Asian Pacific American Heritage Month
Listen
You can listen to her poem here and also read along with my my transcription below.
Samoa
My uncle once broke a man's hands quietly
like you would snap a biscuit in half
and then another
no one knows how loud the man screamed –
or if he screamed.
My uncle was Gary Cooper's body double
Return To Paradise, 1952.
He'd studied in Fiji and could speak English
but no one needed him to talk.
He was afakasi (Somoan an European)
and white enough to look white.
Cooper didn't come out much in the day,
too hot maybe.
They shot him mostly at night
so my uncle stood in the sun
for the longshots
In those Beachcomber shorts and the hat.
What the villagers remember is the church
where Gary Cooper shoots out the
stained-glass windows with a guns
And the machine
that pumped water out of the sea
to make it rain.
The boys remember the cigarettes
and the candy that the crew handed out
all through the night so they
would stay and keep them company
He was Australian, that man.
Most of the crew were from Queensland
they must have sent him back there
with his broken hands
and his Lucky Strikes.
To the right is the movie poster from the movie she references in her poems.
Tusiata Avia -New Zealand Poet and Children's Author
Avia was born in Christ Church, New Zealand to a Samoan father and a Palangi (white) mother. Samoa is part of the Polynesian islands. It has a long history of colonization driven by financial interests and missionary work. If you are interested in learning more about Samoa (note there is Samoa and American Samoa), you can watch this documentary for some background, ask your World History teachers, or contact your librarian for more sources on the topic.
Tusiata wrote this poem about a time that Hollywood came to make a film set in Samoa. The storyline of the poem shows American men coming to Samoa,having fun to spite the uptight missionaries, and then impregnating women and leaving their children behind. In real life, on the set, the exploitation of Samoan people continued. Here is her poem about her uncle's exerience.
Kosal Khiev: Poet, Tattoo Artist, Survivor of the US Prison System
Write: Verses in Exile #1
"Kosal Khiev was born in a refugee camp in Thailand, grew up in the United States, and discovered spoken word poetry while serving 14 years in prison for attempted murder. Upon release, he was deported or “exiled” to Cambodia, a country he had never before seen. There, he was chosen as the poet to represent Cambodia at the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad. Khiev’s first book is “Finding Home,” and his story as a poet and Khmer exiled American is featured in the documentary film, 'Cambodian Son,' and the webseries, 'Verses in Exile'"(Kai-Hwa Wang 2015).
You can find a lot more about him and other refugees by searching online.
Kelly Tsai
Wai-Puo: For My Badass Grandma
Kenji C. Liu - Cinepoet
"Ah Kung in the Philippine Jungle, 1945"
This is a short cinepoem produced by Kenji C. Liu about his Taiwanese grandfather, who was deployed to the Philippines by the Japanese Imperial Army during WWII, and had to surrender to US forces. The cinepoem explores the ambiguities of being a soldier recruited from a Japanese colony to fight in another Japanese colony.
The music for this video poem is a digital collaboration between Kenji C. Liu (poet - LA), Tako Oda (berimbau - Oakland), Marië Abe (accordion - Boston), and Heidi Andrea Restrepo Rhodes (vocalist - NYC). Liu contacted the musicians with a length, time signature, and key, and each contributed audio files, which Liu mixed with other audio samples. All video is free from the Internet Archive and Mazwai.
Published in Issue 59 (June 2014) of The Collagist. Read the poem at thecollagist.com/the-collagist/2014/6/6/a-kung-in-the-philippine-jungle-1945.html
Dear april,
You are so lucky that you in addition to being poetry month, you are also autism awareness month! you get six poems because you are so important!
yours truly,
Ms. Folsoi
Listen to Arvind Nandakumar's powerful poem about living better with autism than without it!
"The 2017 Individual World Poetry Slam Champion, Arvind Nandakumar, (they/he) is an Indian-something immigrant who has lived in Canada, Australia, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and the US. Arvind is currently at UC Berkeley studying Microbial Biology. Their work tackles issues of mental health and focuses on their lived experiences as a poet of color on the autism spectrum."
Listen to "Stand Out For Autism" by poet Katie Walters.
"Stimming" by poet Gabe Moses. A poem of motion and emotion for us all.
April -Happy Poetry Month!
This poem by Rita Dove is called "Bellringer." Henry Martin was born into slavery to on Thomas Jefferson's plantation the day Jefferson died. Thomas Jefferson was his grandfather according to Henry. He went on to ring the bell in the clock tower for the University of Virginian (founded by Thomas Jefferson to educate white Southern white boys, whom he feared were growing lazy and ignorant-but that's another story). He also served as a nurse during the Civil War. Henry Martin was an important figure in the lives of University of Virginia students. Rita Dove wrote a poem about him, for him, imagining what it would have been like to spend his life at a university that he would never be allowed to attend. You can read the text of her poem here, listen to it below, and read more about his life by clicking on the image below.
"In Defense of Ballin on a Budget" by Marcus Wicker is a great poem filled with allusions. An allusion is a reference to something that is supposed to be known, without spelling it out. For me, this poem had a whole host of allusions. I didn't know what "Ballin on a Budget," Slick Rick, or Uncle Phil were allusions to. I do now ;). I had to look up Maybach, Ketel One, and snap back too. Once I educated myself on these allusions, I understood the poem and really liked it. So the next time you read a poem and you think, I don't know what this is all about, check out some of the allusions! You can listen to the poem below and read it online here. The last line really put me in my teen shoes...and in my army jacket with the painted peace signs and the buttons with Jim Morrison's face and a slogans that told you what's what, and my Boy George hat....
This is Sandra Cisneros reciting a short poem in Spanish by Federico Garcîa Lorca. I have no idea what this poem is about because my Spanish is weak, but I can understand enough to hear the title, ¡Ay qué trabajo me cuesta.
Mid march, 2021...BETTER LATE THAN NEVER
Muhammad Ali, Poet Extraordinaire
AHIM BY Ghojimuhemmed Muhemmed, UYGHUR POET, READ BY MUKADDAS MIJIT. IT IS A POEM TELLING OF LOVE AND LOSS FOR ONE'S HOMELAND.
You can think of what has happened to the Uyghurs in the way we think of what was done to Indigenous people here. Their homeland is rich in minerals and resources. Han Chinese were sent, more or less to colonize their autonomous region within China. The Uyghurs have been the victims of racism, colonialism, and were essentially forced to choose between facing the death of their culture and economic death. Some who have chosen to pursue economic survival left the region in an attempt to educate their children in the Mandarin language. They were cleared out of Beijing when China was vying to be the site of the 2008 Olympics in order to erase the evidence of poverty afflicting the Uyghur's there (Eisenman).
You can read more Uyghur poetry here.
Joshua Eisenman. "A Letter from Kashgar: China's Wild West." American Journal of Chinese Studies 10.2 (2003): 119-28. Web.
AND NOW FOR A 15 SECOND POEM I THOUGHT WAS A TOTAL CROCK FIRST TIME I HEARD IT. SO MUCH DEPENDS, I GUESS, ON EXPERIENCING ENOUGH IN LIFE TO FEEL IT...
This poem, "In Defense of
january 2021 - Three amazing poets and spoken word artists
Amanda Gorman is the first Youth Poet Laureate. She is a local girl, from Los Angeles, and she is the youngest person ever to deliver an innaugural poem. Click the link on her name to hear more of her poetry and an interview on NPR.
Kae (formerly Kate) Tempest is an English spoken word performer, poet, recording artist, novelist and playwright. In August of 2020, Kae came out as non-binary. Their pronouns are they/them. Listen to the poem on the right, and you can hear more from them in the NPR interview linked to their name.
Linked here is the last 1:40 of his 12 minute podcast in verse. He is a poet, a teacher, an activist a guide. The full podcast is linked to his name.
December 2020- Poems for our season of reflection and where we've been, what we have, and who we will be in the year to come.
The holidays make me think of my family and where we come from. My people too were pushed out of their homes, and we came here, pushing others off of theirs. Our high school sits on Tongva land. The springs gave life to a civilization and a people who, unlike my people, had no where to go and no where else they wanted to be. The beautiful poem by Kelly Caballero speaks truth and power. Click on the picture to the right to hear interviews of Tongva Indians Chief Red Blood and Mark Acuna.
Dilruba Ahmed- Poet
This is a season for loving and letting go. Listen to Pádraig Ó Tuama's read Dilruba Ahmed's poem on self-forgiveness. He says of the poem, "I think sometimes there can be a concern that a focus on self-forgiveness is somehow selfish. But the focus on self-forgiveness is, in a certain sense, trying to remove yourself from being always the center of the drama of the public life you’re living."
Enjoy the holidays with your human family...we are here for you.
November, 2020. Thanksgiving poems. Poems of gratitude, of rage, protest, of plunder, of forgiveness, of acceptance. You know, Thanksgiving poems.
Warsan Shire (above) reads her poem "Home." Click on the video to the right to listen.
Read "Inherit a packet of earth" by Native American poet Sherwin Bitsui (below).
Click Here to Listen to Poetry Unbound to hear Pádraig Ó Tuama read, discuss, and re-read this poem that ultimately asks for more love.
Listen to Native American author, Joy Harjo, read her Thanksgiving poem.
