BAS News
Diana Manister’s stellar review of Janet Hamill’s new book of poetry titled Body of Water is now online at Big City Lit. Check it out here:
Here is a choice quote from the review, “Fellini and Hamill are both artists on an Orphic journey to the mind’s crepuscular underworld, from which they bring back characters, situations and images that baffle the intellect.” We love any review that has the word crepuscular!
Bowery Arts and Science is thrilled to announce that Suheir Hammad’s book “breaking poems,” has been selected for 2009 Arab American Book Award for first prize in poetry. The book was published by Cypher Books one of our fiscal projects. Congratulations also to Cypher Books editors Willie Perdomo and Lisa Simmons! Hummad is in good company with Naomi Shihab Nye winning for children’s poetry.
You may read more about the awards and find out how to purchase the book at:
Second Annual Bowery Arts & Science Benefit!
Jennifer Bartlett & Daisy Murray Holman, Co-Chairs
Sunday May 10, 2009
Write walt@bowerypoetry.com or call 212-614-0504 for ticket information.
6pm Cocktails with the Stars! Schmooze w/ the Poets!
Sponsored by Pasita with South American & Spanish wine selections from Pasita’s highly regarded wine list and Magic Hat featuring their new “Beet Beer.”
7pm Main Event Hollywood Does Poetry!
Performers include:
Patricia Clarkson
Claire Danes
Michael Lally
Michael O’Keefe
Rene Ricard
Sapphire
Sarah Vowell
Amber Tamblyn,
Kristi Zea
and Youth Poets from Urban Word NYC
8:30: After-Party at Bob Holman’s New Apartment Above the Bowery Poetry Club. Tour The Poetry Floor w/ Walt Whitman, Gwedolyn Brooks, June Jordan, Frank O’Hara and Others!
Can’t Make it to the Benefit?
Still want to help?
Please make a donation to Bowery Arts and Science.
All donations are 100% tax-deductible.
Live WebCast
Poetry On Demand (POD) is Bowery Arts and Science’s live WebCast from the Bowery Poetry Club. This event features: EIGHT DO EIGHT: BOWERY WOMEN TO PRESENT PROVOCATIVE PERFORMANCE POETRY EVENT AT BOWERY POETRY CLUB, Friday Nov. 21st, 8pm EST. Poets from the popular Bowery Women anthology will present “Talking World: Bowery Women Poets in Performance,” an evening of short pieces of provocative performance poetry at the Bowery Poetry Club, 308 Bowery NYC, Friday, Nov. 21, 2008 at 8 p.m., admission $5. Webcast at 8pm. The poets will present eight individual performances, of eight minutes each. The pieces range from traditional theatrical performances to experimental presentations. Starring will be Caribbean-American poets Cheryl Boyce Taylor and Rodlyn Douglas; post-Beat surrealist Janet Hamill; political poet Kristin Prevallet, who has studied with the Dean of performance poetry, Karen Finley; experimental poet and performer LeeAnn Brown; Bowery Women co-editor Marjorie Tesser; the hosts of the city’s most notorious open mic, The O’ Debra Twins; feminist poet Seren Divine Brevigleiri; and noted erotica writer and poet Tsaurah Litzky.watch?v=jCe9uo5qP9Q
Bowery Books is proud to announce the release of BODY OF WATER
by Janet Hamill. On Sunday, Nov. 2nd at 6pm EST you can watch a live WebCast of the book release party.
Body of Water
Janet Hamill
Standing by a body of water. Moving or standing still
in the dark green depths my soul finds its own level
Lost in a mirror of infinite margins. Ever sounding
on and on. Perpetual arms pull me under light’s
silver sheets tossed with wind and waves
where a coiled muscle gives up a perfect word
I come with only a fever to offer. Far from the dried
carnations in summer’s throat and certain birds
that pierce the air with an agonizing cry. I come
to wash and be clean. To drown in my immensity
Baptized by a spray of distant sky. In sympathetic
Response the surface repeats the hypnotic patterns
of my longing. Again and again. Swimming out
to the breaking pages before me with only
a parched fountain to offer. Far from the sun’s
entrenched lullaby of insect music and the worried
sleep that parts with a film of dust and fear. I come
to be carried away through the charitable doors
that open on the shore
Standing by a body of water. Moving or standing still
In the dark green depths my soul finds its own level
Suheir Hammad is in conversation with Gloria Steinem in the latest issue of New York magazine.
Please join us for the book party/ fundraiser for Hammad’s new book,
Thursday, Oct. 30th 6pm, at the Bowery Poetry Club, 308 Bowery,
(between Bleecker and Houston) 212-614-0505 for more info.
Founded in 2003, Cypher Books, a New York City-based, independent publisher is proud to present breaking poems, a new collection of poetry from Tony award-winning poet, Suheir Hammad. Consistent with Cypher’s mission to publish innovative and necessary poetry, Hammad departs from her previous books with a bold and explosive style to do what the best poets have always done: create a new language. Using “break” as a trigger for every poem, Hammad destructs, constructs, and reconstructs the English language for us to hear the sound of a breath, a woman’s body, a land, a culture, falling apart, broken, and put back together again.
Suheir Hammad’s break introduces English to an Arabic vernacular that startles into being an altogether new language, bridging the archipelago of a Palestine under siege to the diaspora and beyond, breaking through convention, breaking open locks on mind and heart, breaking into a music inspired by the Coltranes, Sun Ra and free jazz, Lee Scratch Perry and Ravi Shankar, a music that is at once a joyous celebration of survival and a poignant cri de Coeur that cannot be ignored and that Mahmoud Darwish should have lived to see. This is a poetry written for people who have endured the winds of hurricanes and invasions What wisdom, energy, joy and poignancy Hammad brings to the page-for all of this, and for teaching me a new speaking, I give her my thanks. – Carolyn Forché
Cypher Books has recently transitioned from being an imprint of Rattapallax Press to a full-fledged press under the sponsorship of Bowery Arts & Sciences. This celebration will also serve as a fundraiser to benefit future publications and programming. We hope to see you there!
Jason Norman performs poetry
Bowery Arts and Science is proud of our ASL Poetry Series. Check out this great New York Times article on the ASL poetry series at the Bowery Poetry Club. ASL Poetry is part of BAS ongoing World of Poetry Series.
We have upcoming ASL events on Thursday, 9/25 at 6pm, Sunday 10/26, at 3pm (Special family show) Saturday 11/29, 5:30pm with touring performers TBA, and Saturday 12/27 at 5:30pm with touring performers TBA. See you at the Bowery Poetry Club!