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Poetry Flash Reading Series
Cintia Santana and Dan Alter
4/28, Berkeley
more info
Sixteen Rivers Press: Christina Lloyd, Murray Silverstein, Alice Templeton
5/19, Berkeley
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Carolyn Tipton and Sandra Yannone
6/20, Berkeley
more info


Bert Meyers Tribute: Eric Gudas, David Shaddock, Anat Silvera

22 JUNE 2023 — thursday

Poetry Flash presents a reading celebrating the publication of Bert Meyers: On the Life and Work of an American Master, readers include poets Eric Gudas, David Shaddock, and Anat Silvera, the poet's daughter, in person, Art House Gallery & Cultural Center, 2905 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley, two blocks north of Ashby BART, refreshments, free, 7:00 pm PDT (poetryflash.org).

Thank you for continuing to support Poetry Flash and our reading series.
Bert Meyers: On the Life and Work of an American Master will be available at the event and online at bookshop.org/shop/poetryflash(a portion of the proceeds support Poetry Flash).

Bert Meyers: On the Life and Work of an American Master, the latest volume in The Unsung Masters Series, offers a large selection of his very best poetry alongside essays and appreciations from José Angel Araguz, Jim Bogen, Victoria Chang, Amy Gerstler, Garrett Hongo, Daniel Meyers, Barry Sanders, Ari Sherman, Maurya Simon, and Sean Singer, among others. The Unsung Masters Series exists to bring great but largely overlooked writers to new readers. This volume is edited by Dana Levin and Adele Williams.

"Bert Meyers is an American original—a brilliant poet whose use of tone and figurative language was so emotive, intelligent and nuanced, it became inimitable, became its own unique perspective on our world. I wouldn't be surprised if mid-twenty-first century scholars announce that in Bert Meyers we have overlooked the best poet of his generation." —Ilya Kaminsky
MORE ABOUT THE READERS

Eric Gudas is the author of Best Western and Other Poems, winner of the Gerald Cable Book Award, and Beautiful Monster, a chapbook. His work has appeared in The American Poetry Review, The Iowa Review, Poetry Flash, Los Angeles Review of Books, Raritan, and elsewhere. He lives in Los Angeles.

David Shaddock is a poet and psychotherapist. His most recent poetry book is A Book of Splendor: New and Selected Poems on Spiritual Themes. He has a regular column in Poetry Flash, "Poetry and Healing," and is the author of Poetry and Psychoanalysis: The Opening of the Field (Routledge), and two books on relationships and couples therapy. He lectures widely on those topics, and maintains a private practice in Berkeley.

Anat Silvera, Bert Meyers's daughter, is one of the founders of Silvera Jewelry School in Berkeley. Before and after college she studied with artists and craftsmen, apprenticing as a metalsmith and learning how to create fine beadwork. She is the author of a book on her craft, and has exhibited her work all over the U.S., including as featured artist at the Oakland Museum of Art Collector's Gallery.

The son of Romanian and Polish Jewish immigrants, Bert Meyers (1928-1979) was born in Los Angeles. Always rebellious and a questioner of authority, he dropped out of high school and became a poet. For many years he worked at manual labor jobs, including printer's apprentice, until he became a master picture framer and gilder. Here he found satisfaction in craftsmanship and attention to detail, the same approach he used in composing his poetry. Throughout those years he continued to write, feeling that a poet should be immersed in the world, and should have real world things to write about. Meyers wanted to be self-taught. He read everything he could get his hands on and had a prodigious literary memory. He frequented the vibrant circles of LA poets at the time, with Thomas McGrath and others. His fellow poet and friend Robert Mezey said, "Bert Meyers belonged to no school or coterie and had no use for fashion. He was that rarest of creatures, a pure lyric poet. His poems are very much what he was—gentle, cantankerous, reflective, passionate and wise." Although he had never taken undergraduate classes, and had no high school diploma, in 1964 he was admitted to the Claremont Graduate School on the basis of his poetic achievements. By 1967 he had a Ph.D in English Literature and was hired to teach poetry and literature at Pitzer College in Claremont, where he taught until 1978. During his life as a professor, Meyers finally had the time to focus on his writing; he also had an important and lasting influence on his students, a new generation of poets and writers, including Dennis Cooper, Amy Gerstler, Garrett Hongo, and Mauyra Simon among others.

He published at least eight collections of poetry, including Early Rain (1960), The Dark Birds (1968), Sunlight on the Wall (1976), Windowsills (1979), The Wild Olive Trees (1979). Before he died, he selected the core poems of In a Dybbuk's Raincoat: Collected Poems (2007). His widow, Odette Meyers, son Daniel Meyers, and poet Morton Marcus shepherded the book into posthumous publication. Meyers's precisely framed poems are image driven and often quite short. Noting that "the image is unequivocally at the center of his work" in her introduction to In a Dybbuk's Raincoat, Denise Levertov lamented that "Bert Meyers death has deprived us of one of the best poets of our time." (Information from bertmeyers.com)




Daily Listings

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19 APRIL 2024 — friday

  • City Arts and Lectures welcomes young adult fiction novelist Leigh Bardugo, author of the Shadow and BoneNinth House series, Sydney Goldstein Theater, 275 Hayes Street, San Francisco, $36, 7:30 pm PDT (For more information and to purchase tickets, visit: www.cityarts.net/event/leigh-bardugo)
  • Los Angeles Times Festival of Books presents the 44th annual LA Times Book Prizes, University of Southern California campus, Bovard Auditorium, 3551 Trousdale Parkway, Los Angeles, limited public tickets are available, $20/VIP $75, 7:00 pm PDT (Tickets: events.latimes.com/festivalofbooks/bookprizes)
  • The Poetry Center presents the Tripwire Cross-Cultural Poetics Series, featuring poet and filmmaker Safaa Fathy, who will showcase her work in both poetry and film, as well as engage in conversation with the audience; Fathy is the author of Where Not to Be Born and Revolution Goes Through Walls, both recently translated from Arabic to English, Artists Television Access, 992 Valencia Street, San Francisco, free, 7:00-9:00 pm PDT (More information here: poetry.sfsu.edu)

20 APRIL 2024 — saturday

  • Medicine for Nightmares presents Ajay Singh Chaudhary, political theorist and executive director of the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, discussing his new book, The Exhausted of the Earth: Politics in a Burning World, in conversation with Daniel Aldana Cohen, A Planet to Win: Why We Need a Green New Deal, Medicine for Nightmare Bookstore, 3036 24th Street, San Francisco, free, 7:30-9:30 pm PDT (More information here: medicinefornightmares.com/events)
  • LA Times Festival of Books in partnership with Skylight Books presents a special Ideas Exchange event with RuPaul in celebration of the release of his memoir, The House of Hidden Meanings, University of Southern Callifornia campus, Bovard Auditorium, 3551 Trousdale Parkway, Los Angeles, $35-$75, 12:30 pm PDT (To purchase tickets, visit: www.tixr.com/groups/latimesfob/events/festival-of-books-rupaul-ideas-exchange-94506)
  • The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, hosted by the University of Southern California, is the largest free book festival in the Northern Hemisphere; this year's indoor and outdoor events will include over 200 conversations and performances, over 500 authors, with book signings, cooking demos, poetry readings, bilingual programming and more; POETRY STAGE SCHEDULE: 10:00 am: Lynne Thompson, Blue on a Blue Palette; 10:20 am: Maggie Milner, Couplets: A Love Story; 10:40 am: Simon Shieh, Master: Poems; 11:00 am: K. Iver, Short Film Starring My Beloved's Red Bronco; 11:20 am: Dean Rader, Before the Borderless: Dialogues with the Art of Cy Twombly; 11:40 am: Hala Alyan, The Moon That Turns You Back; Noon: Shelley Wong, As She Appears; 12:30 pm: LA Times Book Prize Poetry Finalist Roundtable, with K. Iver, Airea D. Matthews, Maggie Millner, Jenny Molberg, Simon Shieh, and one more; 1:00 pm: Sarah Maclay, Nightfall Marginalia; 1:20 pm: Derrick Brown, Love Ends in a Tandem Kayak; 1:40 pm: Jenny Molberg, The Court of No Record: Poems; 2:00 pm: Airea D. Matthews Bread and Circus: Poems; 2:20 pm: Kristina Marie Darling, Daylight Has Already Come: Selected Poems; 2:40 pm: Katie Farris, Standing in the Forest of Being Alive; 3:00 pm: Lynn Emanuel, Transcript of the Disappearance, Exact and Diminishing; 3:20 pm: A. Van Jordan, When I Waked, I Cried To Dream Again; 3:40 pm: Sam Sax, Pig; 4:00 pm: Paisley Rekdal, West: A Translation; 4:20 pm: Mag Gabbert, SEX DEPRESSION ANIMALS; 4:40 pm: Marsha de la O, Creature; 5:00 pm: Katherine Coles, Ghost Apples; 5:20 pm: Timothy Donnelly, Chariot; 5:40 pm: Poetry performance with Elena Secota and musicians Daniel Manoiu and Danny Moynahan; Poetry Flash (Booth 901), San Francisco's Manic D Press, and LA's Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center will be among more than 300 exhibitors at the outdoor event, University of Southern California, 3551 Trousdale Parkway, Los Angeles, general admission is free, the festival will also feature ticketed events with authors and celebrities, outdoor programming doesn't require a ticket, 10:00 pm to 6:00 pm PDT (For more information and to view the schedule of participants, visit: events.latimes.com/festivalofbooks/schedule)
  • This workshop, "Less is More! Writing Micro Fiction," taught by flash fiction writer and children's book author Britta Stromeyer Esmail, will teach you how to compact narratives, refine prose, hone editing skills, and help you find literary journals that accept flash fiction, Book Passage, 51 Tamal Vista Blvd., Corte Madera, $80, 1:30 pm to 3:30 pm PDT (For more information, visit: www.bookpassage.com/event/less-more-writing-micro-fiction-britta-stromeyer-esmail)

21 APRIL 2024 — sunday

  • Alta (1942-2024), legendary Berkeley poet, prose writer, and publisher, passed on March 10; she is best known as the founder of the feminist press Shameless Hussy Press and editor of the Shameless Hussy Review; her 1980 collection The Shameless Hussy won the American Book Award in 1981; her memorial will take place at the Chapel of the Chimes, 4499 Piedmont Avenue, Oakland, Noon PDT
  • This two-day workshop, "Building a Story: Plot," is led by author Nina Schuyler, Afterword ; each session of the course will cover a different plot structure; the first session, April 14, will cover causation plot; the second session, April 21, will cover braided or episodic plot, discrete events not connected causally but loosely by imagery, theme, or something else, Book Passage, 51 Tamal Vista Blvd., Corte Madera, $125, 10:30 am to 12:30 pm PDT (For more information, visit: www.bookpassage.com/event/nina-schuyler-building-story-plot)
  • The San Francisco Public Library presents a screening of two documentaries about renowned Beat poets Diane Di Prima and Allen Ginsberg, The Poetry Deal: A Portrait of Poet Diane Di Prima and The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg, Latino/Hispanic Meeting Room A, Main Library, 100 Larkin Street, San Francisco, free, 1:00-3:15 pm PDT (More information here: sfpl.org/events/2024/04/21/film-poetry-deal-life-and-times-allen-ginsberg)
  • The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, hosted by the University of Southern California, is the largest free book festival in the Northern Hemisphere; this year's indoor and outdoor events will include over 200 conversations and performances, over 500 authors, with book signings, cooking demos, poetry readings, bilingual programming and more; POETRY STAGE SCHEDULE: 10:00 am: Victoria Chang, WITH MY BACK TO THE WORLD: Poems; 10:20 am: Kazim Ali, Sukun: New and Selected Poems; 10:40 am: Oliver de la Paz, THE DIASPORA SONNETS; 11:00 am: Tess Taylor, Leaning Toward the Light: Poems for Gardens & the Hands That Tend Them; 11:20 am: Cyrus Cassells, Is There Room for Another Horse on Your Horse Ranch?; 11:40 am: Jacqui Germain, Bittering the Wound; Noon: Megan Fernandes, I Do Everything I'm Told; 12:30 pm: Kaveh Akbar and Anahid Nersessian in conversation; 1:00 pm: Elizabeth Metzger, Lying In; 1:20 pm: Jubi Arriola-Headley, Bound: poems; 1:40 pm: Tennison S. Black, Survival Strategies; 2:00 pm: Lisa B. (Lisa Bernstein), God in Her Ruffled Dress; 2:20 pm: Diego Báez, Yaguareté White; 2:40 pm: Susan Rich, Blue Atlas; 3:00 pm: Saretta Morgan, Alt-Nature; 3:20 pm: Hélène Cardona, The Abduction; 3:40 pm: Mandy Kahn, Holy Doors; 4:00 pm: Jeremy Ra, Another Way of Loving Death; 4:20 pm: Jack Grapes, The Naked Eye; 4:40 pm: Poetry performance by Sofía Aguilar of WriteGirl; Poetry Flash (Booth 901), San Francisco's Manic D Press, and LA's Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center will be among more than 300 exhibitors at the outdoor event, University of Southern California, 3551 Trousdale Parkway, Los Angeles, general admission is free, the festival will also feature ticketed events with authors and celebrities, outdoor programming doesn't require a ticket, 10:00 pm to 6:00 pm PDT (For more information and to view the schedule of participants, visit: events.latimes.com/festivalofbooks/schedule)

22 APRIL 2024 — monday

  • Medicine for Nightmares presents a reading with four California poets, Karla Brundage, Swallowing Watermelons, Ashia Ajani, Heirloom, Kevin Dublin, Eulogy, and Arthur Kayzakian, The Book of Redacted Paintings, winner of the inaugural Black Lawrence Immigrant Writing Series, Medicine for Nightmare Bookstore, 3036 24th Street, San Francisco, free, 3:30-5:30 pm PDT (More information here: medicinefornightmares.com/events)
  • Fresno State University's Armenian Studies Program and Master of Fine Arts Program in Creative Writing present "Armenian Memory, Writing Across the Borders: A Reading and Talk," with Pulitzer-prize winning poet Peter Balakian, Black Dog of Fate and Ozone Journal, book signing follows, Alice Peters Auditorium, 5245 North Backer Avenue, Fresno, free, 6:00 pm PDT (For more information, visit: calendar.fresnostate.edu/index.php?eID=2288)

23 APRIL 2024 — tuesday

24 APRIL 2024 — wednesday

  • Point Reyes Books presents iconic novelist Amy Tan, The Joy Luck Club, celebrating her latest book, The Backyard Bird Chronicles, Red Barn, 75 Bear Valley Road, Point Reyes Station, $40, each ticket comes with a copy of the book, 7:00 pm PDT (Register to attend: www.ptreyesbooks.com/events)
  • City Lights, ALTA Journal, and Heyday Books celebrate the publication of Greg Sarris's new short story collection, The Forgetters, and the paperback release of his memoir in essays, Becoming Story: A Journey Among Seasons, Places, Trees, and Ancestors, City Lights Bookstore, 261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, free, 7:00 to 9:00 pm PDT (For more information: https://citylights.com/events/greg-sarris-in-conversation-with-blaise-zerega)

25 APRIL 2024 — thursday

  • The Poetry Center, in conjunction with TurkxTaylor Initiative, presents "Trans Temporal Resistances," writers and artists deconstruct trans archives and architecture through text and movement, featuring performances by three local writers, Tatiana Luboviski-Acosta, Rowan Powell, and Mason J., co-curated by Emji Saint Spero and Leila Weefur, Tenderloin Museum, 398 Eddy Street, San Francisco, free, 7:00-8:30 pm PDT (More information here: poetry.sfsu.edu)
  • San Francisco Public Library presents a reading by Bay Area poets Dena Rod, Scattered Arils, Taneesh Kaur, Thawing: A Poetic Memoir, and Tony Aldarondo, reading from new work, hosted by San Francisco Poet Laureate emerita Kim Shuck, What Unseen Thing Blows Wishes Across My Surface?, Latino/Hispanic Meeting Room A, Main Library, 100 Larkin Street, San Francisco, free, 6:00-7:30 pm PDT (More information here: sfpl.org/events/2024/04/25/performance-new-poetry-books-bay-area-poets-read-recent-publications)
  • Writers Read Ukiah presents Haiku Night, featuring a presentation and reading of haikus and other short forms of poetry, followed by an open mic reading, six-minutes per reader, emceed by Michael Riedell, Grace Hudson Museum, 431 South Main Street, Ukiah, $5 suggested donation, 7:00 pm PDT (Email: innisfreeriedell@gmail.com for more information)

26 APRIL 2024 — friday

  • City Arts and Lectures welcomes Catherine Lacey, Biography of X, Pew, The Answers, Nobody Is Ever Missing, and journalist and Pulitzer Prize finalist Chloé Cooper Jones discussing Jones's new memoir, Easy Beauty; Sydney Goldstein Theater, 275 Hayes Street, San Francisco, $39, 7:30 pm PDT (For more information and to purchase tickets, visit: www.cityarts.net/event/chloe-cooper-jones)
  • The Book of Light Poetry Series, a reading series that celebrates the spirit and soul of the poetry of Lucille Clifton, featuring Jackson Holbert, winner of the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize and author Winter Stranger, Books Inc., 1344 Parks Street, Alameda, free, 6:00 pm PDT (More information here: www.booksinc.net/event/jackson-holbert-books-inc-alameda)

27 APRIL 2024 — saturday

  • This workshop, "Writing Historical Fiction," taught by historical novelists Siobhan Curham, The Storyteller of Auschwitz, and Linda Joy Myers, The Forger of Marseille, covers the key elements of writing historical fiction including idea, research, character, and plot, Book Passage, 51 Tamal Vista Blvd., Corte Madera, $105, 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm PDT (For more information, visit: www.bookpassage.com/event/writing-historical-fiction)
  • Fourth Saturdays presents a reading with featured poets Jodie Hollander, Nocturne, and Veronica Michalowski, One: Family of Poetry, free, Claremont Helen Renwick Library, 208 N. Harvard Avenue, Claremont, free, 2:00 pm PDT (More information here: www.facebook.com/fourthsaturdayspoetry)
  • Sonoma Valley Authors Festival presents "Authors on the Plaza" featuring authors David Grann, Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI, Colm Tóibín,The Magician, and Amy Tan,The Joy Luck Club, Sonoma Plaza, 453 First Street East, Sonoma, free, registration required, 11:00 am to 2:00 pm PDT (For more information, visit: svauthorsfest.org/authors-on-the-plaza)
  • City Lights, Morbid Curiosity, and Strange Attractor Press present an afternoon in appreciation of the life and work of Mel Gordon, in celebration of the posthumous publication of his Cabarets of Death: Death, Dance and Dining in Early Twentieth-Century Paris, a documentation of three cabaret-restaurants in the Montmartre district of Paris from 1892 until 1954, moderated by Joanna Ebenstein and Peter Maravelis, with Maer Ben-Yisreal, Ati Citron, J. Hoberman, La Pustra, Mark Pilkington, Jill Tracy, Christina Ward, and others, online via Zoom, free, 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PDT (To register, visit Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/voluptuous-life-a-tribute-to-the-life-and-work-of-mel-gordon-tickets-810502062487?aff=oddtdtcreator)

28 APRIL 2024 — sunday

  • Litquake and Litcamp present, "How They Did It: High-Stakes Memoir," a conversation with five intrepid authors of recent memoir including Eddie Ahn Advocate: A Graphic Memoir of Family, Community, and the Fight for Environmental Justice, Sylvia Brownrigg,The Whole Staggering Mystery: A Story of Fathers Lost and Found, Margaret Juhae Lee,Starry Field: A Memoir of Lost History, Susan Lieu,The Manicurist's Daughter, and Carvell Wallace,The Sixth Man, Another Word for Love; the event will be moderated by author Rachel Howard, The Risk of Us, Page Street Co-Working Space, 297 Page Street, San Francisco, free, 3:00 pm to 5:00 pm PDT (For more information, visit: www.litquake.org/upcoming-events.html)
  • San Francisco Public Library presents a reading featuring contributors to the Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, including Nicole Henares, Karen Melander-Magoon, Phyllis Klein, Cesar Love, Ed Mycue, Antoinette Vella Payne, Rafael Pineda, Dan Richman, Alice Rogoff, John Rowe, Eva Helene Stern, and Nellie Wong, Latino/Hispanic Meeting Room A, Main Library, 100 Larkin Street, San Francisco, free, 4:00-5:00 pm PDT (More information here: sfpl.org/events/2024/04/28/performance-poetry-preserves-44-years-vital-verse)
  • Medicine for Nightmares presents the Odd Verse Reading Series, a poetry reading and open mic that amplifies underrepresented voices, in a safe space for discourse, community solidarity, and collective action for social justice, Medicine for Nightmares Bookstore, 3036 24th Street, San Francisco, free, donations welcome, 4:30-7:00 pm PDT (More information here: medicinefornightmares.com/events)
  • Poetry Flash presents a reading by Dan Alter, My Little Book of Exiles, and Cintia Santana, The Disordered Alphabet, 2727 California Street, a cooperative art space, Berkeley, refreshments, free, 3:00 pm PDT (poetryflash.org).

29 APRIL 2024 — monday

  • Mechanic's Institute presents "No Poetry No Peace," a reading celebrating human poetic expression, hosted by award-winning multidisciplinary writer Sheryl J. Bize-Boutte, featuring poets Aileen Cassinetto, Lisa DeVuono, Poems from the Playground of Risk, Benjamin Gucciardi, West Portal, Lucille Lang Day, Becoming an Ancestor, O'Cyrus, Sacred, and Noah Warren, The Complete Stories, Mechanics' Institute, 57 Post Street, San Francisco, free for members, $10 nonmembers, 6:00 pm PDT (Register to attend: www.milibrary.org/events/events-activities)
  • City Arts and Lectures welcomes historian Doris Kearns Goodwin as she discusses her new book, An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s, a historical biography inspired by notes, journals, and letters by Goodwin's late husband, Sydney Goldstein Theater, 275 Hayes Street, San Francisco, $49, 7:30 pm PDT (For more information and to purchase tickets, visit: www.cityarts.net/event/doris-kearns-goodwin-3)

30 APRIL 2024 — tuesday

  • A celebration for the launch of prizewinning anthropologist Angela Garcia's moving work of narrative nonfiction, The Way That Leads Among the Lost: Life, Death, and Hope in Mexico City's Anexos, based on over a decade of research, Garcia's book examines the anexos, community-based recovery houses serving people struggling with addiction in Mexico City, City Lights Bookstore, 261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, free, 7:00 to 9:00 pm PDT (For more information: citylights.com/events/angela-garcia)
  • Cobalt Poets presents a reading with featured poet Ray Jane, Black Like That, followed by an open mic, online via Zoom, free, 7:30 pm PDT (Register to attend: www.poetrysuperhighway.com/cobalt/calendar.html)
  • Skylight Books presents poet Callie Siskel, celebrating her debut collection, Two Minds, joined in a reading by poets L.A. Johnson, Little Climates, and Armen Davoudian, The Palace of Forty Pillars, Skylight Books, 1818 N. Vermont Avenue, Los Angeles, free, 7:00 pm PDT (More information here: www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylight-callie-siskel-presents-two-minds-w-la-johnson-armen-davoudian)

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