Oakland
November 4, 2009
- This week my fave is Deisel Books in Oakland, because they are hosting my poetry performance on Sunday, November 8th, at 3 p.m. Independent bookstores are very brave to host poets and assorted non-John-Grishams in this economy!Please patronize your local independent bookstore. And my goddess, if you're in Oakland on Sunday, please do show up to whistle and coo. Drinks after? Reading is ...
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October 22, 2009
- This is from an August 7, 2008 entry from my blog, but I thought it would be appropriate for this week's blog topic, favorite places. I Miss Oakland. I Miss Me. It hit me when I was pulling into the parking lot at Peet’s Coffee to treat myself after surviving carpooling with three very sullen teenagers facing their second day of school. XM Radio’s “Suite 62” started to play Tony! ...
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October 17, 2009
- I'm excited about performing poems at Diesel Books in Oakland, 3 p.m., Sunday, November 8th. I'll see old friends and hope to meet some online friends--just as "real"--at the bookstore event. There must be a good bar nearby where we can toast each other's health and writing. It would be great to meet in person! The November 6th reading at the Art Institute of California in ...
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August 7, 2009
- For now, the Parkway’s dreams of reopening are deferred. This week news broke that Motion Picture Heritage Alliance, a Midwestern-based cinema company, moved their business elsewhere. It’s bad news for Oakland, and for Park Blvd. neighbors who wanted the boards on the storefront taken down. It appears then that the “Curious Case of Benjamin Button” poster will remain for the next ...
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July 17, 2009
- I'll be reading at Diesel's bookstore in Oakland on Sunday, November 8th at 2 p.m. I know it's a long way off. But I've started to look for hotels nearby. And to fantasize about meeting in person some of our Red Room pen pals. I was going to stay with my aunt in the Berkeley hills. But she passed away suddenly, to my family's great dismay.And now I'm rethinking the lodging. Does ...
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June 18, 2009
- For much of my married life, I lived in various areas of Oakland with my family. One year, we lived in the murder corridor, a box of death named thus in the mid-eighties, a place where most of the over 100 murders that year occurred. Other times, we lived in the hills or near hills, and one of those houses was off of Lincoln Avenue, a street that almost connects Highway 13 to 580. But ...
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June 17, 2009
- [Fruitvale BART station,Oakland CAJanuary 1, 2009]my country 'tis of theesweet land of libertyof thee I singdid you know before today a bullet fired in disdain,callous indifferenceinto a young father's backas he lies face down on harsh cementwill power through, race throughhis body pronebounce off the pavement coldand splash back into vital organslike the heart and spirit and soul,leaving ...
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June 4, 2009
- For a couple of years after I left my husband--leaving him in our home and living in my hometown--I resented the fact that he had gotten my hometown in the divorce. There he was, living in the place I grew up in, driving the streets I ran around on, shopping in the stores I used to shop in with my mother. My post office. My library. My gas station. My past, my memories.This resentment ...
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May 28, 2009
- ghost town redux Posted in Uncategorized on May 28th, 2009 Tags: art murmur, oakland Yesterday I met up with a friend at Mama Buzz Cafe, located on Telegraph and 23rd Streets in Oakland, the same block where the Oakland Art Murmur takes place. When I was thinking about how to frame the book’s introduction as a discussion of the current state of independent arts communities, it ...
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April 16, 2009
- Following the Oct. 17, 1989 San Francisco Bay Area earthquake, I started writing in rhyme—the stricter the form the better. That’s because I was scared, scared shitless and on behalf of my friends, neighbors and family, I wanted the world to come to order. “Settle down, world, settle down!” Fear was there big time, fear in all its glory. "Why not make a friend of fear? Why not make ...
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