Join us and a selection of poets – some local, some far flung – to explore how “poetry provides pathways for creative and cathartic human expression and peace.” The No Poetry No Peace™ title comes from a collection written by Sheryl J. Bize-Boutte and her daughter Dr. Angela Boutte.
Poets’ Biographies
Aileen Cassinetto is a Filipino American poet and 2021 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow. The author of two poetry collections, her work has appeared in American Poets, Anthropocene, Poetry magazine, and West Trestle Review, among others. She co-edited the award-winning anthology, Dear Human at the Edge of Time: Poems on Climate Change in the United States, a companion to the congressionally-mandated Fifth National Climate Assessment (NCA5), and wrote the lyrics to “Wide American Earth” which premiered at Carnegie Hall in June 2023.
Lisa DeVuono is a poet living in Philadelphia. She was one of the founders of It Ain’t Pretty, a women’s writing collective that performed locally. She has led creativity and poetry workshops and has worked with teens in recovery and cancer patients. She wrote a peer-based curriculum Poetry as a Tool for Recovery: An Easy-to-Use Guide in Eight Sessions for facilitators working with persons living with mental health challenges. In addition to the full-length manuscript This Time Roots, Next Time Wings, her poetry has appeared in Mad Poets Review and other poetry reviews. She is the author of the chapbook Poems from the Playground of Risk published by Pudding House Press and was the recipient of an honorable mention in Passaic County Community College’s annual Allen Ginsberg Contest. Recently retired, she enjoyed a career as a librarian.
Benjamin Gucciardi was born and raised in San Francisco, California. His first book, West Portal (University of Utah Press, 2021), was selected by Gabrielle Calvocoressi for the Agha Shahid Ali Prize in Poetry and was named a finalist for the Northern California Book Award and the Julie Suk Award. He is also the author of the chapbooks Timeless Tips for Simple Sabotage (Quarterly West, 2021) and I Ask My Sister’s Ghost (DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press, 2020). His poems appear in American Poetry Review, Harvard Review, POETRY Magazine, and elsewhere, and have been featured in On Being’s Poetry Unbound. In addition to writing, he works with newcomer youth in Oakland, California through Soccer Without Borders, an organization he founded in 2006.
Lucille Lang Day is the author of four poetry chapbooks and seven full-length collections, including Birds of San Pancho and Other Poems of Place and Becoming an Ancestor. Her many honors include the Blue Light Poetry Prize, two PEN Oakland – Josephine Miles Literary Awards, the Joseph Henry Jackson Award, and eleven Pushcart Prize nominations. The publisher of Scarlet Tanager Books, she lives in Oakland, California.
O’Cyrus is an award-winning author and independent book publisher, writing/publishing poetry books such as Sacred and childrens’ books such as Goodbye John. In 2023, he launched his podcast Ocyrus Ink. O’Cyrus’ goal is to utilize his platform to tell stories that will positively impact people’s lives, help them identify their own gifts, and live in their purpose to add true value into the world. He is actively serving in the military.
Noah Warren is the author of The Complete Stories (Copper Canyon, 2021) and The Destroyer in the Glass (2016), winner of the Yale Series of Younger Poets. His poems appear in The Nation, The Atlantic, The Paris Review, POETRY, The American Poetry Review, Ploughshares, and elsewhere. A PhD candidate at UC Berkeley, he teaches at Claremont McKenna College and lives in Los Angeles.
About the Host
Award-winning author and Pushcart Prize nominee Sheryl J. Bize-Boutte is an Oakland multidisciplinary writer whose autobiographical and fictional short story collections, along with her lyrical and stunning poetry, artfully succeed in getting across deeper meanings about the politics of race and economics without breaking out of the narrative. Her first novel, Betrayal on the Bayou, was published in June 2020 and a poetry collection she has written with her daughter Dr. Angela M. Boutte, titled No Poetry No Peace™, was published in August 2020 and is the namesake of the No Poetry No Peace™ series at the Mechanics Institute of San Francisco. Her in progress novel first chapter, “The Burden Keeper,” was the 2021 fiction category winner for the San Francisco Writers Conference writing contest anthology. An inaugural Oakland Poet Laureate runner-up, she is also a popular teacher, literary reader, presenter, storyteller, curator, and emcee/host for literary and poetry events.
good evening poetry enthusiasts and welcome to no poetry no peace a special online event brought to you by Mechanics Institute my name is niiko Chen and I am the program manager for literature and writing programs here at Mechanics Institute we are gathering virtually this evening to celebrate not only the transformative power of poetry but also the community and shared Humanity that poetry Fosters to our returning members it’s wonderful to see you again in this virtual space And for those of you who are attending a Mechanics Institute event for the first time a warm welcome to you as well as we close out National poetry month I’d like to reflect back on the programmatic offerings we had this month at Mechanics Institute earlier this month we kicked off our national poetry month celebration with captivating in-person readings from three marketable poet laurates Lee herck the California poet laurates tongo Eisen Martin the San Francis Isco poet laurat and aod Del nazinga the Oakland poet laurat who brought their unique voices and perspectives into our historic meeting room filling them with words that challenge comfort and Inspire earlier today for our Monday noon time history series we were privileged to delve into a poignant intersection of history and poetry through Jeffrey Thomas Leong’s enlightening talk poems of Chinese Exclusion his presentation illuminated the somber narratives of Angel Island where Chinese immigrants were detained some of these detainees hopes and despairs were etched into the wooden walls of the immigration station these poems carved during moments of uncertainty and longing remind us of the enduring human spirits and the profound resilience that poetry can encapsulate as we navigate the currents of our times poetry remains an essential vessel for expressing the complexities of human emotions and experiences it is a force that can move move those who listen towards greater understanding and compassion breaking down barriers and Building Bridges across diverse communities it is with great pride that we present this annual event today this evening no poetry no peace with one of our most steadfast members Cheryl’s J BB to continue our efforts Beyond National poetry month Mechanics Institute is also proud to announce the formation of our very own member-led poetry writers group we have just one spot left and we are limiting this intimate group to just eight people this is a unique chance to be a part of a close-knit community of poets committed to meeting regularly and exploring the Artistry of poetry in depth our inaugural meeting is scheduled for Wednesday May 1st from 2 to 4 p.m. in our third FL Library classrooms mark your calendars now and be part of the beginning of something truly special and you can access this link in our chat box for more information about this poetry writers group I will now pass the mic over to to our host of no poetry no peace the wonderful Cheryl jout Cheryl please go ahead and take us away all right thank you Nico and thank you Mechanics Institute and thank you poets and all of you out there who came to listen to The Poetry tonight um welcome to well the day before the end of 2024’s national poetry month and we’re very happy that all of you have joined us uh this even We Gather with poets from a variety of geographies as well as a diversity of poetic Inspirations together they bring a stunning mix of artistic expression through poetry that I am sure you will all enjoy welcome poets welcome everyone let’s do some poting let’s start with eileene cinetto who is a Filipino American poet a 2021 Academy of American poets fellow and the author of two poetry collections eileene also wrote the lyrics to Wide American Earth which appeared at Carnegie Hall in 2023 welcome eileene thank you Cheryl good evening everyone thank you all for being here it is such an honor to be with all of you tonight T my poem was part of the Manifest differenty project it interrogates the complicated legacies of manifest destiny in the Philippines and also what it is to be both mother and Country to a people in diaspora let me call you sweetheart nobody asked what we wanted we were entangled in the fate of Empires as one Falls and another Rises and we stood Ravid squatted like our mothers over guava leaves and steaming water moist heat soothing the paranal wound of childing fruit and spice mixed with blood now clotting jellylike and metallic sweetheart say Sinta the stress is on the second syllable almost like a serenade or a slight movement cerus and so dear let me hear you whisper honey is thicker than blood is thicker than water what to make of the slaughter in a time of chera just before the St Louis World’s Fair where our kin were made to put on a show of butchering and eating dogs 20 or more each week in in the name of Empire a baptism of fire how do you like your Dinan soupy and smooth and savory our our mothers mothers made it with awful but the secret is in the pig’s blood add a little vinegar before cooking add more when simmering but never boiling keep the love light glowing keep the water bubbling then let it rest add guava leaves and honey I’m talking about tea a remedy for chalera malady of War a Mastery of paired movements like populations and their afflictions how much of Might is metal what is the measure of an age in Manila Bay We buried one Empire and birth another before the century ended we were a colony twice over an archipelago of blood and Ash what is the collar of Empire as it sits on the Pacific with all the might of an age where lies its heart and undoing first order of business was to quash the rebellion and impose English as the language of chance and Circumstance minder addiction and maledictions the irony was that McKinley didn’t even want us could not have told where our darned Islands were within 2,000 miles his words but moral obligation is a force that basts the burdens of annexation as does having a a foothold in Asia all told hamha McKinley could not let go when I next realized the Philippines had dropped into our laps I confess I did not know what to do with them we could not give them back to Spain that would be cowardly and dishonorable we could not turn them over to France and Germany that would be bad business and discreditable we could not leave them to themselves they were unfit for self-government but one day I promise you my people will board a ship split the Ocean Walk in water Scorch the Earth lose our continent all to show how well we speak in English the kind no one wants to hear we have lost more than what is bearable devoted our days to finding a habitable language to building a dwelling of sea water and Ash how much of it is ours how much to keep how much to let slip let me call you sweetheart let me find a way to start over stay closer one Island to another here lies our heart and undoing say Sinta shelter and shutter some of our struggles we are more than our history our Manifest Destiny we are a love story older than the sea sweetheart ask me what I want as I tread wildly feel the belly of green turtles and gentle Giants citizens of the great Philippine Sea thank you oh wonderful thank you does she have more time left Nico uh it’s up to you if you want to do a two-minute poem Ean I think am I to ask e a question we’re not we’re not we’re just doing reading thank you um all right then our next poet is Lisa let me make sure I say this right de vano did I get it hey okay you’re on you’re on mute uh Lisa is a Philadelphia poet who incorporates song music poetry and dance into her art and has worked with teens in recovery cancer patients and is the founder of a’t pretty a woman’s writing Collective welcome Lisa thank you so much it’s just an honor to be here the first poem that I’m going to read um is one actually that Nico had requested and um it’s called inquiry start with your own question it doesn’t have to be profound it just has to have a wondering so you have no idea where it might lead not only no idea but no worry about how far away from your own clutching it might take you a question that doesn’t have one answer but rather opens the possibility for even more not ones that have been living under that tired story buried on the back of your heart start with a question that doesn’t make you feel like this is the only one you’ll ever have but rather one that can hold you like a hammock or a cradle or an old painted rowboat in which you just might let yourself drift far enough away from the shore of familiar nice thank you uh the next two were written during the pandemic um the second one is called performance and I really love music and during the pandemic I really missed live music and so this poem addresses the return to that performance after the post pandemic concert we drove home discussing which of the three silver-haired folks singers we liked best whose guitar playing was more skilled whose voice more clear whether this was the last time we would hear them together ping up the driveway laughing from the high of live music we untangled our tired bodies from the car grasped our winter coats Like A Squeeze Box and paused in the cold breathless night it was the darkest Sky we could remember the Stars Were Gleaming tremble singing their own show tonight Orion’s B Milky Way Big Dipper all together on Constellation stage it almost seemed normal gazing up at them as if the trio had been away for a long time and suddenly decided it was time to come home holding everything up like they had never left thank you and my last one uh is called skunk one of my favorite poems is by Naomi sheab na Palestinian American poet who wrote this poem called uh Valentine for Earnest man in which he mentions a man being delighted by the eyes of skunks and so uh this is my homage to the skunk that lived in our backyard petunia visits us zigzagging across our common backyard she is a waddling old lady her snout digging for grubs like a king testing for solid ground it’s 2 in the afternoon and I Marvel at her through my binoculars why are you here out in the bright sunlight of day I think maybe she’s pregnant that her shuffling body is carrying her litter down low like a folded up apron filled with gathered fruit when it’s time for me to go food shopping I see her in the patch of green near the driveway which of us will give up our ground first I am ready to wave my white flag but it is she who flattens herself into the tall all grass is she dead or trying to make herself and her scent invisible I can relate to playing possum in this fake it unto you make it World Now hidden behind the disguise of mass but I shimmy passed her to start my engine turn the car around and in the rear view mirror I furtively see that she is back on her feet again her nose held up to the sky spring dowsing her with all its perfumed air thank you everyone thank you that was great our next up is Benjamin G okay wait a minute I’m I’m gonna get it good did I get ity perfect perfect all right so great to meet you Benjamin uh Benjamin is a native San Franciscan whose first book West Portal was a finalist for the Northern California book award his poems appear in many Publications and in addition to writing he works with youth in Oakland through soccer Without Borders welcome Benjamin thank you so much Cheryl and thank you Nico for all the work to organize um it’s great to be here with you all and I just want to start acknowledging I’m feeling very inspired by all the student activism that’s happening right now and um it’s nice to to be reading in in the context of that time um I’m going to read three three poems uh this first poem I want to read is called Kat and uh that is the second largest town in Sicily uh which is where my family comes from so um this is Kat we lived in a stone Farmhouse at the edge of town I’d been assigned to process Asylum claims and you’d come to write about the abandoned homes in the islands interior the government was selling cheap a family of barn swallows lived inside our chimney in the mornings I drove to the intake Center through fields of hay alfalfa a crop of sunflowers spanned the tract along the creek most of the men I interviewed were farmers back home they’d left because of drought sometimes flood or blight afternoons the sunflowers bowed in their furrows and the clouds turned Alabaster at home I’d find you lying on the Hearth listening to the swallows we were good to each other though new in our love with shape to our days the fighting spread and more ships came ashore women and children were held in a new location impractically I studied Sicilian not because my grandfather spoke it because I wanted to unlearn time I could have looked up the word for sunflower I could have asked but it was the not knowing I savored on the slow drives through the fields the pheasants disappearing into thick brush along the road the possibility of a word that could redeem us I lay beside you on the cool Stone beside the chimney the swallows were out hunting or looking for hair grass most of the rich who bought the empty houses couldn’t fix them up told me the Plies were scarce labor hard to find night wind carried the smell of the fields Through the screenless Windows a flock of egrets followed the Balor gorging on the insects and frogs the blades exposed and left Without Shelter um and I’ll just read uh two more poems this next one is also one that uh niik requested and Nico was also a teacher at Oakland International High School uh where I’ve done some work for for a long time and this poem comes from some work there so thank you Nico for your teaching and your your your mentorship of Youth and this poem is about holding space for young people the rungs only the person with the green dice should be talking I remind the boys holding up the oversized foam cubes and the others should be listening K says and how should we listen cor corason and replies thumping his chest with his closed fists that’s right I say with the heart who wants to start the dice are passed around the circle and the boys gloss over the checking question when they reach be who’d walked here unaccompanied from Honduras 3 months ago he holds them like Boulders we straighten when his lip begins to quiver it’s not my place to tell you what he shared that day but I can tell you how M put his hand on be’s back and said Mah which translates roughly to undrown yourself though no English phrase so willingly accepts that everyone is drowned and that we can reverse that gasping expel the fluids from our lungs I sit quietly as the boys make with their bodies the rungs of a ladder and Bee climbs up from the current sits in the Sun for a a few good minutes before he jumps back in the dice finished the round and we are well over time I resist the urge to speak about rafts what it means to float good I tell them let’s go back to class after handshakes and side hugs I’m left alone in the small room with a box of unopened tissues two Starburst wrappers on the ground um and I’ll finish just with this very short little poem called The Nest uh the nest and this is dedicated to Salvadoran poet Alfredo Espino who wrote a poem also called The Nest many years ago this morning I watched a goldfinch disappear into a tree through a hole no bigger than my open mouth from the hollow the finch began her cring that’s what poetry is I thought not the tree but the hidden song not the yellow bird but the instinct to climb inside the darkness to sing thank you all thank you Benjamin our next poet is my friend Lucille Lang day we’ve done a lot of things together uh Lucille is is the author of four poetry chatbooks and seven full length poetry collections among her many awards and honors are two Penn Oakland Josephine miles literary awards and the Joseph Henry Jackson award she is also a publisher at Scarlet Tanager books welcome lucil thank you Cheryl um I’m honored and delighted to be here I’m going to read three poems uh the first one is called the Legacy and it’s dedicated to my grandchildren I leave you the last 4% of the ancient redwoods that once covered more than 2 million Acres of the California coast watch for Roosevelt Elks Blacktail deer and mountain lions among the trees were spotted owls marbled merets fly catchers thrushes Jays and woodpeckers in the canopy I leave you the last 10,000 blue whales of the hundreds of thousands that once roamed the oceans the largest animals known to have lived they’ve been recorded singing Beethoven owed to Joy their huge hearts beat only twice per per minute when they dive beneath the surface of the sea I leave you a watery planet now warming because humans are so dependent on oil and coal wildfires turn the sky orange and drive away Birds while flash floods shatter houses and trees in their path may your generation create a world that runs on Good Will fairness sunshine and wind I leave you a country torn by hatred and lies though these are ageold problems they must be faced and conquered Again by each new generation don’t believe everything you hear people lie for many reasons ignorance malice Mischief greed truth always exists somewhere and you can find it it I leave you the Redwood in my backyard which suffers from Barrios speria caners and the Anna’s hummingbirds that visit the Mexican Sage out front while I write poems inside I leave you those too brief records of my Journeys Joys and Sorrows I leave you grief I leave you love I leave you hope the next poem um is another one that Nico requested uh it’s a short poem called among humpback whales where does a protest song Lead it will pass unnoticed under the waves in the great heave and suck of the Sea and the whales will go on singing for months on end weaving low resonant notes for mating or pleasure until they reach Baja where in backyards and dumps turtle shells pile up swearing at you and me and my last poem is called letter to send in a Space Capsule and this is addressed to um intelligent beings uh elsewhere in the universe millions of light years in the future I lived on the third planet Circle playing an ordinary star at the edge of a spiral galaxy 2 million light years from the Andromeda nebula we called it Earth in Spring the mock cherry trees were flocked with white blossoms when Maples blazed green and hummingbirds with long narrow beaks and Brilliant throats sucked nectar from bril from red and orange flowers in summer the sky was pale blue and sometimes feathered with clouds like the wings of giant swans when our star known as the sun was at its peak the pavement of our streets began to sizzle forming black tar beads and ice cream sweet and sticky dripped from children’s cones as the Earth tipped away from the Sun maple trees turned red liquid ambers gold and fall Falling Leaves swirled in every gust of wind when no leaves clung to the trees the year’s final season arrived like a bride adorning the world with ice and white lace the planet was mostly covered with oceans that filled great basins surrounding continents and islands that Rose green and Lush from the radiant water that surged and frothed at every Shore War I was born 20 centuries after the birth of a prophet many considered the son of the creator of the Earth the heavens and everything living my species Homo sapiens was one of many warm-blooded creatures with four limbs a backbone and enamel teeth our brains were large and we figured out how to shatter atoms and even fuse nucleus eye releasing energy like the heart of a star we built enough nuclear bombs to incinerate or irradiate all life and fill the atmosphere with Ash needless to say most people didn’t want to use them but we spoke many languages and live by different customs and Nations that couldn’t reach agreement often waged War as we burn fossil fuels to run our factories and cut down forests to build our towering cities the Earth grew warmer the air turned grayer and the polar ice caps crumbled into the sea one by one flowers frogs worms and birds began to disappear it may sound strange but most people cared deeply for the planet and each other this is what I know the language in which I write is English a strongly stressed indoeuropean tongue with regional variation and peculiar spelling I hope The Clapper rail with its brown and white striped belly still inhabits the salt marsh and the Scarlet bugler still blooms each spring in the coastal Hills of California my home I hope the rain still Falls on fields and rivers I hope you can decipher this code thank you ah nice thank you our next poet is another of my friend poet friends Osiris Osiris uh can you sit back a little bit oh that move back move back a little bit how that little bit more well that’s slightly better but what we see is the bottom half of your face oh wait can you do you need to just see my face it would be nice oh how’s that you’re you’re you’re too close well we’re that’s better okay okay it looks different on my screen than it does on you all for me it’s showing me kind of far away so I apologize about that that’s okay Osiris is an award-winning author an independent publisher of poetry and children’s books through OS Iris Inc with the goal of utilizing his platforms to tell stories that will positively impact people’s lives in 2023 he launched his Osiris Inc podcast he is also actively serving in the military and as you heard if you were on earlier has a set of twins oh yeah right all right welcome Cirus thank you so much Miss always a pleasure thank you all for having me so I’m going to read four poems but one is 14 words so I’ll start with that one all right this one’s titled defeated or not defeated depleted received it relieved it delivered dismembered live forgive deserving preserving bleed bleed best blessed that’s all I got for that one from from my dear sigment of our so the these these next three gonna be really really deep really deep so I don’t know if you if anyone’s familiar with the story of Gabriel um think his name is Gabriel palmdell is where he lived at was like a seven to eight year old kid it’s a pretty pretty devastating story but my wife went to school with a relative of her any way um this hit me particularly hard because he was born on the same day as me so this title this po poem is titled February 20th 205 through May 24th 2013 such violence in his home is this what true love looks like physically attacking her son ashamed of what he looks like her boyfriend caged him in a bathroom cabinet stored away with cleaning supplies neither could care less for his well-being being and slowly counting down until he dies Nowhere to Run nowhere to turn just a scared 8-year-old boy being left to burn tortured for years and his social workers did nothing suppose his cracked skull and broken ribs were just a sign of him bluffing named after an angel murdered by a devil burned with flames beaten by metal in such pain he writes I love you so much that I will kill myself even in his final moments of life he still chose to love his mother and no one else well not all pearls are worth of Fortune This Pearl only brought Misfortune he was just a boy fatally beaten because he failed to pick up his toys you stood 6 feet 2 in 270 PBS this child barely weighed 60 lbs an exse security guard who apparently was a nice guy not everything is as it appears to the naked eye you two left him naked why di 911 because he wouldn’t open his eyes First Responders ared he isn’t breathing they said what hope did he have to survive several injuries to his body as he lied on the ground screaming for his life crying without a sound creation came the only flame that could ensure his protection his PS remain with his grandparents who will ensure his protection you can finally receive the love that you need rest in paradise now you are finally freed how much time do I have left by the way want to make sure on my clock you have four minutes and 30 seconds okay cool I was hoping so okay this next one is about my son who’s also shares the name Noah hi Noah I know you’re in here hello son nice to see you I’m kidding okay this one is called My Soul Survivor this happened this is based off of his first night back coming home for the first time those fishbed eyes gazing back at me could bring a tear down my face with the Innocence you express after weeks of Separation our family can finally be together and head home to rest what a day that was but the night would come as a surprise we all lying down to sleep for the night but someone almost dies my sweet baby boy is choking and his face is turning purple my wife is trying to save his life as she’s pacing in a circle this can’t be happening to us we were all just in our car the paramedics are on their way as I perform CPR his body is limp but his six day old fists are clinched he’s fighting for his life but won’t move an inch my baby isn’t breathing he’s on the verge of losing his life what’s scarier is that this mostly occurred in the arms of my wife death knocking at the door dressed as firefighters he’s breathing they said your son is a Survivor ambulance surve and one parent has required to go both my wife and I are so traumatized but I decided to go staring at you on a gurnie for 34 minutes was an endless sight of fear I just want to hear your cries in my here thankfully there is a happy ending to this traumatizing day he survived and is still alive to this day thank you Lord for granting my baby boy with another day of life so all right I got one more one more this one is from a poetry um a poem that I wrote that’s going to be in my next poetry book the title is undisclosed I’m G to play a little song with it this on Moonlight Sonata this poem is called ocean of emotions why do I refute the notion of my mind being buried in the ocean emotions motion is slow motion until I arise from the ocean so overwhelmed as if I’m drowning in this ocean regardless of my efforts this NeverEnding cycle is in motion but I fear this ocean I swim in a panic and do my best to escape the fate of the Titanic but my Panic has left me stranded on the door sinking towards the ocean flooor on the bottom of the Atlantic countdowns begun I’m struggling to hold my breath until the count down to one my wife my sons I’m shook scared my life is done suddenly a hand grabs onto my wrist pulling me towards the sun free from my struggles no longer feeling numb off in the distance are one-wing Angels surrounded by nuns at least that’s what it seemed like before I was awakened from this dream that seemed right thank you all very much very very much thank you Osiris of course it’s a pleasure next we have Noah Warren uh Noah I found you on k w Bay poets uh we have that in common um Noah Liv in Los Angeles and is the author of complete stories and winner of the Yale series of younger poets he is a PhD candidate at UC Berkeley and teaches at Claremont McKenna College welcome Noah thank you thank you Cheryl um and thank you all for being here it’s just it’s a really beautiful to hold Community with you um I’m going to read just a few poems um one for request uh ni requested this poem called poet love of the world is so clearly come and go the way we talk sounds beautiful and sad you have to say these three words before you can try the harder thing the air at evening crumbles into Rose flakes the wind like a child’s breath this is cement it’s almost hard now but when it’s new it’s soft if we step in it then it’ll be there forever to describe is to praise I’ve always felt that two crows fly up and disappear into the depths of the Redwood talking with Sarah in bed I touch her neck how often do we use the word safe each day thanks a walk sounds nice when I write this winter I trace lines of motion I conclude I’ve lived my friend’s voice tells me I am more than a series of inclinations Twilight knotted with dislikes this next poem is also called Talk um I was during the pandemic listening well you know there were all these times where you couldn’t actually hang out with people um and so you had to kind of summon them up um and Stage your little conversations um and also maybe you know your modes of thinking were a little dissociative and a little loopy um so I started putting white space between thoughts this poem is also called talk she painted me a quartered window dominated by the Airy whites and Browns of the top right quarter into which I felt myself receding the road was drying unevenly and the clouds stood above it as you would stand above a thread where has my mother gone there was a moment yesterday evening when my mind leapt holy with desire then for an hour this morning I cried and now there is now the icy lake the houses the people changing slowly into other people yes I love reading and exercising and love seasons moving the past and the present Loom like equal calamities above the hill I’ll climb in my two warm clothes my face gradually rening to show that I’m still as Brave as I was when I was a child and the room went still with words I understood but didn’t understand and felt it was somehow my role to heal there was a brother who melted from from my arms back into the walls of the womb the people who have them relax on their balconies with drinks um and I guess I’ll read just one more um and this is a poem called University I also like Ben I’ve been so inspired by seeing all the student activism we’ve been saying and it really inspiring University buildings from the international movement articulate a question in statement form the ways in which we wait you wait I keep turning the handle of this life I open the ox blood cover and fall deeply into Slumber speaking naked at the Lecter I split open a highest in a sadder one I have to stand very still I am for the weather a tower of bells who were those children I used to play with that bullied me windy evenings under the plum trees raining plums they held me down they needed to hear their own names enter enter what a murder of crows has descended on the bristles of the synthetic field the blankets and pizza boxes like so much black dust I remember standing in front of an automatic Amber tinted door before the bank opened hello teller I want to save the rain that lingers in my wife’s hair long after we walk the cherries and black garlic softening on the window sill the smell of open soil and I’ll stop there thank you so much thank you Noah thank all of you poets before I read mine I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciate all of you being here and how wonderful you have all been this evening Nico of course um I will read the bio of our wonderful hostess with the mostess Cheryl J baz bout Cheryl J bout is an award-winning internationally published Indie author and poet in addition to being a short story writer she is also a highly praised novelist this event is named for no poetry no peace the book of poetry that she co-wrote with her daughter Angela and Cheryl please take us away with your beautiful poetry all right I want uh to ask all of you when I say no poetry no peace I want you to repeat it after me uh because the poem I’m going to read is called No poetry no peace it can Suter in serenely press its form against any door of any room enter on a vapor Trace hijacking my senses taking over my everything yet much of the time it knocks hard on my wall asleep interrupted slapping my R into wide eyed recognition that another one has arrived compelling me to rise to speak it before it is gone write it before it is erased but I turn my pillow to the cool side and Sleek Slumber return leaving open the door to a morning of regret a day of clumsy attempts to reach back and get the right words in the right order in the right Rhythm so many times I foolishly let it sleep away dreaming myself good enough to retrieve it all intact in my chaotic wakefulness with original meaning thinking I would repossess it easily with my anointed poetic compass even as it warned in whisper there will be War within and conflict unresolved I will scatter you if you do not find me no poetry no peace no poetry no peace I awake and still believe the pros of the dream is tucked away and easy to wave return by the magic wand of The Bard but that is the LIE of the fantasy as Sunrise scorches recall I mourn another disappearance to the toss and the turn to the burning wet skin to this false strength of memory this confidence of divine recollection this fear that if I Rise I will have to explain why I am up at this hour and will have to reveal a poem is here I must let it in no poetry no peace no poetry peace it doesn’t give up on me an unrelenting surprise I do believe it loves me another has arrived compelling me to rise to speak it before it’s gone to write it before it is erased no poetry no peace no poetry now I am loud with it I know the consequences of an abuse of this power it will all be said whether you ever hear it or not I am a soldier in this war of self-appointed Pros protector from those who live without the reason and the rhyme and can be prone to evil no poetry no peace I did not know it would make me feel this way so I do not hesitate on those nights more frequent now I am Duty bound to track it and assure its capture so I can set it free I write in the dark on paper I can only feel with my hands purposely spacing the lines much too far apart so that there are no misunderstandings while the armor of urgency Shields each movement and the words fall out with the hope that Clarity is still present in the next and somehow I know all will be well I have kept the night safe there will be another morning I have once again completed my ordered contribution against the tide of damage caused by the missing poem in the no verse bad lands where punishment is Swift when words are not used as intended leaving space for Alternatives that lack compassion and Grace and diminish the one who ignores the message of the muse no poetry no peace no thank you thank you all again for being with us this evening I see we have uh a few more minutes and Noah you said that you had some questions you might want to ask or a a question at least but I want to thank each and every one of you poets for being here and thank you audience for being here and I hope you enjoyed what you heard this evening no poetry no peace no poetry no peace um I would like to follow up with one question for all of our poets and that question for you all is tell us the story of one of the poems that you read today how did this poem emerge and how did it find itself configured either on the page or through your voice and I’m going to pass the mic over to eileene to share her story of her poem Eileen would you like to get us started um I think I talked about it a little bit it’s it’s it’s about um the US uh colonization of the Philippines um uh Philippines we were the the um the US’s first colony in 1898 and um this is the 125th anniversary so this is a um interrogating the the history and Legacies of of that complicated history and can you tell us a little bit more about how this sort of poem emerged in your Consciousness like what was going on in your own sphere while this poem was making itself present to you uh I had to do a bit of research I found uh um I went back to um Library of Congress records about what uh um then President McKinley said and I also interspersed it with um family histories um and and I think that’s that’s basically um how it it came about it it took a while to put together just because um I’m I’m at a point where I think I’m I’m moving towards a a certain direction in my writing but then I became I was invited to be part of manifest differently and so I had to go back to to uh a part of my history that I had not thought about for a while yeah thank you for sharing um next up we’re I’m gonna ask um Lisa Deano the same question Lisa how did um a poem that you read today emerge and reconfigure itself on the page sure I’m going to talk about skunk and I said a little bit about it before that I was in inspired by er uh Valentine for Ernest man a poem by Naomi sheab NY and this poem was written during the pandemic and so you know I was outside a lot and and we had a lot of animals visiting throughout the neighborhood and I was just really struck by um this idea of skunk and how sometimes you know the first thing we do is we smell the scent of the skunk and sometimes we turn our noses up at that and so what I really wanted to do was just spend some time observing this skunk that was moving through our neighborhood and and then I just started to imagine you know how are we going to negotiate our living together in this space you know which is kind of a metaphor for what we might have all been doing during the pandemic sort of how do we now imagine this new space that we’re in so that’s how the poem the poem emerged thank you for sharing um a beautiful story Lisa and next up we have Ben Ben would you like to share with us about your poem and how it emerged and became a poem yeah I think I there’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot um and this it’s it’s from some some criticism I was reading recently um but it’s just this sentence it said about Wordsworth poetry he takes a subject or a story merely as pegs or Loops to hang thought and feeling on um and I thought that was a really interesting idea so just yet the story merely as pegs or Loops to hang thought and feeling on and so I guess the poems I read the first two are definitely very narrative and um but not necessarily you know exactly true to how the story went but more so as pegs are Loops to hang thought and feeling on so I think that that’s kind of what I have been thinking about with experience and how how to how can you how can I allow my own experiences in moving through the world um as subject or story to hang thought and feeling on and I think that’s where poems can come from yeah thank you so much for sharing Ben Lucille you’re up next how did your poem emerge and find itself through your voice are on the paper okay well I’ll say a bit about the the first poem I read the the Legacy um and that’s the most recent of the poems I I read I wrote it last year and I found myself worrying about the state of the world that um we’re leaving to the Next Generation and I have uh four grandchildren Who currently range in age from 13 to 21 and I I want them to be able to have good lives and the and to be able to enjoy the beauty of the earth and I started thinking about the you know the loss of species and climate change and War and all the horrible lies and hatred that are found on social media and so I tried to write a poem um addressing them and um not uh avoiding these problems in any way but as much as possible to turn it in to something pos positive because there’s a lot of beauty um that’s still here we still have a beautiful planet and uh there’s there’s still a lot of opportunity to turn this around and find Solutions so rather than saying I’m sorry this is such a mess it’s all hopeless I I wanted to say that then you know that um all of us including you can do something about that so that’s where I was coming from thank you so much for sharing that Lucille next up we have Osiris Osiris do you want to share about how your poem emerged and became something on the page or in your voice of course yes thank you so much I’m gonna speak specifically about my soul survivor about my my my about my son Noah so they it was just a real tough night and it actually took a long time to even have my wife read it she would not look at inside of that poetry book she wouldn’t read it and I actually told her like that’s the one you don’t want to pay attention to because it’s pretty it’s pretty detailed in the descriptions that I give about it but it was just tough it was really tough and the most therapeutic way that I can uh uh believe to approach it was just writing it down um poetically but you know it’s interesting how life and how particular moments in life can trans uh can be transformative because of that I ended up being relatively like connected to my to my children even up to this day and I ended up just starting reading uh reading a lot of children’s books to them and then I eventually started writing my own children’s books um so I want to give them a away like if anybody has children or anyone who is interested in children’s stories I have this right here and I’d be I’d love to just mail them out or send them to them um it’s it’s it’s all love it’s all joy and it brought me a lot of joy to be able to read to my children that came out of a dark moment so um yeah that’s that that’s my that’s my answer thank you thank you very much for sharing that Osiris next up we have Noah Warren how did your poem emerge and reconfigure itself on the page or through your voice I think the pieces I read were kind of they were light in a certain way there’s a kind of um pedestrian Rhythm I wanted the kind of to create space I said between the between the thoughts um and so I guess they’re kind of prayers um their prayers for a lightness when uh you know one gets melancholic um and one needs to kind of remind oneself that it’s all it’s not all bowling balls all the way down um and so finding that Rhythm was a way of kind of uh finding a sound I could think too and it was a way of uh you know in these kind of like couplet these couplet little near nonsense phrases a way of kind of fitting other people’s speak to the world um and trying to convince myself to see the world in terms of that lightness even as it’s threaded with a little dark thank you for sharing that Noah and last but obviously not least Cheryl would you like to share your answer to the question and close us out for today well um my entire thought about no poetry no peace uh and the poem that I read this evening is is to share the message that as poets and I don’t know if the rest of you feel this way but for me I don’t own the Poetry The Poetry owns me and when it arrives it arrives and it does not call First it does not make an appointment and uh there is a compulsion to make sure that it is captured and that’s what I um tried to capture in that poem uh as the namesake of of the book I also um believe that writing in general for writers uh it becomes an obligation but it is a joyful obligation to make sure that you are sending your messages out into the world because this is how we create empathy and understanding and hopefully at some point peace and I thank you all for joining us and helping that to happen thank you all so much for being here today for this wonderful Gathering I invite everyone in our audience to also if you can open up your video and wave to the wonderful group that is in front of you send the send the love forward into the world and let those um you know ripples move outwards into the world as we um finish up our um National poetry day programming here at Mechanics Institute