Calendar Update - End of April

Dear All,

I hope you take a look at the Community Poem included in the previous post. This community has much happening all of the time and I get information from a lot of sources, much of it overlaps. I will share what I can, but mostly it will be about HART Rock, 5 Women Poets, poetry or other related topics.

If I don't get something up, understand that I simply could not. I will do what I can. If you are organizing a reading send the information about a month ahead, that way, it most likely will get posted here and possibly be sent to our mailing list.

Thank you for being and Blessings of words and creativity.

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LEMONSTONE - Reading Series of the Bloomington Writers Guild presents visiting poet Christine Rhein and classical guitarist Maja Radovanlija 7-8:30 p.m. April 29 at Sweet Claire Gourmet Bakery, 309 E. Third St.

Women Exposed which is an annual fund raiser for Middleway House.

The website is http://bloomingtonwomenexposed.org/ If you click on the photos the information comes up.

This year performance pieces are being included: poets Antonia Matthew, Shana Ritter and Patricia Coleman. The schedule is set out below:

Friday Night: The Lodge

7:30-7:50 Kati Gleiser music

8:00-8:20 Ritmos Latinos Indiana dance

8:30-8:50 Bobbie Jane Lancaster music

9:30-9:50 Dena El Saffar & Friends

Friday Night Street:

7:00-7:20 Belly Belly dance

9:00-9:20 IU Step Dance

10:00-10:20 Kali Ma dance/movement

10: 25-….Dark Side Tribal dance

Saturday Afternoon Soiree:

3:00-3:20 Sarah Flint music

3:30-3:50 Janas Hoyt music/spoken word

4:30-4:40 Shana Ritter poetry

4:45-4:55 Nicole Kousaleos poetry/prose

5:00-5:20 Tyler Ferguson music

5:30-5:55 Lazy Susan: Merrie Sloan & Kate Long music

Saturday Evening Salon:

7:00-7:10 Antonia Matthews poetry

7:30-7:55 The Grateful Divas music

8:00-8:20 Yuriria Rodriguez music

8:30-8:50 Bette Lucas-Flamenco dance

*Sunday May Day on Courthouse Lawn:

noon-12:30 Maypole Ribbon/Circle Dance

12:50-1:15 Dark Side Tribal dance

2:00-2:25 Hudsucker Posse Hoop Jam ~movement/hula hoop jam

Sunday Intergenerational The Lodge:

4:00-4:25 Bobbie Jane Lancaster Children's Music music

4:35-4:45 Gwenette Gaddis poetry/prose

4:50-5:10 Raging Grannies

5:15-5:25 Alisa Alering short fiction

--------*interlude*----------

7:00-7:10 Patricia Coleman poetry

7:30-7:50 The Vallures music

8:00-8:25 Amy Roche & Friends music

8:30~gathering & thank you from organizers, curators, director

May is Creative Aging Month in Bloomington!

Our community focus will be on honoring the Creative Aging Initiative of Bloomington, Indiana's Commission on Aging which "Challenges the community to showcase the talents and skills of both established and first-time older artist and performers; cultivate intergenerational understanding through dialogue, sharing, traditions and storytelling; enhance awareness about the value of creative engagement to adult health and well being during May which is nationally considered “Older American's” Month.

*May 7th - May 28th, “Art & Aging: the third act” –Bellevue Gallery
The Opening Reception is Friday May 7th, 5:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
- This exhibit will feature the creative work of Bell Trace Resident Artist infused with the collaborative spirit of teaching artist Julie Hill and Ron Elkins. As an organizational member of the National Center for Creative Aging, Bell Trace Senior Living community is dedicated to enriching life for older people by offering opportunities for creative expression, community engagement, and lifelong learning. For detailed information on Bloomington's Creative Aging Initiative check the documents file under “Links” at http://www.bellevuegallery.org

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* May 8th at 2pm there will be a Gallery Tour at the IU Art Museum with several of the museum's leading elder docents. Following the tour, at around 2:45pm, there will be a Reading of Original Works by the Bell Trace Writers' Group. Come and be inspired!

*May 27th – HART Rock Poetry Series and Open-mic presents "Women's Words" with Women Writing for a Change is part of a national network of affiliate writing schools who share a mission to provide opportunities for individuals to craft more conscious lives through the art of writing and the practices of community. WWf(a)C is a place where the individual voice is nurtured, developed and celebrated. We create unique learning environments to make this possible.

The Bloomington affiliate of Women Writing for (a) Change supports the lives of individuals for whom writing is, or is becoming, an important creative and spiritual practice. The mission of the school has always been to create a healthy, creatively-charged writing community that celebrates the voices of women (and men in select offerings) in search of authenticity, deeper consciousness, healing, personal transformation and re-connection.

* Hatije's Hafla (poetic movement of belly dance) an annual fundraiser for Middle Way House
Thursday, May 12 at 7:30pm, Location: Player's Pub - more information forthcoming.

JUNE

The 71st Indiana University Writers' Conference on June 5-10 The Indiana University Writers' Conference, now in its 71st year, will welcome an award-winning lineup of authors to the Bloomington campus of Indiana University from June 5-10 for a week long festival of readings, classes and workshops. Classes include "Writing the Unthinkable" with Lynda Barry; "The Art of the Blog" with Gary Ferguson; "The Art of Screenplay" with Jill Godmilow; and "Poetry" with Julia Story. The Writers' Conference will also offer fiction workshops led by best-selling author of Await Your Reply, Dan Chaon, and IU Professor Tony Ardizzone, as well as a poetry workshop with award-winning poet Patrick Rosal. For an application and more information visit: http://www.iuwc.indiana.edu.

After April Reading Note and Community Poem

Greetings,

Rain and storm yesterday and throughout the night, and Peggy and I are grateful that listeners were not kept from coming out to Rachael’s Café to listen to, and share some of their own poetry.

The HART Rock Poetry Series and Open-mic, hosting Bronislava Volkova and Feliz Cicek as featured poets, offered the community a program replete with well crafted and equally well presented poems in celebration of National Poetry month. Bronia read from the anthology she recently edited featuring more than 62 poets “Up The Devil’s Back: A Bilingual Anthology of 20th Century Czech Poetry” (with Clarice Cloutier, 2008), and poems from “Drink We Will from Delectable Well” her most recent collection of poetry. Filiz’s, reading came from a variety of poets with her presenting some of them in the Turkish language followed by English translation. She also shared some of her own writing, passing copies to listeners so they could see the color/emotional associations she attached to some specific words. She explained earlier, that as a visual artist, she enjoys using visual cues and each poem creates its own unique form on the paper.

Last month Peggy started a new tradition for the HART Rock readings. It is a line by line poem where one line is written and the page is passed along and whoever wants to join in can write a line. The paper is folded so that the writer sees only the line previously written. Follow is the poem composed last night.-----

Community Poem on Earth Day

– Line by Line poem written by participants and attendees at HART Rock’s Poetry Series and Open-mic, April 22, 2011

Earth and air, water and all fires of life

Purify and save us from the Tea Party!

With its toxic leaves and stolen spoons

The junk drawer burst its’ brim

Forks, spoons, & knives splash up like a bowling ball hits water

AND AS THEY FALL; I AM UNAFRAID

As the photons bubble, bubble up from the Sun

We may open to this bubbling on a soul level

So that we can paint orange colored days

That fade to a ribbon of moonlight stretching across the lake

The lake of delirious dreams

AND, so it is that

April is the month of melted clouds

Before me ruffles and lace, softening the night, creamy

And dreamy, casual and formal all at once

Converge upon me, begging to comfort me.

This, of such borrowed surroundings

Will not rest, surges out of the water like a whale

Free like a dolphin

Menaced by nets cast by man’s infirmity

And yet

A fiery anger

That fills and sears and eats away and

Does all matter of consumption, without remorse or regret

Updates: Ross, Ling Book Release, Women Exposed Calendar, IU Writers Conference

It is morning, even if it looks more like dusk here in Bloomington, Indiana where the celebration of Earth Day continues! Here are some updates to the calendar.

Blessings of good words to you.

Patricia

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- Not poetry, but some you may but some of you may be interested. Saturday, April 23 - All City Swap Exchange facilitated by Transitiontown Bloomington at the Showers Building (City Hall) beside the Bloomington Farmers Market. Bring stuff, take stuff.

-Tonight, Saturday, April 23, poets Ross Gay an Micah Ling Book Launch

-Women Exposed, April 29^th – May 1^st, Art, music, performance and poetry

-IU’s 71^st Writers Conference

Book launch party for local poets Ross Gay and Micah Ling! Presented by Boxcar Books:

Saturday, April 23rd at 7pm
The Bishop Bar, 123 South Walnut St.
Free, 18+


About the event:
Bloomington's own Ross Gay and Micah Ling have each had their second books of poetry published and they'd like you to help them celebrate their achievement! Each author will read from their book and be available for a casual signing and chat afterward. Books will be for sale at the event.

Ross Gay‘s books of poems include Bringing the Shovel Down (University of Pittsburgh Press) and Against Which (CavanKerry Press, 2006). His poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, MARGIE, and Ploughshares among other magazines. Ross teaches in Indiana University‘s M.F.A. program, is on the board of the Bloomington Community Orchard, and is a former Mother Hubbard‘s Cupboard garden intern.
"These poems speak out of a global consciousness as well as an individual wisdom that is bright with pity, terror, and rage, and which asks the reader to realize that she is not alone— that the grief he carries is not just his own. Gay is a poet of conscience, who echoes Tomas Tran-stromer‘s 'We do not surrender. But want peace.‘" –Jean Valentine

Micah Ling completed her BA at DePauw University as an English major. She earned her MA in 20th Century American Literature and her... MFA in poetry at Indiana University. Ling is currently teaching at Franklin College and in the MFA program at Butler University. She taught for the 2010 Indiana University Writer‘s Conference in Bloomington, Indiana. Ling‘s first full- length collection, Three Islands, was published in September, 2009 by Sunnyoutside Press. The collection deals with three figures: Amelia Earhart, Robert Stroud (the Birdman of Alcatraz), and Fletcher Christian. Ling‘s second collection, Sweetgrass, (Sunnyoutside, 2010), is almost entirely prose poems about south-central Montana. She was one of three finalists for the 2010 Indiana Authors Award.

About Boxcar Books :
Boxcar Books and Community Center, Inc. is a volunteer powered, non-profit organization that exists to provide new and used books, zines, magazines, and comics on topics of social justice, independent media, and fiction for the community; send literature of all types free of charge to prisoners in the midwest; and to provide a meeting space for community and literary groups.

Facebook event page: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=205952609433427
For more info, please visit http://www.boxcarbooks.org/

______________________________
Boxcar Books and Community Center
The Midwest Pages to Prisoners Project
408 East Sixth Street
Bloomington Indiana 47408
812.339.8710
http://www.boxcarbooks.org/
http://pagestoprisoners.org/

Contact:
Tara Johnson tara@boxcarbooks.org, 219-973-7425
Abbey Friedman abbey@boxcarbooks.org, 812-327-7247

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Women Exposed which is an annual fund raiser for Middleway House.

The website is http://bloomingtonwomenexposed.org/ If you click on the photos the information comes up.

This year performance pieces are being included: poets Antonia Matthew, Shana Ritter and Patricia Coleman will be reading. The schedule is both attached and set out below:

Friday Night: The Lodge

7:30-7:50 Kati Gleiser music

8:00-8:20 Ritmos Latinos Indiana dance

8:30-8:50 Bobbie Jane Lancaster music

9:30-9:50 Dena El Saffar & Friends

Friday Night Street:

7:00-7:20 Belly Belly dance

9:00-9:20 IU Step Dance

10:00-10:20 Kali Ma dance/movement

10: 25-….Dark Side Tribal dance

Saturday Afternoon Soiree:

3:00-3:20 Sarah Flint music

3:30-3:50 Janas Hoyt music/spoken word

4:30-4:40 Shana Ritter poetry

4:45-4:55 Nicole Kousaleos poetry/prose

5:00-5:20 Tyler Ferguson music

5:30-5:55 Lazy Susan: Merrie Sloan & Kate Long music

Saturday Evening Salon:

7:00-7:10 Antonia Matthews poetry

7:30-7:55 The Grateful Divas music

8:00-8:20 Yuriria Rodriguez music

8:30-8:50 Bette Lucas-Flamenco dance

*Sunday May Day on Courthouse Lawn:

noon-12:30 Maypole Ribbon/Circle Dance

12:50-1:15 Dark Side Tribal dance

2:00-2:25 Hudsucker Posse Hoop Jam ~movement/hula hoop jam

Sunday Intergenerational The Lodge:

4:00-4:25 Bobbie Jane Lancaster Children's Music music

4:35-4:45 Gwenette Gaddis poetry/prose

4:50-5:10 Raging Grannies

5:15-5:25 Alisa Alering short fiction

--------*interlude*----------

7:00-7:10 Patricia Coleman poetry

7:30-7:50 The Vallures music

8:00-8:25 Amy Roche & Friends music

8:30~gathering & thank you from organizers, curators, director

The 71st Indiana University Writers' Conference on June 5-10 The Indiana University Writers' Conference, now in its 71st year, will welcome an award-winning lineup of authors to the Bloomington campus of Indiana University from June 5-10 for a week long festival of readings, classes and workshops. Classes include "Writing the Unthinkable" with Lynda Barry; "The Art of the Blog" with Gary Ferguson; "The Art of Screenplay" with Jill Godmilow; and "Poetry" with Julia Story. The Writers' Conference will also offer fiction workshops led by best-selling author of Await Your Reply, Dan Chaon, and IU Professor Tony Ardizzone, as well as a poetry workshop with award-winning poet Patrick Rosal. For an application and more information visit: http://www.iuwc.indiana.edu.

Filiz Cicek and Bronislava Volkova at HART Rock Poetry Series and Open-mic's National Poetry Month Celebration

POETRY CELEBRATION with Filiz Cicek  and Bronislava Volkova APRIL 22ND , 2011 at 7:00 pm CELEBRATING NATIONAL POETRY MONTH!

Filiz Cicek is a Turkish-Georgian-born American visual and performance artist and scholar-journalist. Her work has been exhibited in major galleries and museums in Istanbul, New York, California, Chicago, and the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction. She serves as a regional coordinator for The Feminist Art Project based in New York City. She teaches a Gender Sexuality and Popular Culture course at IU. Cicek’s poetic aesthetics are informed and influenced by Rumi, Yunus Emre, Pir Sultan Abdal, Nazim Hikmet, Pablo Neruda, Margaret Atwood, Sylvia Plath among others, as well as the singer song writers, ballads, story tellers and poets within her family. Cicek uses poetry as a creative outlet at times to celebrate the joys and perils of life.

Bronislava Volková (Professor Emerita of Slavic Languages and Literatures and former Director of the Czech Program at IU) is an exile poet and scholar from Czechoslovakia residing currently in Bloomington, IN. She has published ten books of existential and metaphysical poetry in Czech and English, two books on linguistic and literary semiotics, and most recently Up The Devil’s Back: A Bilingual Anthology of 20th Century Czech Poetry (with Clarice Cloutier, 2008) and And Drink We Will from Delectable Wells… (2011, with its Czech version preceding in 2010). Her poetry has been widely reviewed and translated into various languages. She has also written on a wide variety of topics, such as Czech poetry, Czech popular culture, issues of exile, gender, race, nationalism, prejudice and emotive signs. Since 2000, she is also active as a visual artist and a director of multimedia performances of poetry. In 2009, she has received an “award for significant contribution to culture and scholarship” from the Czechoslovak Society of Arts and Sciences in Prague. More information is available at bronislavavolkova.com

She will read today from her two latest books.

Followed by a community open-mic

Share your favorite poems and poetic stories and songs during the open-mic or come to listen. Open-mic presenters have three minutes.

co-hosted and produced by

Patricia C. Coleman and Margaret Squires

Open-mic readers have up to three minutes to share poems, short stories, prose pieces, music or song.

Send questions to poetry@hartrock.net or bloomingtonpoetry@gmail.com

This event is FREE and open to the public.

Next month HART Rock presents readers from Women Writing for a Change in conjunction with 

a city-wide celebration of our elders.

Rachael's Cafe is located at 300 East 3rd Street, Bloomington, IN
(812) 330-1882

Food and drinks available for purchase.

Poetry Readings April 2011 - National Poetry Month in Bloomington, Indiana

National Poetry Month Readings in Bloomington, IN!

• “Framing the Silence: The Myriad Forms of Poetry” is 2-3 p.m. today at the Bloomington branch of the Monroe County Public Library, 303 E. Kirkwood Ave. Celebrate poetry in its various forms by bringing a poem or two written by you or your favorite poet. A discussion will be lead by Dory Lynch.

• The High School Poets will read at the library 6:15 p.m. April 14.  Poets from several high schools come together for the event.

• The Hart Rock Poetry Series and Open-mic presents readings by poets Peter Bethanis and Filiz Cicek at 7 p.m. Followed by a Community Open-mic - April 22 at Rachael’s Cafe, 300 E. Third St.

• Teen poets and songwriters from area high schools will perform 7:30-9 p.m. April 27 at Rachael’s Cafe.

• Book Launch Party for Ross Gay and Micah Ling - Saturday, April 23rd at 7pm, The Bishop Bar, 123 South Walnut St.  For more info, please visit http://www.boxcarbooks.org

• The Lemonstone Reading Series presents visiting poet Christine Rhein and classical guitarist Maja Radovanlija 7-8:30 p.m. April 29 at Sweet Claire Gourmet Bakery, 309 E. Third St.

Connect with all styles of writers through The Writers Guild of Bloomington, part of the Arts Alliance of Greater Bloomington, Indiana. Learn more online at www.bloomingtonarts.org.

OTHER VENUES WHERE SPOKEN WORD MAY BE HEARD ALL YEAR LONG

• MAX'S PLACE hosting weekly open-mic every Wednesday

 

• PLAYERS PUB every Monday 8:00pm (donation) Singer Song Writers Night, April 10th, IU Songwriters Extravaganza and April 28th Open-mic Night (free). See calendar. 

• Poetry Revival, 10 p.m. Fridays, a weekly performance event for writers, readers, musicians and more at the Michael Lindsay Studio, 110 E. Sixth St.

Welcome to HART Rock's Poetry and Open-mic Blog and Calendar

 Welcome to HART Rock's Poetry Blog!  This is where we will, as often as possible post incoming press releases related to poetry in Bloomington, Indiana and surrounding communities. 

To give us the the greatest chance to list your event, please send your information to us a month in advance.  If later, we will make an effort to get your event posted, providing there is time in our schedule.