Happy Lit in 2013! this saturday and more...

[Lisa Gill]

Dear poets, poetry aficionados, friends,

Happy new year to everyone and happy winter!

As you know, Local Poets Guild takes a hiatus from some of our reading series during the winter (due to lack of heat in the Projects) but we do plan to be back sometime in March. Mitch Rayes will actually be taking over hosting the weekly East of Edith open mic and feature series. When we get closer to reopening, I'll put out a call for volunteers to help him host and do pr and also to solicit recommendations for features.While some of our regular programming is dormant for two more fly-bye months, you still tons of regular  opportunities in the community and from the LPG end, some good stuff continues also. As usual, Don McIver is working hard for the community and keeps plugging away with programming poetry segments to go with chamber music for Sunday Chatter (formerly Church of Beethoven) and you can find news of that at http://chatterchamber.org/sunday/  Next year, I'm hoping that we can take LPG in even more overtly interdisciplinary directions and to continue in that vein (since we did a few events in the fall), we booked another show for January 5th at the Filling Station (which has heat!) 

So you're invited to an event this Saturday!

FIVE-oh-FIVE

Saturday January 5th at 7 PM admission $5.05

Filling Station (1024-4th Street SW, at Pacific, south of Lead/Coal)

Presented by LPG, Basement Films, & TEO 315

Set 1 has W.B.Yeats (performed by Ben Borrman), a short movie addressing our love of radioactivity called "Chicken Delight" by Bryan Konefsky, and the duo Baba (banjo/tuba/vocals). 

Set 2 opens with Jenette Issacson with a short film strip performance, and then goes into a set alternating poetry and music with TEO 315 (th3 e1emental orke5tra) and micro features from Ben Borman as himself, plus Angela Janda of Santa Fe, and Adam Rubenstein plus mini open mic. Maybe spillover after. 

I'll be hosting, and reading a tiny bit here and there as both Yeats-the-essayist and myself. We're asking for $5.05 at the door to help cover space rental, but I'm hoping in exchange to give you some version of a homemade wooden nickel, which will come in terribly handy at some future date I'm sure.

More info on the show in the last couple blogposts at http://localpoetsguild.wordpress.com

Also, in February, we're trying to put together a little celebration of International Rare Disease Day February 28th. I'm calling it Zebras Are Us, after medical zebras and something begins to take shape. I'm hoping for showcase with open mic, plus some blog posts of both poetry and prose that relate to rare diseases, from people with the diseases (dx or undx) as well as from friends, family, advocates. As most of you know, I struggle with chronic disability issues, some of which remain undiagnosed. I'm currently still in medical throes and since most of what impacts me comes out of the rare disease spectrum, and because I know others who also struggle with disability and chronic hard-to-figure-out disease, I wanted to do something related to this type of disability issue, even if it's something small squished between doctors appointments or treatments.  A few of us are already on board, Rachelle Mechenbier, Lisa Hase-Jackson, Rosanna Cordova, to try to work together to make something happen and if you'd like to join us somehow as reader/audience/organizer/writer-of-articles-or-poems-for-the-blog, we'd welcome you.  Able-bodied or disabled, we are all impacted whether personally, or through struggles of friends and family. Let's share literature around this issue and see what happens. For global news on this day's events, see http://www.rarediseaseday.org/   If you want to participate in New MExico either in person or virtually via writing, drop me an email at  nearartexperience at yahoo dot com. (And I'll put out news on what events shape up as well as a more formal call for blog submissions later.)

Kudos shout out to all the organizers and participants in ABQ lit events. Beautiful stuff everywhere! I can't keep up with the full run down, but have to say "great work" to  Andrea, Zach, Jazz, Kenneth, Jules, Julie, Katrina, Jessica,  Jennifer, Billy, Carlos, Hakim, Amanda, Don, Eric, all the slammers... Tons of beautiful good stuff happening... Happy poetry to all ! 

And congrats to Tanaya Winder and Cassie Lopez (who is back in NM on fellowship also I believe) and also to the whole world, everyone who will contribute to or benefit from their new journal, AS US, which just launched. Take a look at http://asusjournal.org 

That's it for now. My gratitude to everyone. Day by new day,

Sincerely,

lisa gill

http://localpoetsguild.wordpress.com