Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Dog Ears Bookstore and Cafe 4th Friday Poetry Series


 


   


Curated by Fred Whitehead featuring Jennifer Campbell 
joined by several fine writers in Western New York. 

This was an evening at Dog Ears Bookstore and Cafe during The 4th Friday Poetry Series where Jennifer Campbell was the featured reader. To purchase her outstanding writing, listen to audio, and to review her books, visit Jennifer Campbell, HERE.




[Click each name to listen]


  

Please visit the bookstore, contact Fred about the series and check out Think Twice Radio below.

  


Thursday, March 19, 2015

above, below, beneath, behind, beside



Published on Poems and Poetry HERE 






above
below
beneath
behind
beside
me
your spirit resides


an eternal yearning
met in dreams
and moments
of existential
bliss


with you
there is no
thought


an inherent
knowing
that our spirits
have met
will meet
collide like atoms
in this universe
undiscovered
like lands yet birthed
before the age of man
before languages
were spoken
when nature existed
in her
utter
holy
glory


this is where we met
the wind whispering
through pine trees
the sun loving soil
the rain drenching valleys
when lightning was born
from a solitary
cloudburst


this is how we first met

above
below
beneath
behind
beside



© Susan Marie




Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Black and Tans [Jackdaw and The Ruffians]






Every St. Patrick's Day I put this out, a fine Celtic Rock Band, my dear brothers, all of them, in rare performance with The Ruffians. 

I recorded, engineered and edited/mixed this at one Irish Feis in South Buffalo managing so many boards I am shocked it turned out good. 



This includes the most mind-blowing version of "Black and Tans" with Danny from The Ruffians playing bones. 

Be safe, enjoy, and Slainte! 

Photo © N. Vargo in Ireland 
Audio © Susan Marie and Jackdaw

Monday, March 16, 2015

Earth's Daughters at Fourth Friday Reading Series at Dog Ears Bookstore



Published on WGRZ HERE

The editors of Earth's Daughters magazine (Kastle Brill, Jennifer Campbell, Joyce Kessel, Janna Willoughby-Lohr, and ryki zuckermanwill read from their work on Friday, March 27, at 7 pm in the Fourth Friday Reading Series at Dog Ears Bookstore, 688 Abbott Rd. South Buffalo. 

The series is hosted by Fred Whitehead.  Admission is $4. Long time sponsor, Bella Pizza, will provide pizza and beverages will be available.

Earth's Daughters is both name of the magazine, which has been publishing for 44 years, and the name of the collective, comprised of the editors, each of whom is an accomplished poet.  Earth's Daughters magazine is the longest continuously published feminist literary arts periodical in the US.  

Kastle Brill is a poet, memoirist, fiction writer, artist, and editor, who has two chapbooks: One Night Stands & Other Pieces of Time and The Head

Her poems have appeared in
  • White Pine Journal 
  • Black Mountain II Review 
  • Serendipityarts 
  • Poetry on the Bus 
  • Earth's Daughters 
  • Celebrating Western New York Poets 

Kastle has read as a feature with:
  • Joanne Kyger
  • NYSCA panel with Allen Ginsberg and Jim Carroll
  • Center for Inquiry
  • Daemen College Readings at the RIC
  • Just Buffalo
  • NYSCA
  • Artists Gallery
  • Niagara-Erie Writers
  • Ujima Theatre Company

She is also a retired environmental lawyer and an active and passionate tai chi teacher.

Jennifer Campbell is a Professor of English at Erie County Community College/North. In addition to Earth’s Daughters, she co-edits Beyond Bones.  Her first book of poetry, titled Driving Straight Through, was published by FootHills in 2008. In 2013, Saddle Road Press published her collection, Supposed to Love.  

Her work appears in: 
  • Saranac Review
  • Fugue
  • The Pedestal
  • New Millennium Writings 
  • Eclipse
  • Slipstream
  • Slant
  • Sow’s Ear
  • CHEST

She has been the featured reader at:
  • Center For Inquiry
  • Empire State College Appletree Series
  • Screening Room
  • Burchfield-Penney Sunday Reading Series
  • Daemen College Readings at the RIC series
  • BuffaloEast

She is the co-curator of the  Center for Inquiry Literary Cafe Series.

Joyce Kessel teaches literature, writing, and interdisciplinary courses at Villa Maria College.  Her chapbook, Describing the Dark, was published in 2013 in the Forty-Three North Chapbook Series from Saddle Road Press. Classroom Quiche (Writer's Den) is due 2015.  

Her poems have appeared: 
  • Celebrating Western New York Poets
  • Waging Words for Peace 
  • A Touch of Saccharine 
  • Point Mass 
  • Backlit Barbie 

Her work has also appeared: 
  • WNY Metro buses through Swift Kick
  • Black Mountain II Review
  • Pure Light
  • Earth’s Daughters
  • A Room of Our Own

She has read at Hilbert College, ECC City Campus, and Empire State College at Appletree, and the CFI.

Janna Willoughby-Lohr was awarded the "Best Spoken Word Artist" title in the Artvoice Best of Buffalo Awards 2010. 

Since graduating from Warren Wilson College, she has been performing poetry and music. She was a Grand Slam finalist in 2005-2008 for the Nickel City Poetry Slam, and a member of the 2006 Nickel City Slam team at the National Poetry Slam. She performs with her band, The BloodThirsty Vegans, "a lively mix of energetic hip-hop, rock, funk, Ska, and blues, topped off with socially-conscious, positive lyrics." 

She has read her poetry at: 
  • Impact Gallery (new/reN.E.W. series)
  • Artpark (Buffalo Society of Artists International Poetry Reading)
  • Wordflight Series
  • Poetry at the Woodlawn Diner
  • Infringement Festival
  • Burchfield-Penney Sunday Reading Series
  • thinktwiceradio

She currently works as a graphic designer for Bodycandy.com.

ryki zuckerman is a poet, editor, teacher, and artist who is the author of the full-length volume, Looking for Bora Bora (Saddle Road Press, 2013), and also the chapbook, body of the work (Textile Bridge Press). She has a forthcoming volume, The Nothing That Is, from Benevolent Bird Press (2015).

Her poems have appeared in :

  • Black Mountain College II Review
  • Slipstream
  • Steel Bellow
  • Swift Kick
  • Lips
  • Escarpments
  • Paunch
  • The Other Herald
  • Pure Light
  • Buffalo News
  • Artvoice
  • poetrysuperhighway
  • Moondance
  • A Celebration of Western New York Poets 
  • Brigid's Fire
  • Mo' Joe anthology
  • Broadsides for Serendipity Arts 
  • Tea Leaves Collection.

She has been a featured reader at:
  • Empire State College Appletree Series
  • Daemen College Readings at the RIC
  • Center for Inquiry
  • The Woodlawn Diner Poetry and Dinner Series
  • Brighton Library "Art All Over the Place" Buffalo State's Rooftop Series
  • Tru-Teas Series
  • Raiders of Niagara Reading Series
  • The Screening Room
  • Artspace Annual Poetry Reading
  • Buffalo Society of Artists International Poetry Reading at Artpark
  • WNED-TV
  • WBFO-FM
  • WHLD-AM (AudibleInk Radio)
  • thinktwiceradio

In 2009, ryki was a featured reader for the Poetry Collection of the University of Buffalo at the Butler Mansion. She created, curates, and hosts two series: the Wordflight at Red Doors Series and, for Earth's Daughters, the Gray Hair Series.




Sunday, March 8, 2015

i am spirit









i am
universe


spirit

a thoroughbred on fire

Vesuvius exploding
millenniums
of age old stories
told by firelight


dancing flames of mouths of ancestors
ring in my
external auditory meatus
creating intense magnetic fields
between both palms
placed upon ears


a circuit to free my thinking brain
from onslaught of
data,
technology
information
fear
love
death
hate
and all that exists


in divine ugliness and beauty

this universe encompasses
all that is, was, will be
and I, human, here and now


am spirit

i am spirit, i say
and stand and scream
opening my lungs to this most holy sky
and it blazed like photogenic supernovas
across my inner eyelids
closed, sleeping, awake
my still small hands shake
beneath starry skies in eve


for i am spirit
in this shell
on this Earth,
existing in a Universe


as human.


© Susan Marie

Friday, February 20, 2015

Spontaneous Conversation: Soul Family, Universal Truths, Mystical Perspectives



This is so divine and precious. 

Also, on my radio show on Think Twice Radio 

This is NOT the Apple 

and below. 

 



Myself [Sue Marie, [This is Not the Apple] and Joel Lesses [Unraveling Religion] both radio producers at ThinkTwiceRadio, discuss various perspectives in spontaneous conversation at Our Lady of Victory Basilica & National Shrine.

The conversation focuses on soul family, spirit bonds, mystical perspectives, universal truths, the soul with two faces, rebirth, archetypes, psychology, medicine, holistic arts, ego vs self, trusting in the process, and poetry. 


The intro track © Deva Premal and Miten is from the CD "The Essence", and the track is "Gayatri Mantra" [the world’s oldest mantra, known for purification and healing.] The bells at the end are going off seven times at the national shrine. 


The question remains: Without Soul Family, What Is Life? 




Sunday, February 15, 2015

Journey To Nepal


                 Published on KingSpring.Org 







Joel will be volunteering with and for --> http://www.tevelbtzedek.org - an organization that focuses on impoverished communities in Nepal, Haiti and Burundi, to enhance and advance the livelihood, capacity, and well-being of their members.


He is a poet, listener, counselor and a person who values exploration and evolution above all things and thanks everyone deeply for your consideration of his efforts.



Joel is a dear soul, brother, and friend I have been blessed to know personally for years. I support him wholeheartedly on his journey and dream. Nepal is an important place for me and I wish him wellness, peace, inspiration, enlightenment and education.  I am so proud of him and will do whatever is in my power to get him there to assist in the education of human rights and empowerment for those who live differently than most of us. 



Please do your part, if able, and give, share, give, share! 

I thank you from the depths of my own heart. 

Peace, 

Sue

This is Joel. 
Angels on your shoulders.




Thursday, February 12, 2015

soulscreaming




Please, never stop creating poetry, he said to me.

And I replied:

for all eternity
i shall attempt to describe
in words
how our kiss
hides
between the thin line
where the sunset burrows
beside the sea

awaiting to rise
yet again
in love for the dawn
when she drags her belly
pregnant and full
across the purpling morningtide

a kaleidoscope of colors
yet to be seen
by the human eye
colors that exist
within your spirit
the iris
the corners of your smile

this is our kiss
eternal scripture

mere words
can never come close
to that divinity

yet i shall try
to write about that thin line
where the sunset burrows

beside the sea




 Words & Photo ©  Susan Marie

Wednesday, February 11, 2015

A Peaceful Pakistan, Pakistan For All [Children's Art Submissions]




Pakistan for All is proud to present a visual arts campaign for peace led by children.

We are asking children to show us the light and the way to 


'A Peaceful Pakistan, A Pakistan for All'

Please encourage your children to participate.

For details please contact ilmana_fasih@hotmail.com





Sunday, February 1, 2015

i am gasoline


Published on Poems and Poetry 








reassemble
my
thought
with visions and goals
dreams and ideals
a sustainable life

something more
than this
current
societal
existence

rejuvenate
my
body
arms
splayed

outstretched
before you
your feast
my mouth
your escape
my holy altar
your salvation

regenerate
my
blood
so that it
brings me
sweet breath
open your mouth wide,
dear


allow it to flow
into your own
be a shining white beacon 
of hope
be all of this and more
for me, you, us

this most divine union
of souls
is meant
to change

everything 


let us rejoice
and bring them all
back home
to the land
the silt
the rich green grass
emerald
the climbing vines
and meadows
the cool deep streams
and the air we breathe


oh, so pure
the ether

let us bring it all
together
again

let us set fire to the sky
awaken oceans
raging, angry


let us call thunder
alerting the Earth
to shiver and quake
like my thighs
alabaster
like your deep rich eyes
boring down upon me now
like the volcanic rumbling
of every tired human voice


let us torch ourselves
this world must be reborn

i am gasoline
and you are my match

let us awaken the angels
so their choirs are heard
in all worlds
divine

like when we first met
a hazy rendition
of tidal waves
and dolphins dancing

ecstatic



© Susan Marie 
Artwork © Mark Reginald