Category: poetry

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Brazil, Censorship, Chico Buarque, music, poetry, Social Justice, translation

Who’s Your Troubadour? Fifty Years of Chico Buarque

More than fifty years ago, a young singer songwriter burst on to the exciting and boundary breaking music scene in Brazil, a country grappling with the legacy of cruelty, colonization, migration, and above all, enslavement. Burgeoning movements for racial and regional equality, along with student and feminist movements, workers, and small peasantry, found themselves clamouring for both more and just representation in Brazilian social, economic and … Continue reading Who’s Your Troubadour? Fifty Years of Chico Buarque

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Art, George Floyd, Henry Dumas, poetry, racism

Our Uncomfortable Dread: From George Floyd to Henry Dumas

It’s been 6 weeks since I have been on the blog. I have been watching the state of the world with eyes that want to look away, but can’t. It seems we are on a collision course with hopelessness and destruction, vaccine or no vaccine. Human rights are being violated and lives taken with impunity, due to governmental inaction (India, Brazil, Peru) and governmental action … Continue reading Our Uncomfortable Dread: From George Floyd to Henry Dumas

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Art, depression, national poetry month, poetry

Poetry for the Peeps! Adam Zagajewski

I’ve been away from the blog for nearly a month this time. I’ve been grappling with flares of chronic health issues and also been feeling somewhat disheartened by the announcement of a surge of covid-19 patients where I live, the increasing shuttering of small businesses, the business as usual approach of capitalist warlords, the rise of tent cities in the parks around me and an … Continue reading Poetry for the Peeps! Adam Zagajewski

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celebration, human rights, Indigenous people, Jamaica, language rights, Mexico, poetry

Poetry in a Thousand Tongues! International Mother Language Day

It is International Mother Tongue Day, today, the 21st of February. It’s an important day to celebrate because imperial monopolies of language (English, Spanish, Portuguese, French) have erased so many forms of communication and Indigenous and languages. Only this month, the Mexican government recognized 68 Indigenous languages as national languages alongside Spanish. This took over 500 years, to return official status to languages that existed … Continue reading Poetry in a Thousand Tongues! International Mother Language Day

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African liberation month, Georgina Herrera, poesia cubana, poetry, translation, women

Poetry for the Peeps! Georgina Herrera, Cuba

This is a continuation of my previous blogs in which I present my translations of the AfroCuban poet Georgina Herrera. I find her an amazing poet whose economy of language and simple words belies the deep and complex essence of her feelings and poetry. She balances a righteous anger with a hope for wholeness, with regard to both self and community. Her early life was … Continue reading Poetry for the Peeps! Georgina Herrera, Cuba

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Art, cats, Humour, poetry

Of Feral Cats and Cockroaches!

This week, I’ve been trying to get through the winter blues and the covid blahs by reading some humour. Over a hundred years ago, journalist and humorist Don Marquis created some of funniest free verse around. Wikipedia tells us: Marquis’s best-known creation was Archy, a fictional cockroach (developed as a character during 1916) who had been a free-verse poet in a previous life, and who supposedly left poems on … Continue reading Of Feral Cats and Cockroaches!

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Art, Colourful, poesia cubana, poetry

Poetry for the Peeps! AfroCuban Poetry in Translation

The following three poems are by the contemporary Afro-Cuban poet and scriptwriter, Georgina Herrera, who has graciously given permission to share and translate her work . Author of numerous collections of poetry and radio and television scripts. I have done the English translations you see below. I’ve included a biography from Wikipedia, to give you some idea of the achievements of this great poet, who … Continue reading Poetry for the Peeps! AfroCuban Poetry in Translation

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Art, music, poetry, winter

Solstice 2020

Today marks the shortest daylight in our hemisphere, and the arrival of winter’s official season. But as of tomorrow, the days will lengthen again imperceptibly, and for those of us who need the light, like morning glories or sunflowers, hope will gradually be born anew. Indigenous and pagan peoples celebrated and celebrate the energies and magic of this day when the darkness must be propitiated … Continue reading Solstice 2020

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Art, poetry

Citizen Heart

there have beenso many armiesso many hungersfood, land, water,the naming and naming of ourselves,chanting out in slogansthe red, brown, black of usthe “not-you” of us. there have beenso many citizensso many subjectskidnappings, rapesbuyings and sellings at auction blocks.since then ships and trains hurtling, planes gleamingso many travellerstrading home for outsidershiptrading belonging for hopethere have been so many. there have beenso many handssowing, tilling, building, diggingso … Continue reading Citizen Heart

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Art, haiku, poetry

The Wind Speaks Winter: Haiku

Once again, I joined in https://ronovanwrites.com , Ronovanwrites’ Haiku challenge based on the two words, “grace” and “slip”. I enjoy the exercise for my rusty brain. And for me, so much more enjoyable than writing essays! The Haiku form has been around for centuries. It’s very sparseness makes it alluring. It’s like the very distilled form of story telling. 90 proof! Salud! Wind Speaks Winter … Continue reading The Wind Speaks Winter: Haiku

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Art, Autumn, fall, poetry, Refugees

Poetry for the Peeps! Of Spiders and Refugees

Autumn is a time when spiders look for warm places to spin their webs and lay their egg sacs. I’ve always been terrified of large and hairy spiders but outside among the plants they design the most beautiful webs which catch the dew or frost of colder times. While, I’m not a fan of spider infestations, one or two small ones don’t terrify me. In … Continue reading Poetry for the Peeps! Of Spiders and Refugees

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Art, Disability, Fibromyalgia, haiku, Insomnia, poetry, reading

Late Night Haiku

Many people living with chronic illness, worry, and pain, experience insomnia. In fact, even children can experience it. It is a very insidious problem, and with the current state of affairs, I suspect that more people are staying awake than before. Paradoxically, even those with chronic fatigue or fibromyalgia, may be unable to sleep, although they feel exhausted. Sometimes, after exertion, whether cleaning or shopping … Continue reading Late Night Haiku

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Art, poetry

The Great Unknowing

I seek answers in the sky.Astronomy. The stars hang like freshly washed clothes.Around me cities writhe. Pandemics and empty promiseswritten in neon. When will they preen again? Can you imagine our lives now?Astronomy. Replicating the starsMalcom lived by, Billie sang by. Harriet led by.Stars made of the dust of a thousand footsteps. Astronomy. Replicating the starsthat John Carlos held in his fist.That Sandinistas, or Zapatistas, … Continue reading The Great Unknowing

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