum drum me a bat cave at dawn speak sweet words to me and i'll blossom so good i'll swoon a smoky wood a wolf cocked at dusk with her mouth full of blood other times at first light i fight raging the seas in the inner seas of my knees oh a cutting winds all these ego things i'm a bad bitch and i like to fuck and it's not a fucking problem though it makes my shadow long and wrong makes me draw dragons my hungry hot mouth that widens this far south i leave love notes in your layer because i care because loss is my nightmare i hope will grow as intertwined as stacks of lies or like slices of apple in a cheddar cheese crust pie i'm sorry for the love we've lost and the blood we've seared but fuck the fear i'm a woo you with finger tattoos and bed cover croons seduce you under the full moon ask you to kiss me in the street like a romantic geek please tinder my fire so tender please tender my tinder like wire so supple drink my butter it's tight my sauce is no bark just a bite get me smeared my wood ache disappeared wet my sauce deep in your beard this love like teetering ledges this katie bird dragon has soft wings with sharp edges this terrible gnashing this hunger our two worlds are crashing this world in jungle this place we are waking makes me shake in the taking your blood i am drinking it winds down my throat it as hot as it's snaking the stream we are making please eat this cut of meat eat your fill your will of me your eyes such kind knives you may break or cut or bruise me please so tenderly fry me eat me entirely now we'll now we're going to the third district the third district will feature Anne Leonard Jean Powell and Joe Pulikino that's uh i think the North Beach district yeah i'm not here jean this is a broadway hill bohos red and green parrots burst from senora de guadalupe's eucalypti at broadway tunnel hilltop flocking crazy zigzags across the sky in noisy fall apart come together above church school gates is shrieking crush of children bouncing laughter up up up hillside steps suffuses my descent past old flowing beard billy goat boho in shirtless cloud of funky sex musk pegging bickoo stick in path to sun his horny eyes attention all on my tank top breasts slows the moment but breaking in a sudden eclipse boho number two chinese twin pointed gray beard cloaked in bickoo muteness wearing black wrap shades pushes bicycle up handlebars tied with twin pink plastic bags powell street takeout on one side for aging mother found cans for quarters the other burying his burden home my eyes telescoping worn buildings cakewalk down either side of the street the slot broadway's long long skip and slip to sweep of bridge and bays hills crimped rise the keyhole sky the key slides down the slot tumblr spin my hand is on the key arc of gray's hit fovea centralis macula lutea the key in the keyhole it's me i see telescope down the slot opening opening walking projecting film strip of cellular light bodies pasted to face front a box of light lit from circuits of somewhere creating creating from tunnel to bay face full of broadway eye full of being bronze filigree tunnel mouse river of sound school buses taxis motorcycles coming up through me campo hk greasy spoon sip bar and lounge red lights green lights ocean pearl restaurants gray foam sidewalk scrub brushes punctuating traffic great min trading lucky star discount we do see dough casino billboard hot slots gushing crazy sevens floating ben franklin's uphill and down hk anaheer and beauty bling bling cosmetics pet central tv bi we all go dosy dough broadway dim sum ping you in projects in a lazy reel the sam wong hotel big alz the condor crosswalk to crosswalk and garden of eden flashing neon taste of paradise millions and billions kaleidoscopic human peddling brief cloud of oyster sauce a flourage all graffiti vegetable trucks from here to shanghai redwall of double decker of fire engine howl deep horn blasts all doing the street corner dosy dough diesel engines huffing crossing broadway forever the hum of creation seeing it all flying out of time not even seeking yet picked up by serpent's tail carried in a flick of movement yes the outflowing in convergence fusing mo movement with the moment light shooting onto the big nerve fiber screen i'm creating it creating it seagulls drifting distant deeply planted bridge feet port of oakland crane towers white dazzle lineup behemoth trojan horses of trade waiting tide flats in formation looming black mount diablita tit tugboat fireboat tuna boat sail boats crinkle of blue satin diamond ship glitter sea spew resting yet not contained it's a god's eye scene and now forming recoa lessing walking down the loping twist and curve i find myself the only as she begoo ever to skip and trip the slot and ruminating road riding dharma boys scribbling she devils and tantric sex sex goddesses a plenty yet i find nary a bikuni none and down at the dock on the bay seagulls hover low and screech and scree at happy couples babies jump ups arms flapping screeching louder yet louder squeeze as china seaman with old transistor lean smoking grooving to tinny hong kong disco and all now grooving at the dock on the bay lapping container ship waves rhythmic sea slapping and i say yes yes it is me the only as she begoo ever casting self upon posies page the only one so named yes i am broadway hill bow ho number three thank you good afternoon i wrote this poem in celebration of a friend's marriage and as you'll hear it evokes the much storied wedding feast where water was turned into wine the poem is called miracles of the vine what astonishes everyone most at the wedding is that the best is saved for last the host knowing there is nothing left in the cellar smiles coyly at his stewards apparent sleight of hand an abulient with this impossible wine he savers his guests delight this bouquet of the miracle of hospitality some guests relishing a quick fixed to turn the dance lighter the tempo quicker the singing more boisterous in the coupling less discreet barely taste the new wine's whole richness and lose the longer more surprising finish others though seeing the stunning ferment of a supple mind creating accelerating the ordinary into the uncommon do not appreciate the subtle hints of pineapple mango and soft oak they do not notice the magic of this rich lush miracle of nature's lovely balanced labor roots drawing water from soil vines extending to sunlight growing flesh of fruit sweetness finally turned to spirit it happens every season day by day miracles in ordinary appearances in every vine every taste the miracles we savor taking so long becoming so common barely seeing them happen at all what astonishes me most about you is you're living at the edge of miracle creating the best out of a long late harvest making it last miracles of the vine complex and full-bodied poor slowly thank you bravo okay now now we go to district four that oh and i should say by the way those who uh who are not here will either have another engagement or they're out of town they will receive of course their their uh the copies of their of the anthology we'll hear next from gloria kealy robert levette smith and matthew montay do you have them here yes yes is gloria here gloria is not here is matthew montay here also he is not here terrible terrible terrible oh terrible terrible well here's someone who believes in community bravo bravo here you go my friend you got it okay okay you are robert robert levette well i would have been delighted to be here in any case but as it appears i'm the only person from district four who made it i'm especially happy to be here okay now i thought a lot about which of the three poems to do and i think this one's maybe the most fun uh i'm sure there are some people out there who do go to the free concerts at stern grove yep thought so this is about one of those it's called she's not there taking the stage at stern grove the zombies not the somnambulant corpses that dominate movies and television these days but the iconic british rock group graying and crinkled but still vibrant cullen blundstone's creepy tenor soaring over a rumbling base on the sides of the ravine under the trees the crowd all t-shirts and sunscreen applaud's old favorites teller no time of the season the air's dense hot the medicinal treacle of eucalyptus battling the cloying of cannabis for a moment it's possible to imagine the summer of love risen from its flowery grave and i wonder who was playing here then but the illusion lingers only briefly dissipating like a vaguely pleasant dream years sift through slanting light like pollen like the husks of last season's seeds she's not there none of us are thank you very much we'll continue with district five and district five is lin barnes alice chou and judith yamamoto thank you dear thank you all right we'll begin with lin thank you friends thank you jack nice to see all of you this poem is called bijou of new orleans bijou meaning something small delicate and exquisitely wrought and it's a poem for ruby bridges on her 60th birthday on september 8th 2014 bijou of norleans at six she walks past fears sibling hate her shoulders high as if there might be something invisible lifting them in her white dress with a matching bow shoes socks radiant against her chocolate skin she beams self-possession beyond her age every day for a year beginning in 1960 dress suited federal marshals with yellow armbands escort her to a new orleans school where all the other parents have withdrawn their children where she is now the lone student they tell her not to look at anyone in the crowd around her jeering and they lead her past a white wall splattered with hurled tomatoes with the first graders guileless determination she walks america past that white wall into a penetrating look at the slur scrawled next to her fresh-faced innocence cockroaches and mice come to feast on her abandoned lunches until her boston teacher mrs barber henry eats with her every day after this discovery this hint of a silent deeper disturbance sleeping in the basement of her courage they learn together care for one another all that year even as mobs outside their school's walls shout obscenities at them they travel from separate worlds unite to form the unbreakable bond that comes from facing danger on a battlefield in comradeship with a fellow human these two black and white facets of reality's diamond cut through the steel bars of an imprisoning culture this child is immortalized with startling tenderness in norman rockwell's painting that president obama hangs on a wall inside the west wing of the white house the problem we all live with rockwell called it when he offered it as the cover of a 1963 look magazine it is 50 years later when the first african-american president greets this woman who entering her seventh year of life helped cut away briars of hate clear the trail he took to the oval office the mythology of heaven is festooned with gold streets and shiny pearl white gates while here on blue green earth we're blessed with incandescent arc-like visions of tiny sturdy ruby bridges this year in asia minor this year in asia minor in an inland sea the water rises a woman goes on taking what she can carry flight beginning on a night without moonlight rain uncertain and the distortion of that last tree the black sea fills luck hangs on the fall of a veil a woman turned away or allowed to go on a child hidden the hour irregular unsteady in the low call of darkness at those checkpoints where we wait there is always a risk our disguises falling into disbelief the passage to the aegean sea opens a woman walks now in the shadows of the oldest stone beasts a u.s. destroyer deploys from norfolk we cannot separate all of these parts we cannot make them come together we no longer know who we were thank you next we're going to hear from district six sylvie al-sivar jay passer and savadi theaton let's welcome them jay jay is not here jay passer okay sylvie this poem is for my mother listo mother who cleaned the coffee machine with vinaigre and didn't bother to give it a rinse before brewing a 12 cup pot which out of want or forgetfulness you just keep warming mother who always began our phone conversations oh how you you okay a formality you didn't really understand never leaving room for me to answer having too much to say about esa hija de puta or the neighbor teniendo otro bebé or las babaridades de la propiedad mother who so often disappeared across the street to have your coffee on the porch with Nancy stealing breaths of cigarettes you knew you'd never get back mother who sat on a rock in the front yard sucking mango seeds having eaten every right bit of flesh we watched you our eyes asking for what we'd never get when you had your satisfaction you tossed the seed to us like the waiting dogs we were and we'd know on that soft stone we'd scrape your desire satisfied into our own mouths it always got caught in our baby teeth but we learned how to pick it out by watching you use toothpicks mother who shouted for us try me las al though it was two steps in the cupboard right beside you maybe you wanted salt maybe you wanted a daughter to watch you cutting fat from thighs and bones adding cumin and soy sauce and adobe seasoning maybe you wanted her to see how you never used a measuring cup or a spoon maybe you just wanted a body in the room while you sang spanish pop songs off-key and the radio played too loud digame otro canción de amor digame otro canción de dolor mother who forced us to sit in the front row at church kneeling standing praying for 45 minutes of faked faith to pass quickly and these pews turning to each other for peace be with you and handshakes i remember reaching for you wondering how you came to have such soft hands mother who for as long as i can remember went days without a bath without much reason dark hair darkening under the weight of greece making its own parts that didn't seem to move even when you touched them i wondered why you didn't mind to seem the night smell you carried into the kitchen on your breath calling out to us cafe listo mother who went baths became as painful as the constant ache underneath your fingernails stop taking them more than a person should but you were not a person so much as a series of strange side effects that kept you constantly pressing your nails into the skin that hurt underneath them as if to hold them together as if pressing hurt against hurt could make it disappear mother who refused to stop cooking though the heat of the stove made you wince you sat in a chair to stir the stew a solitary front row pew to honor what you could hold on to cumin soy sauce lentejas no measuring spoons things that reminded you how it felt to be you mother who grew hysteria and roses lilies of the valley and bleeding hearts mother who planted marigolds at boppy's grave always returning to collect the seeds in the same white envelope year after year after year mother who's now buried beside him no year engraved to mark your end because none of your children knew how or where to get that number set in stone how to mark the day and year we became children without parents forever and ever amen mother who knew how to love children when they didn't know they were children when they played viejito with a scrunched up face pressing against your laughter your tenderness which never seemed to live past three years old mother who over salted dinner because you could no longer taste and so it was all too late discovered this is why your tongue had ulcered why tiny cuts felt like giant rips why nothing tasted good why nothing stayed inside for long mother who bore the pain not on your fragile skin or inside your nearly arthritic bones but in the shame that would have clung to your hair if baldness was not another side effect you wore the kind of shame that waged so heavy on your tongue it turned all your wants dame digame oye listo to silence mother who began to say i love you before hanging up the phone not as a feeling i understood so much as the truth of a life lived in the absence of actions that match the words mother who invited me to ecuador para ver su vida who laughed and laughed con mis primos y su madre con sus hermanas and memories coming alive as i watched you laugh as i've never seen you laugh as if joy was the only thing that lived inside your skin mother who understood abuelita's faces she cried holding my hands sobbing and sobbing because she thought she'd never see me again her dementia mistaking me for you because i was in her house that was your house and i have your name forever and ever amen thank you thank you and thank you for being here on such a lovely day and to show my gratitude i would like to read a poem kindness kindness you do not need to see the bottom to know the lake is full you do not need to count the stars to know there is no limit to the world distracted through the day by our fears and loves and sorrows we are a part of that which has no center the thread that quilts our lives together an overflow of kindness surrounds us from the day we are born set adrift on a breathable sea of light and air powered by the tides of the sun and endowed with seamless growth and sleeps repair our share in life is kindness it is kindness that we share whether we breathe it in or breathe it out we walk through time united by this kith or kin we are all the same kind and if we wish to tithe the lot that we receive we need to be reminded to endure and forbear to not be eaten by our anger or diminished by our despair thank you okay in district seven kenny jenna chin alice rogoff toshi wa jizu and with kenny we'll read a poem about cuba victoria makinyana will read it then in spanish after he reads it in in uh in english okay here's the book that's yours hi in 2012 uh we took a family people to people vacation to cuba after the uh planet friendly planet tour we were asked to write our impressions of cuba i wrote it and i thought when poets speak will governments listen so this is called cuba my forgotten love i went on a vacation during an august to moon i met her on the shores of la habana i looked into her eyes and saw her beauty and diversity i looked into her heart and felt her love and friendliness after a round of mojitos i i asked her her name my name is cuba memories of defiant love and clashing futures spilled so much bitterness into the sea until the ebb and flow of the waves washed the herd away i looked into her eyes again and saw a longing i looked into her heart again and saw the scars of the embargo and the impoverishment her worn in agua dress barely concealed the vestiges i asked do you not recognize me cuba's distant gazed turned to me mine our love and passion turned so vengeful years of resentment has made me so wary your exceptionalism your heavy hand your schemes to subvert my historic revolution i was more fearful of your suitor but i know that there is no other now cuba stared silently into my eyes i am independent but the blockade is cruel i dream of a world where we we will be one human family cuba looked as beautiful as the day i left her luscious black hair swirling against green hills and white beaches i i've missed you even though we have become so different i want to love you again i am rich with funds enterprise technology and know-how you are rich in community values health and resourcefulness let me love you again let us forgive our past misdeeds and regrets let us learn to love anew and to earn our blessings let us grow together a better tomorrow cuba's eyes moistened on the bright shores all the bright on the bright shores of la habana that night the bright moon framed the visage of our embrace as we as we kissed after 54 years of separation i'm pleased and honored to have translated kent's poem into spanish cuba mi amor olvidado bajo una luna de agosto de vacaciones fui en las orillas de la habana yo la conocí al inquirir en sus ojos su belleza y diversidad vi y en su corazón su amor y simpatía sentí tras una ronda de mojitos su nombre la pregunté me llamo cuba recuerdos de amores desafiantes y por venir eschocantes derramaron tanta amargura en el mar hasta que el flujo y reflujo de las olas acabaron lavando su dolor inquiri otra vez en sus ojos y algo adelante vi de nuevo en su corazón inquiri las cicatrices del embargo y en pobrecimiento vi su vestido desgarrado por el agua apenas podía sus vestigios esconder yo le pregunté es que no me reconoces a mí la mirada de la distante de cuba volteó a ver mis ojos nuestro amor y pasión se volvieron vengativos los años de resentimiento me han hecho tan cauda tu excepcionalismo tu mano pesada tus intrigas en trastornar mi histórica revolución tenía más miedo de tu pretendiente pero ahora sé que ya no hay otro cuba me miró silenciosamente a los ojos soy independiente pero el bloqueo es cruel sueño con un mundo donde seamos una sola familia humana cuba se veía tan bonita como el día en que partí su exquisito cabello negro y girando contra los cerros verdes y playas blancas yo te extrañado aunque nosotros nos hemos vuelto diferentes quisiera amarte otra vez yo soy rico con fondos empresas tecnología y conocimiento tú eres rica en cuanto a comunidad sanidad e ingeniosidad déjame amarte otra vez perdonemos nuestros antiguos delitos y remordimientos aprendamos a amar de nuevo y merecer nuestras bendiciones cultivemos juntos un futuro mejor los ojos de cuba se humedicieron en las orillas de la vana aquella noche la luna brillante marcó el semblante de nuestro abrazo mientras nos besamos tras 50 años de separación thank you jack and thank you the library sumi abedin i am going to two fulsome street the gap headquarters down near the bay a large square building dominating the block i hurry to get to the rally to ask the gap to sign the fire and building safety agreement sumi abedin a garment worker from bangladesh stands in front of inert pretend corpses shrouded in white sheets her face a map of sadness she jumped from a factory building on fire so her parents could identify her dead body so she would be more than ash or flame charred bones and tissue a face a name a daughter arriving on the sidewalk whole but deceased yet she opened her eyes to the sunlight to the smoke to the fire she asks i keep thinking will there be more fires more collapses more ash and burns more nightmares more sorrow konichiwa good afternoon first i'd like to thank jack hershman and the friends of san francisco public library jack is amazing with his energy humanity and passion for poetry i am grateful for his generosity and continuing efforts for our communities basslet in the far corner of the schoolyard they assemble after school a gang of boys in military style uniforms girls in sailor blouses and pleated skirts the jury appears on this judgment day the prisoner's crime she's poor and dirty she snatched persimmons from the principal's garden stole money from the offer tree box at the temple family of beggars under the bridge a whore of a mother and a couple of bastard kids the girl stands in front of the crowd her neck and legs dusky with grime hair matted and unruly eyes crazed with fear and hate children closing on the condemned running the gauntlet thief beggar ugly bitch whore toss her around among them dazed and helpless she flails her arms the executioner beats her down to the ground you die the mob shouts in unison roused die die die one witness looks down at her sprawled at their feet hesitates for a moment then joined the chanting die you homeless bastard the girl squats on the ground her skirt unfurled like a shield she shuts her eyes to the world sound of crashing water a stream running down the dirt path oh no she's pissing pissing like a horse the yellow streak separates the crowd they scatter run in the deserted schoolyard maple leaves rustle in the wind her knees bruised and naked she wipes her nose with a sleeve and stands up alone in an ocean of orange sunset don't worry at all thank you all right gene all right uh gene powell has arrived from district three so she will be reading with district now we're up to district eight and that's benjamin infinitary mercilee jenkins and steven copel please and gene powell please come up here you go there you go there you go all right thank you oh watch it watch it you all right no that was free okay so we're going with uh your first yes benjamin infinitary hello i'd like to thank jack and the friends of the library and all of you for coming thank you why i fell in love with you your intensity is equal to arkamedi's death ray the subjects of your focus undulate like roman boats on the mediterranean they tack to avoid you but you position your gaze with such precision your light finds a direct line delivering heat and fire you flash moments of listening brilliance top two percent stuff you're a grizzled detective experienced in gathering facts asking strong follow-up questions attempting to discern motive you hear the message under my noise parse the elusive words discover my obsessiveness and anxiety your sense of smell so in tune with your surroundings it conjures memories of my childhood the suffrete and laundry soap and sugary smell of my grandmother's hugs the damp hot air joining me during card games on my grandfather's porch on august nights in new england you are accommodating to all tastes and preferences understanding that so much of life exists on a continuum you are a magician at mixing and matching ingredients discovering the alchemy that makes everyone's palate celebrate i know you think i'm stingy with your touch and you're right i am but only because the power in your touch commands respect it must be delayed then cherished your look when i'm interacting with others when you think i don't notice you you watch my doubts keep me silent how i hold my body weak at the lower back and shoulders you note the fidgeting of my fingers in these moments the calm of your eyes the barest hint of a smile reminds me of your love but i see there's more something pressing you you wait until we're alone in the car where i'm free from embarrassment but also unable to escape to deliver the message i most need to hear step up your game you tell me there's an angel inside of you you've shown it to me now show it to everyone thank you okay hello thanks for coming it's good to be here and thank you jack the poem that i'm going to read was inspired by a npr radio report that i read and also a photograph that i saw several years ago it's called dolphin report the experimenters are proud of their discovery dolphins not only have a unique whistle a sound a song they can recognize the signature sound of any dolphin they have ever known the experimenters arrive at their at this conclusion by playing recordings of dolphins to dolphins in captivity who were at one time in close proximity they monitor the dolphins reactions swimming more quickly around their enclosure repeatedly responding to the calls with their own songs circling searching long elegant noses sliding up against the glass imagine you hear the voice of a lost friend that distinct timber of a loved one who's been missing perhaps now found but there's no one there it's just an experiment the experimenters do not interpret the impact of their procedures but the dolphins do a potty a pod of these large body beautiful swimmers witnessed the deep water horizons disaster leaping in air as one to see the ocean on fire what did they report there is a curious species here lives on land but can swim only recognizes one song i want to say thanks to all of you for showing up for sticking around for the good stuff yet to come all that music fox and foxy trod on over when the music swings music downside up measures syncopated wild enough for mad hatters hell bent on the chase tie for second place next numb from necking with a dumb waiter who opens the gate to rumberousers in loose trousers up all night and to those down on their luck who hit the hay in by the day rooms band stands easy bends suits stretches its first swing set notes spilling around couples loco with motion bases and sacks pick up the beat toss it to couple 21 that's lois and clark on the low down from terry town who step on it feel their feet absorb the heat they fly the floor not there anymore piano keys unlock wish boxes from which dancers spin and grin those musicians from tonight's rubber band hitting highs all night according to the blonde lanky lounge lizard who's saving her notes usually bundled twenties for some goofy gag or gamey gig that pays big bucks though wily jinny grin runs this show out of cell 69 bookings managed by matilda master of arts and potty mouth darts who waltz is around on tiptoes jockeying for lead inside position on every ballroom floor in baltimore thanks for listening good afternoon and thank you all for being here except for the official camera i'm going to ask that other cameras be turned off and cell phones as well thank you this is called word storm saturday night adventure in the blinding rain gk telephones from vallejo wants me to hear him feature and wants to hear my new poem during open mic but it's vallejo so what can i do cable car ride and ferry boat trip and then a long walk am i up for this one time i had asked gk whether he liked living there with his current love and whether it was a good place for me to move no effing way he said i mean no effing way there is no effing way you should ever effing move to effing vallejo effing ever do you effing hear me gk like to make a point and in case you're wondering about my use of that term when i was a child and said a bad word my mouth was washed out with fells naphtha laundry soap and so i still can't say that word in public so sorry the magic day arrived when gk was being featured in vallejo but it was pouring rain pouring felines and canines with dolphins thrown in the raindrops had gills i gathered my good luck charms in a spiritual huddle and off the gang of us went in the wet and windy downpour anything for poetry anything at all my london fog umbrella had suffered near fatal damage in the last rainstorm caught in a burst of hail outside the old sears robux store on masonic but it still had a few minutes of service remaining so my battered umbrella and i forged a path through the rain from cable car to ferry boat in record time that tough little ferry rocked and rolled all the way to vallejo while i downed multiple glasses of wine to keep my courage dry my cantankerous poet friend was celebrating a birthday in a town he hated but in a tiny coffee house he loved just a few blocks from the pier and i promised to be there suddenly i was on stage during open mic with a parcel of musicians while it rained outside like there was no tomorrow i read aloud my new poem about romantic love in a menstrual storm feeling wonderfully grand for a rain soaked saturday night gk roared with delight there it was sex talk rough cider poetry in the raw joys of menstruation foot stomping jazz pesky raindrops carats of wine and my birthday friend laughing as though he were back in new york and free of vallejo forever thank you okay at uh now for district nine well you heard d allen earlier we have miriam mula and callos suarez miriam mula and callos suarez miriam here you go callos is not here what okay all right so then go ahead miriam thank you jack and friends of the library and all the poets in san francisco who create the atmosphere for this america in present tense and there's a historical note to this the reference in this poem is to the workman's circle which with similar organizations not only helped forge the unions but put in place for their members those benefits and rights while they fought to legislate them for all workers america in present tense the past is present jefferson crafting from ideas and thought both his house and the shape of a nation lincoln pausing a midwar and opposition to send words of hope to a widow to the survivors to the future my great grandparents selling everything but clothes and memories taking ship to become strangers in a foreign-tongued future for life for their children's education and their children using that schooling and the dream to fight unfeeling greed for a living wage laboring late under the lamp light studying meeting to shape what people working in union could do win the right to vacations and build a country camp to enjoy them combine to pay doctors for members hurt and sick create a safe haven for those who live to retire other heritages tell other ancestral tales and the richness and strength of this land includes this generation now stooping in the hot fields living the tales their lawyer and teacher grandchildren will tell let us embrace the strength the courage the selflessness the risk of being unpopular denounced defamed insulted scorned as those before us were to deserve what we have inherited enough to pass it on okay we are we're now going into this two more districts district 10 is Anita Audina Cruz Rebecca Fugate and Raven Singh Mekta would you come forward please no one is here none of them are here right now yeah bravo bravo bravo who is that Anita hello good afternoon ladies and gentlemen I'm so happy to be here and be part of the point 11 2014 I'm so thankful to Jack for being very generous and the San Francisco public library my my poem is inspired by one of my clients I'm a tax preparer here in San Francisco who just lost her apartment from Ellis Act so this the title of this poem is Ellis Act in San Francisco California 120 days I'm still angry at the fog that curls and hangs above the rooftop of my apartment like a ghost at the past of this Victorian house morning ache I feel the angry turn of my landlord is still is looking for me anyway oblique to get me out this contract hardened encrusted banister I stayed at this apartment for a hundred months ink stains time prints on all letters calendar bills and even the last sticky notes these tilted chairs I cling to climb the rocks letters and all the yawning firescapes the landlord silence frightens me most there is something behind the smoke alarms even the cockroaches knew something is coming up the burden I carry pushing my baggage outgrown garbage to another place his silence should have warned me through the years the look brute knives during his last visit I know my rights I said trying to tie up loose ends looking for some conversation for sentiment for memory and unclutter the tables and the closets I kept a child in my room I said I cannot leave him behind my only hope my only life are you deaf in both ears I asked him hearing the cries of the abandoned child no sound he replied as I locked the door and closed the windows my child is still screaming in my mind thank you so much and the last district jenet kevano alelia amabel the cashier new weed and you've already heard katie willa dubin so let's welcome the two my dear okay jenet kevano thank you i'm very glad to be here thank you all for persevering all the way to district 11 and thank you jack and friends of the library i'm going to read a poem that i wrote a couple of years ago when my father was dying and i felt like the whole world needed to stop and let me deal with that and it didn't this poem is called after the diagnosis so it turns out one day is not so different from the last calla lilies turn brown at the edges milk sours in the sink snails suck holes out of strawberries in the garden dusk colors the city streets with its auburn melancholy yesterday the man in the apartment on the corner planned to live forever today he is dying oh not like we are all dying inch by inch dealing out loose change on lattes and other people's pain hamstrung and grocery lines with carts full of organic hot dogs and hormone free milk counting back the morning as we watched the old woman in front fumble with her checkbook in the apartment he is dying by miles eyes stripped to bear breath short and shorter blue feet and purple hands with broken strands of music in his ears still there is laundry to be folded and potatoes to be mashed with his daughter the man gathers words like cockleshells lashes stories together into a raft they draw the evening out and out no matter tomorrow comes crashing through the door without permission hello everyone i'd like to add my thanks for staying to the end of this of this event it's been so wonderful to hear everyone read and be a part of this group of people in this room right now who are brought together by proximity and by poetry this poem is called november when i try to recreate the late nights they are nothing but sober mornings in disguise maybe because it is not october this now is the month of stomachs bears and hedgehogs make ready to sleep across the tundra expanse of hunger in this way there is control if not over time then over the effect of time in a black planner i map the hours and assign purpose to each in increments of one or two comfort resides in clear delineations the october pages are almost untouched a marker of abandon starting the day we met after i charted hours again as for other lesser months always the small and stupid things awaken memory is it mine or his or is it absolved from belonging he appeared at the door still unsteady from nighttime activity i stole a book for you he said a gray grain volume from the university library unlikely to be missed until several novembers from now an american studies phd candidate seeks the 1941 issues of mankin's american mercury concerned with the cultural milieu of world war two era american intellectuals and when he reaches the shelf in three east he will find space enough for a gray green volume i hope he will understand one reaches fullness only after the feeling of interminable emptiness for bears and hedgehogs there is the fullness and then there is the devouring november the month of stomachs stands a poor and useless imitator of october the month of appetites in return i gave him a poem in a stolen envelope birds were waking yet it was not a late night but the mere ghost of one like ours in a black planner defined and then erased what i wrote for you i said i didn't mean it only the part about late nights he said quit being so critical i really liked it when there is no hunger what are we left to fill when there is no hunger what do we become and what becomes of us hunger is becoming in bears and hedgehogs but only when they rise for months long sleep after having chewed slowly on energy reserves they wake to a spring morning the world shaken of snow ready to be complete again thank you all uh let me just say that it's been a great pleasure and honor to read all the wonderful poetry some of which you've heard and others the other ones you i hope you'll read in the volume of the poets 11 anthology of this year what you have heard today is actually the poetry of the city of san francisco i tried to be in choosing the work as diverse as this city is with its dimensions and strands of social and political struggle that are continually going on and you'll hear that in any future poets 11 events that will take place so thank you very much i'm very glad that you were all here