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Poem of the Day: “Ajo Trabajo” by Laurie Macrae

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By Anna Daniels

Ajo Trabajo is from Laurie Macrae’s chapbook Your Place or Mine? published in San Diego by Geronimo Press. This collection of New Mexico poems conveys specific geographical settings which are often filled with shifting light and unexpected bursts of color. The tonal quality of the poems derives from the poet’s personal connection to the landscape. In some of the poems that connection derives from memory and longing. In Ajo Trabajo that connection is gloriously in the moment.   [Read more…]

What We Lose When We Rip the Heart Out of Arts Education

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The course was speech, taught by Mr. Brannon. I was a freshman at a junior college just 15-20 miles from my home. Despite the college’s close proximity to my home, my father insisted I live on campus. But that class and those first two years of college were more than living on campus; they were the essential beginning of my life.

In one of the earliest classes, Mr. Brannon read aloud and gave us a copy of [in Just-] by E.E, Cummings. I imagine that moment was, for me, what many people describe as a religious experience. That was more than 30 years ago, but I own two precious books that followed from that day in class: Cummings’ Complete Poems and Selected Poems. Several years later, Emily Dickinson‘s Complete Poems would join my commitment to reading every poem by those poets who made me respond over and over, I wish I had written that.

But my introduction to Cummings was more than just finding the poetry I wanted to read; it was when I realized I was a poet. Now, when the words j was young&happy come to me, I know there is work to do—I recognize the gift of poetry.   [Read more…]

Poem of the Day: “The End of Tracks (One Poet’s Journey Across America by Rail)” by Ishmael von Heidrick-Barnes

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Taking trains
across country
looking through myself in windows
sky-scraping clouds rolling past
wheeling clocks
ticking off time
engineers can’t keep

I am many stations of being
departing arriving
shut down boarded up
erupting main streets in small towns   [Read more…]

Poem of the Day: “Vato Loco de la Maravilla” by Manuel J. Vélez

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By Brent E. Beltrán

In 1997 I co-founded the Chicano literary publishing company Calaca Press. In 1998 Calaca Press published it’s first book, a collection of poetry called Bus Stops and Other Poems by Manuel J. Vélez. Inside this sixty-four page tome, which included amazing artwork by Chicano Park muralist Victor Ochoa, was a poem called “Vato Loco de la Maravilla.” The poem, using caló (a code-switching hybrid language of Chicanos using English and Spanish in the same sentence and sometimes within the same word), highlights life inside the barrio and how stereotypes of barrio youth can be used to justify negative perceptions by “the judge, the news, and us.” Since the book came out the author has become a tenured Associate Professor of Chicana/Chicano Studies at Mesa College. Bus Stops and Other Poems may no longer be in print but the poem “Vato Loco de la Maravilla” remains with us in video form.   [Read more…]

San Diego City Works Press Celebrates Its 10-Year Anniversary!

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By Staff

Ten years ago, Jim Miller and Kelly Mayhew co-founded City Works Press, a nonprofit publisher that they edit in concert with the San Diego Writers Collective. Both Jim and Kelly are well known to the San Diego Free Press community.

Jim has written a weekly article for his Under the Perfect Sun column since we launched the site in 2012 and prior to that he submitted articles to the OB Rag, our sister publication. Kelly wrote a series of articles about Golden Hill restaurants when SDFP provided a neighborhood focus on that community. Throughout the years this couple has hosted myriad events that benefit progressive organizations in San Diego. This Saturday, April 26, they will be hosting a celebration and fundraiser for City Works Press, the only press of its kind in San Diego.
  [Read more…]

Poem of the Day: “Ode to a Composting Toilet” by Sharon Olds

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“Poetry is the music of being human.”

By Anna Daniels

Sharon Olds has the ability to write poetry about “unpoetic” life events with a provocative boldness. Her poem The Pope’s Penis immediately comes to mind. The results are nevertheless quite poetic in their use of form and language. She is also known for her versatility. Her poems about familial relationships can sizzle and crackle with rage and anxiety. Olds’ poems about sex are about more than what bodies do, although she describes that. Sex is wrapped in often disjunctive raw emotions. It is that coupling of body and feeling that shocks.   [Read more…]

Poem of the Day: “Quagmire” by Kyle Dargan

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“Biology all makes sense if you live long enough.”

By Anna Daniels

Bill Moyers has long been a champion of poetry. Last year he ran a memorable poetry series on Moyers and Company. It was so memorable that a number of readers sent me the link as a source for poems this month. Kyle Dargan is a young professor of writing and literature at American University. He has three award winning books of poetry under his belt and he has a beautiful reading voice.   [Read more…]

Poem of the Day: “Enigmas” by Pablo Neruda

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Translation by Robert Bly

By Anna Daniels

Nobel Prize winning Chilean poet Pablo Neruda is well known for his love poems which have been translated by such luminaries as WS Merwin and Robert Bly, both poets in their own right. Matilde Urrutia, who is the subject of a number of those poems, has been described as his muse of love. Neruda hearkened often to the muse’s call.

Less well known are his keen observations of nature that reflect an inquisitive and informed intellect. His poems about birds in Arte de Pájaros/Art of Birds as well as those about the sea and sea life are as sensual in their language as the love poems.   [Read more…]

Poem of the Day: “Don’t Want to Spoil Your Party Don’t Want to Bust Your Balloon”

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By Ernie McCray

Don’t want to spoil your party
Don’t want to bust your balloon
But look up above your head
There’s some ozone gone
ozone gone
ozone gone
Can we get it back

And you’ll see that the sky
Is no longer blue   [Read more…]

Gabriel García Márquez in His Own Words

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By Staff

Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.

Muchos años después, frente al pelotón de fusilamiento, el coronel Aureliano Buendía había de recorder aquella tarde remota en que su padre lo llevó a conocer el hielo.

This is the unforgettable opening line of Gabriel García Márquez literary masterpiece Cien años de soledad— One Hundred Years of Solitude.   [Read more…]

Poems to Saturday by…

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Poems by John Wester

By Anna Daniels

Back in the early 70’s Julian was home to an enclave of young writers, intellectuals and politicos. John Wester was part of this group of kindred spirits that also included SDFP contributor Jay Powell and Bud Sonka who recently introduced me to John’s poetry. I hope that we will hear more about what they built and thought about up on the mountain during that time.   [Read more…]

To Be a Warrior Poet

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By Will Falk

I tried to kill myself a year ago.

In the year since, I quit my job as a public defender, spent weeks in group therapy, went on Phish tour, tried to kill myself again, searched every corner of my soul and began writing earnestly.

Sometimes, I think writing has kept me alive. Writing my poetry and essays allows me to fill my world with a meaning that is under attack.

The world is burning at an ever-faster pace. We are at war. Many of us may be imprisoned, tortured, raped and ultimately killed. Before I tried to kill myself, I let myself wander too far with clogged ears deaf to the friends – both human and non-human – that fill this world with meaning.

Armed with my experiences, I know that art can – and must be – a weapon used in defense of the world.   [Read more…]

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