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======== FIGHT THE BUDGET CUTS ========
Thanks to the Governor and State Legislature
Nine Unpaid Work Furlough Days for Fall 2009
September 4, 8; October 23, 26;
plus five employee elective dates
Nine More Unpaid Work Furlough Days coming in Spring 2010
Information HERE
===================================

February

Friday January 29
Dennis Tedlock 2000 Years of Mayan Literature
art exhibition and book party/reading

7:00–9:00 pm @ Meridian Gallery
535 Powell Street, San Francisco

Dennis Tedlock will read from his astounding new book, 2000 Years of Mayan Literature, just published by the University of California Press.

There will be color prints of 24 different pages of the book available to purchase, all printed on 11 x 17 archival paper.

Mayan literature is among the oldest in the world, spanning an astonishing two millennia from deep pre-Columbian antiquity to the present day. Here, for the first time, is a fully illustrated survey, from the earliest hieroglyphic inscriptions to the works of later writers using the Roman alphabet. Dennis Tedlock — ethnographer, linguist, poet, and award-winning author — draws on decades of living and working among the Maya to assemble this groundbreaking book, which is the first to treat ancient Mayan texts as literature. Tedlock considers the texts chronologically. He establishes that women were among the ancient writers and challenges the idea that Mayan rulers claimed the status of gods. 2000 Years of Mayan Literature expands our understanding and appreciation not only of Mayan literature but of indigenous American literature in its entirety.

Dennis Tedlock is Distinguished Professor and Endowed McNulty Chair of English and Research Professor of Anthropology at the University at Buffalo of the State University of New York. He won the PEN Translation Prize for Popol Vuh: The Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings. For his other books he has received awards from the American Folklore Society, the Society for Linguistic Anthropology, the Society for Humanistic Anthropology, and the Association of American Publishers.

"Never before has anyone focused so successfully on the literary genius of these ancient authors. Tedlock is so much more than a translator, placing selected Mayan works in a continuous narrative that skillfully links authors from the third century to the sixteenth century with writers of today. An extremely important, original, and innovative work."—Martha J. Macri, coauthor of The New Catalog of Maya Hieroglyphs, Volumes 1 and 2, and Director of the Maya Hieroglyphic Database Project, University of California, Davis

"A stunning recreation of the intellectual world of the ancient Maya, the only fully literate people of pre-Columbian America. Informed by the latest research on Maya hieroglyphic writing, art, and mythology, this beautifully illustrated and wonderfully readable work by an outstanding scholar should be on the bookshelf of all those interested in this fascinating civilization."—Michael Coe, author of Breaking the Maya Code

"This book is, like the ancient Maya texts and images it explores, a work of art."—David Freidel, co-author (with Linda Schele and Joy Parker) of Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman's Path

"Literally breathtaking. A truly unprecedented gathering and translation of written Mayan texts. Tedlock is making visible, for the first time, a Mayan literature in comprehensible, meaningful form."—Jerome Rothenberg, poet, author/editor of Technicians of the Sacred and Poems for the Millennium

Thursday February 4
Stephen Motika and Bill Mohr

3:30 pm @ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

Poets Stephen Motika, from New York City, and Bill Mohr, of Los Angeles, will be in town to help celebrate the life and work of late poet and editor (of 10 volumes of the remarkable journal Temblor, among other works) Leland Hickman. (See FEB 6 below) Tiresias: The Collected Poems of Leland Hickman was just published by Nightboat Books & Otis Books/Seismicity Editions, edited by Stephen Motika, with a Preface by Dennis Phillips and an Afterword by Bill Mohr. While they're in town, we have drafted them to read their own work—and perhaps a bit of Leland Hickman's—at the Poetry Center.

StephenMotika,Berlin

Stephen Motika is the editor of Tiresias: The Collected Poems of Leland Hickman (2009) and the author of the chapbook, Arrival and At Mono (2007). Recent work has appeared in Eleven Eleven, The Boog City Reader 4, and The Poetry Project Newsletter. The Field, his collaboration with visual artist Dianna Frid, was on view at Gallery 400 at the University of Illinois, Chicago, in 2003. He is the coordinator of public programs, exhibitions, and education at Poets House in lower Manhattan and the publisher of Nightboat Books, a literary non-profit publisher based in New York's Upper Delaware River Valley.

Bill Mohr's collections of poems include Bittersweet Kaleidoscope (If Editions, 2006) as well as a spoken word CD, Vehemence (New Alliance, 1993). His writing has appeared in dozens of magazines, including a recent special Los Angeles issue of Luvina (University of Guadalajara, Mexico), as well as many anthologies, including all three editions of Stand Up Poetry, edited by Charles Webb. In addition to contributing a chapter on Los Angeles poetry to the Cambridge Companion of Los Angeles Literature, he has a book on that subject, Backlit Renaissance: Los Angeles Poets during the Cold War, forthcoming from the University of Iowa Press. After years of working as a typesetter, he is currently an assistant professor at CSU Long Beach.

Saturday February 6
a tribute to Leland Hickman

(1934-91), poet, actor and editor of TEMBLOR
to celebrate Tiresias: The Collected Poems of Leland Hickman

7:30 pm @ Unitarian Center, 1187 Franklin (at Geary), $5

featuring
Todd Baron
Norma Cole
Beverly Dahlen
Kathleen Fraser
Robert Glück
Larry Kearney
Kevin Killian
Bill Mohr
Laura Moriarty
Stephen Motika
Brian Teare

We've assembled a terrific group of fellow poets, friends, and younger writers to help celebrate the life and work of late poet, actor, and editor (of 10 volumes of the remarkable journal Temblor, 1983-89, among other publications) Leland Hickman.

Tiresias: The Collected Poems of Leland Hickman was just published by Nightboat Books & Otis Books/Seismicity Editions, edited by Stephen Motika, with a Preface by Dennis Phillips and an Afterword by Bill Mohr. The work, collected anew, is a revelation.

"I found quickly that the concept of taking 'a quick peek' does not pertain to any reading of Leland Hickman's poetry. I can tell you, however, that what I read and re-read, and again re-read, is utterly compelling in its song, clang, pain, urgency & curiosity. He is some sort of GGianTT." —Kathleen Fraser

"Maximal: as if the towering world above him, writing from the kneeling position, were bursting with element and import — and down they rain! Leland Hickman's poetic abjection is one of deep saturation, a full-body sensorium, slurped to the brim and fearless of overflow. The stance is worshipful even as it sorrows, incantatory while it keens. His verse lines open in paratactic elaborations that are also compressions: a restless, animating, outward-seeking erotic energy that wants to turn event into body, cauterizing memory and sizzling attention via absorption. Poetry in Tiresias is a relational act in the Whitman tradition, where the reader is taken in and stuffed underneath the shirt to lie close to a shameless beating heart. As I see it, the goal is to make two hearts beat as one. Reading throbs for such poetry at last!" —Aaron Shurin

Leland Hickman, undated photo by Rod Bradley

Thursday February 18
a reading with Akilah Oliver and Jane Sprague
• 3:30 pm @ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

March

Wednesday–Thursday March 3 & 4
The Poetics of Healing
a series of programs featuring special guest
philosopher and author Alphonso Lingis
curated by Eleni Stecopoulos

• Wednesday March 3, 7:30 pm, “Dominion of Shadows”
@ Subterranean Arthouse, 2179 Bancroft Way, Berkeley, $5-10

• Thursday March 4, 3:30 pm, a public conversation with
Alphonso Lingis and Eleni Stecopoulos
@ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

Thursday March 11
two readings with Jonathan Skinner and Juliana Spahr

• 3:30 pm @ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

• 7:30 pm @ the Green Arcade, 1680 Market (at Gough), San Francisco, free

Friday March 12
Immortal Cupboard: in Search of Lorine Niedecker
a screening and discussion
with director Cathy Cook
and poet Jonathan Skinner

@ Artists Television Access, 992 Valencia Street
co-sponsored with Kino21 and Small Press Traffic

Thursday March 18
a reading with Brandon Downing and Macgregor Card

• 3:30 pm @ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

April

Thursday April 8
a reading and conversation with Ammiel Alcalay

@ The Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

Saturday April 10
a reading with Ammiel Alcalay and Diane di Prima

• 7:30 pm @ Meridian Gallery, 535 Powell Street, San Francisco, $5-10

Thursday April 22
INDIVISIBLE
editors Neela Banerjee, Summi Kaipa, and Pireeni Sundaralingam
and featuring Tanuja Mehrotra and Minal Hajratwala

contributors to the first ever anthology of South Asian American poetry

• 3:30 pm @ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

• 7:30 pm @ the Green Arcade, 1680 Market (at Gough), San Francisco, free

Thursday April 29–Saturday May 1
The Poetics of Healing
a series of programs with special guests
Petra Kuppers, Neil Marcus, Sadie Wilcox • Olimpias Artist Residency
curated by Eleni Stecopoulos

• Thursday April 29, Petra Kuppers and Neil Marcus: CRIPPLE POETICS
3:30 pm @ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

• Friday April 30, artist talks with Petra Kuppers and Sadie Wilcox
7:30 pm @ Subterranean Arthouse, 2179 Bancroft Way, Berkeley, $5-10

May

Thursday April 29–Saturday May 1
The Poetics of Healing
a series of programs with special guests
Petra Kuppers, Neil Marcus, Sadie Wilcox • Olimpias Artist Residency
curated by Eleni Stecopoulos

• Saturday May 1, BURNING workshop and performance
@ Subterranean Arthouse, 2179 Bancroft Way, Berkeley
• workshop 2:00–5:00 pm, $30
• performance 7:00 pm, $10
(no one turned away for lack of funds)

Thursday May 6
a reading and conversation with Richard O. Moore
• 3:30 pm @ the Poetry Center, HUM 512, SFSU, free

Thursday May 6
PRISON/CULTURE book launch and celebration
featuring contributors Jack Hirschman, Ericka Huggins, and Rigo 23

• 7:00 pm @ City Lights Bookstore
261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, free

co-sponsored with Intersection for the Arts, SFSU Gallery,
and City Lights Books

Saturday May 8
Richard O. Moore
reading and *rare* screening of two historic films featuring Robert Duncan
produced by Richard O. Moore for KQED, 1965 and 1973

• 7:30 pm @ the Unitarian Center, 1187 Franklin (at Geary), San Francisco, $5-10

Wednesday May 12
a reading by Charles Bernstein and Norman Fischer

• 7:30 pm @ the Unitarian Center
1187 Franklin @ Geary, San Francisco, $5-10

All programs free to SFSU students and Poetry Center Members
No one turned away for lack of funds

the Poetics of Healing: creative investigations in art, medicine, and somatic practice

project curated by ELENI STECOPOULOS
supported by the CREATIVE WORK FUND

Poetry heals the wounds inflicted by reason.

—Novalis

Supported by a two-year project grant from the Creative Work Fund, the Poetry Center presents throughout 2009–2010 a series of programs under the title The Poetics of Healing: creative investigations in art, medicine, and somatic practice. Curated by San Francisco poet and scholar Eleni Stecopoulos, the project brings together innovative writers, artists, and medical practitioners doing parallel work within altogether different traditions and practices.

Guest participants read, perform, and discuss their own work, talk with each other, and engage with audiences. Throughout the project, Eleni Stecopoulos is writing an original book on the subject (incorporating material by other participants and as arising out of the public forum) to be published late 2010 by Factory School.

An originating Spring 2008 program, guest curated by Eleni Stecopoulos for the Poetry Center, set the prototype for the project as a whole. Portions of our Spring 2009 program series were presented in collaboration with the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine Medical Humanities Initiative, the UCSF Osher Center for Integrative Medicine, and Meridian Gallery.

Programs in the series include:

Saturday March 15, 2008
Eric Greenleaf and Robert Kocik

Wednesday–Saturday March 12–14, 2009
Barbara Tedlock and Dennis Tedlock

Thursday & Friday April 9-10, 2009
Raúl Zurita, William Rowe and Nuri Gené-Cos

Friday May 8, 2009
Listening to Listening

Saturday May 9, 2009
a symposium on the Poetics of Healing

Monday-Thursday November 16-19, 2009
Morris Berman and Eleni Stecopoulos

Wednesday-Saturday March 3-6, 2010
Alphonso Lingis

Thursday April 29-Saturday May 1, 2010
Petra Kuppers, Neil Marcus and Sadie Wilcox

Under the heading The Poetics of Healing, our project seeks to cultivate an important dialogue that rarely happens across disciplinary borders; to highlight the role of poetic language, sound, and imagery in somatic practices, medical treatment, and patient experiences; to explore the therapeutic and somatic dimensions of poetry and other art; and to acknowledge and encourage a conversation that is already occurring among writers and in various academic medical humanities and healthcare fields, but has not yet been formally established as a field of artistic and intellectual inquiry.

With the recognition that poetry and medicine share the sense of engagement in a practice, or calling, and work within multiple historic traditions, we’ll highlight the progressive, experimental communities that have been conspicuously prominent in San Francisco in the arts and medicine.

Programs supported by San Francisco State University and College of Humanities, the Creative Work Fund, Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund, National Endowment for the Arts, the Fund for Poetry, and Friends of the Poetry Center.

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