CIENTO: 100 100-Word Love Poems Nominated For Northern California Book Award for Poetry! Lorna Dee Cervantes at Awards Ceremony TODAY!

I'll be at the Northern California Book Awards, 2012, ceremony TODAY at the San Francisco Main Library, Koret Hall, 1-4 pm! My book, CIENTO: 100 100-Word Love Poems has been nominated for an award for Best Book of Poetry! Michael Pollan will be accepting a Lifetime Achievement Award. One of my favorite poets, Jane Hirshfield is also nominated for an award for poetry; I don't expect to win.

Will I see you there?

_________________________________

31st Annual Northern California Book Awards

Sunday, June 10, 2012

1:00-2:30 pm: Awards Ceremony
readings & remarks by this year's award-winning authors

2:30-4:00 pm: Book Signing & Reception

San Francisco Main Library
Koret Auditorium, 100 Larkin, Civic Center, San Francisco
Reception follows in the Latino/Hispanic Meeting Room
Nominated books on sale by Readers Bookstore at the Main
Fred Cody Award presented by Jonah Raskin
Event emcee Sedge Thomson, "West Coast Live"

The Northern California Book Awards are presented by Northern California Book Reviewers, Poetry Flash, Center for the Art of Translation, Red Room (redroom.com), PEN West, Mechanics' Institute, San Francisco Public Library, Friends of the San Francisco Public Library, and Readers Bookstore at the Main.

For more information: Poetryflash.org, 510.525.5476, NCBR@poetryflash.org

FRED CODY AWARD FOR LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT
in COMMUNITY & LITERATURE
Michael Pollan, author, journalist, food activist & cultural critic

NCBR RECOGNITION AWARD
Everything Is Its Own Reward, An All Over Coffee Collection,
Paul Madonna, City Lights

FICTION
Sequoia Gardens, Ernest J. Finney, Southern Methodist University Press
A Wild Surge of Guilty Passion, Ron Hansen, Scribner
Turn of Mind, Alice LaPlante, Atlantic Monthly Press
Lola, California, Edie Meidav, Farrar, Straus and Giroux
We the Animals, Justin Torres, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

CREATIVE NONFICTION
A Journey with Two Maps: Becoming a Woman Poet, Eavan Boland, W. W. Norton
Everett Ruess: His Short Life, Mysterious Death, and Astonishing Afterlife, Philip L. Fradkin, University of California Press
The Left Coast: California on the Edge, Philip L. Fradkin, photos by Alex L. Fradkin, University of California Press
Rereading Women: Thirty Years of Exploring Our Literary Traditions, Sandra M. Gilbert, W.W. Norton
Maya Roads: One Woman's Journey Among the People of the Rainforest, Mary Jo McConahay, Chicago Review Press

GENERAL NONFICTION
Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System, Barry Eichengreen, Oxford University Press
To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918, Adam Hochschild, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
The Shah, Abbas Milani, Palgrave Macmillan
Natural History of San Francisco Bay, California Natural History Guides, Ariel Rubissow Okamoto and Kathleen M. Wong, University of California Press
Pacific Crucible: War at Sea in the Pacific, 1941-1942, Ian W. Toll, W. W. Norton

POETRY
Ciento: 100 100-Word Love Poems, Lorna Dee Cervantes, Wings Press
Come, Thief, Jane Hirshfield, Alfred A. Knopf
Sugar Zone, Mary Mackey, Marsh Hawk Press
When I Was a Poet, David Meltzer, City Lights
Thread, Michael Palmer, New Directions

TRANSLATION
Fiction
The Twelve Chairs, Ilya Ilf and Evgeny Petrov, translated by Anne O. Fisher, Northwestern
Tyrant Memory, Horacio Castellanos Moya, translated by Katherine Silver, New Directions
Poetry
After Many Autumns: A Collection of Chinese Buddhist Literature, editors John Gill and Susan Tidwell, translated by John Balcom, Buddha's Light Publishing
The Changing Room, by Zhai Yongming, translated by Andrea Lingenfelter, Zephyr Press
My Naked Brain: Selected Poems of Leopoldo María Panero, translated by Arturo Mantecón, Swan Scythe Press

CHILDREN'S LITERATURE
Young Adult
Instructions for a Broken Heart, Kim Culbertson, Sourcebooks
Why We Broke Up, Daniel Handler, illustrations by Maira Kalman, Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Clean, Amy Reed, Simon Pulse
Younger Readers
Seabird in the Forest, Joan Dunning, Boyd Mills Press
A Dazzling Display of Dogs, Betsy Franco, illustrations by Michael Wertz, Tricycle Press
Far from Shore: Chronicles of an Open Ocean Voyage, Sophie Webb, Houghton Mifflin Books for Children

CREATIVE WRITING WORKSHOP W/ Lorna Dee Cervantes at MALCS Conference, UCSB, July 18-20!

CFP: MALCS Creative Writing Workshop – ECOPOETICS: The Creative/Critical Response

June 6th, 2012 CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS

Chicana/Latina Studies: The Journal of Mujeres Activas en Letras y Cambio Social calls for participation in the Creative Writing Workshop with Lorna Dee Cervantes at the 2012 MALCS Summer Institute at University of California, Santa Barbara, July 18-21, 2012.
DEADLINE: Postmark June 15, 2012

WHAT: Creative Writing from inception to publication with former professor and Director of Creative Writing, Lorna Dee Cervantes!

ECOPOETICS: The Creative/Critical Response is a Xicana creative writing workshop designed to be open to all levels, from no experience to very experienced. Writers of all genres and persuasions are invited to attend as what we will cover may apply to all types of writing. Learn how to go from no poems to a full-length manuscript in two days. Bilingual (Spanish) writers welcome. Please bring copies of one poem or short prose piece for workshopping with the group along with whatever we generate in class. Besides workshopping we may even find time to do a bit of works hopping.

This intensive workshop will be divided into four distinct phases of the creative/critical process: GENERATION, SELECTION, Re-VISION, and CRITICAL EVALUATION. We will participate in exercises designed to match each phase of the process We should come away with at least 5 new poems and a sense of our own patterns and patterning, a new toolbox of techniques and methods, a new confidence and playfulness, a new sense of our own strengths and weaknesses as writers, and maybe even become acquainted with our own inner critic as well as become accustomed to the sound of our voice as well as our own individual "Voice" as "Scribe." We'll also cover the nuts and bolts of "Po'Biz" such as how to prepare and edit a manuscript for submission, how to find publishers, how to maintain the inspiration (breath) for sustaining a work or book over time. How to perform our work in "Real Time". How and when to detach ourselves from our work and voice. How to criticize another writer's work. How to discover and foster a community of feminist writers — maybe even how to support, start and develop our own publishing resources and performance venues.

This workshop respects all and expects such from participants. Expect diversity. Expect to learn how to pleasure yourself - so to speak. Expect work.

This Creative Writing Workshop follows the spirit and mission of MALCS; its expressed purpose is to identify and develop creative writers for publication in Chicana/Latina Studies. Participants bring their work-in-progress and read and comment on the material of the other writers before and during the workshop within the context of Chicana/Latina feminist values: humility, collaboration, community involvement and justice. Attending both two-hour sessions (the first on Weds. July 18, and the second on Friday July 20) is required.

(Lorna Dee Cervantes will also be available for private manuscript consultation. Send hardcopy of manuscript.)

One Creative Writing Workshop will be offered this summer:
1) ECOPOETICS: The Creative/Critical Response, A Creative Writing Workshop, facilitated by Lorna Dee Cervantes, former editor/publisher of MANGO & RED DIRT, former Associate Professor of English and Director of Creative Writing at CU Boulder.

WHEN: July 18 at 4:00-6:00 p.m. and July 20 at 8:00-10:00 a.m.
Participants may arrive on Tuesday, July 18, but must contact the Site Committee to arrange housing.

WHY: A rare opportunity to study with an award-winning and critically acclaimed Xicana poet, Lorna Dee Cervantes: publisher (Sandra Cisneros, Jimmy Santiago Baca, Alberto Rios, Victor Martinez, Sherman Alexie, Ray Gonzalez, Jose Antonio Burciaga, Luis Omar Salinas, ronnie burk, ...) and professor (Luis Alberto Urrea, Haas Mroue, Alan Gilbert, Simone Muench, Kristin Prevallet, Michael Robbins, Cody Todd, ....) with over 35 years of experience.

WHO: We encourage applications from writers at all levels, including tenured or mid-career professors.

HOW MANY: The workshop has space for 12 participants, who must register for the Summer Institute and be current MALCS members.

FINE PRINT: Acknowledge the labor of others.

HOW TO APPLY: ECOPOETICS: The Creative/Critical Response, A Creative Writing Workshop

DEADLINE: Postmark June 15, 2012.

WHERE: Postal mail documents to

Lorna Dee Cervantes
3181 Mission Street, PMB 16
San Francisco, CA 94110

WHAT TO SEND: Please submit a cover letter describing your experience as a writer, your contact information, and no more than 10 pages of creative writing, typed and double-spaced. Please identify all work-in-progress or published pieces. (Books welcome!)

Also send via email.

 EMAIL: Send the same materials in PDF to (LornaDeeCervantes) at (me) to the usual commercial suffix by June 15, 2012.

To register for the MALCS (Mujeres Activas en Letras y Cambio Social) Summer Institute 2012 "Todos Somos Arizona: Confronting the Attack On Difference" at UC Santa Barbara, July 18-21, go to www.malcs.org; early registration by June 15, 2012.

Where In The World Is Lorna? San Jose Community College TONIGHT 6:30

Join me TONIGHT, 6:30-8:30 pm. I'll be returning to where it all began: San Jose "City College" where I studied with Rose Higashi, Richard Regua, Mr. Gutierrez & others; where I performed with Teatro Conciente in a drama workshop with Adrian Vargas in Mexico in the summer of '74, where I read my poetry on stage between our 2 actos & was approached by Juan Bruce-Novoa from Yale (RIP), Nicolas Kanellos of Revista Chicano-Riqueña, now Arte Publico Press, publisher of my 2nd book, and an editor from El Excelsior where I saw my first published poem. I'll be reading from new & old work. I'll have copies of new book, CIENTO: 100 100-Word Love Poems. Find me on Facebook & join the event page. I hope to see you there! Poetry On!

Lorna Dee Cervantes, CSU-EB Distinguished Writer Reading TONIGHT, 4/16, Hayward & Pegasus Books, Berkeley, 4/18

I'm looking forward to seeing all you East & South Bay folk & friends TONIGHT, 7pm, at the library at Cal State East Bay, Hayward, where I'll be reading for their Distinguished Writers Series. FREE! Come and say "hello!"

I'll also be reading poetry in Berkeley on Wednesday, April 18, 7pm at Pegasus Books for their "Lyrics & Dirges" series . You know I write plenty of both.




I'll be reading from my new book, CIENTO: 100 100-Word Love Poems, and from a brand new book forthcoming from Wings Press, SUEÑO: 30-Something Of The Cruelest; poems I wrote in the month of April for NaPoWriMo, which is right now. So, where's your poem a day?

You can now order books from me online via PayPal at my email at mac.com which is my full name run together. I'll post an ad soon.

Poetry On! It's National Poetry Month!

Lorna Dee Cervantes TONIGHT UC Berkeley Featured Poet, Holloway Poetry Series, 315 Wheeler Hall, 6:30 pm!

TONIGHT! THURS, Jan 26, 6:30 pm, UC Berkeley Campus, Wheeler Hall, Maude Fife Room 315. FREE! Lorna Dee Cervantes will be the first Featured Poet for the Holloway Series in Poetry, reading with PhD student poet, Javier O. Huerta. (Look us up on Facebook!)

I hope to see you all there! Tell your friends! I'll have copies of my new book, CIENTO: 100 100-WORD LOVE POEMS and, if they arrive, copies of the collection of critical essays on my new work, STUNNED INTO BEING: Essays on the Poetry of Lorna Dee Cervantes which includes recent interviews. I'll be reading mostly new work tonight, including from a forthcoming new book of poems, "30-Something of the Cruelest."

My bio doesn't show up too well on this design, so here it is:

Lorna Dee Cervantes is an internationally acclaimed poet. Recipient of numerous awards, honors and fellowships including the Lila Wallace/Readers Digest Writers Award, 2 NEA Fellowship Grants, 2 Pushcart Prizes (another nominated this year) & "Best Book" awards for EMPLUMADA ('81), FROM THE CABLES OF GENOCIDE: POEMS ON LOVE AND HUNGER ('91), and the 5-volume DRIVE: THE FIRST QUARTET ('06) which was nominated for a Pulitzer, her new books are CIENTO: 100 100-WORD LOVE POEMS ('11), STUNNED INTO BEING: Essays On The Poetry of Lorna Dee Cervantes ('11), and the forthcoming SOMETHING OF THE CRUELEST.

A California native (Chicana-Chumash), born in The Mission, Lorna Dee Cervantes was the former Director of Creative Writing at CU- Boulder where she was a Professor of English for 19 years. This year's UC Regents Lecturer at Berkeley, she is home again in the Bay Area writing fiction, essays, poetry & screenplays. Visit her on her blog: http://lornadice.blogspot.com.

"More Than 100 Facts For The 99%"

More Than 100 Facts For the 99%




Ninety nine percent of all life forms
that have ever existed are now extinct.
99% of The Universe is plasma.

Ninety nine percent of all schools
have computers. 99% of all Shakespeare's
plays have been tapped out by virtual monkeys.

Ninety nine percent of all Santas are jolly,
merry and kind-hearted. 99% of all
lawyers give the rest a bad name.

Ninety nine percent of all felonies are settled
by plea bargaining. 99% of all problems
in communication start with misunderstandings.

Ninety nine percent of all marijuana
eradicated in the US is feral. 99% of all new
online businesses will fail.

Ninety nine percent of all tomato products
consumed in the US come from California.
99% of all river blindness is in Africa.

Ninety nine percent of all bandwidth
on the internet is devoted to child and animal
porn. 99% of Believers would take the gold.

Ninety nine percent of all migrant farmworkers
are members of an ethnic minority. 99% of all
turkeys raised in the US are Broadbreasted White.

Ninety nine percent of all family foundations
have assets under $100 million. 99% of all
human DNA is exactly alike.

Ninety nine percent of all law under
Capitalism has to do with property. 99%
of all profit is made by 1% on Wall Street.

Ninety nine percent of all puppies sold come
from puppy mills. 99% of all public schools
serve lunch from the National Lunch Program.

Ninety nine percent of all calcium in the body
is found in the teeth and bones. 99% of all
freshwater pearls are grown in China.

Ninety nine percent of all Oregon state prosecutions
involving non-violent protesters exercising their rights were
against them. 99% of all hazelnuts are grown in Oregon.

Ninety nine percent of all ghost pictures
can be explained away. 99% of all maternal
deaths occur in developing countries.

Ninety nine percent of all cats deliver
their kittens without assistance or complications.
99% of all US households have a television.

Ninety nine percent of all TVs sold in the US
come with remote controls. 99% of all promotions
are created because somebody has stock to sell.

Ninety nine percent of all land animals eaten
in the US are factory farmed. 99% of all gas consumed
in the US comes from the North American Continent.

Ninety nine percent of all snail species
have shells with whorls that coil clockwise.
99% of all successful businesses require teamwork.

Ninety nine percent of all businesses lose
25%-40% of their profits from mistakes. 99%
of all masturbation involves lust and fantasy.

Ninety nine percent of all virtual forces
affecting our life is invisible. 99% of all
beer cans are made out of aluminum.

Ninety nine percent of all book queries
to agents and editors are rejected. 99% of all
first books are not good enough to publish.

Ninety nine percent of all mass in the galaxy
is taken up by the sun. 99% of all the world's
land ice is in Greenland and Antarctica.

Ninety nine percent of all banking organizations
have assets in excess of $10 million. 99% of all
new jobs since 1990 have been in the service sector.

Ninety nine percent of all the billions
of ants on Earth are female. 99% of all
US prisoners on Death Row are male.

Ninety nine percent of all water on Earth
is ocean water. 99% of all life is invertebrate
and 99% of all invertebrates are extinct.

"Ninety nine percent of all failures come from
people who have a habit of making excuses,"
declared the inventor of the peanut. 99% of all diets fail.

Ninety nine percent of all things that most
of us worry about never actually occur. 99%
of all species that have ever existed are extinct.

Ninety nine percent of all living structures
are built from just 6 elements. 99% of all living
things live within a few thousand feet from the surface.

Ninety nine percent of all newspapers take
their own photos. 99% of all reading
takes place in the brain and not the eyes.

Ninety nine percent of all interactions between
bacteria and host are beneficial. 99% of all
"germs" are killed by hand sanitizer.

Ninety nine percent of all electricity generated
in the world is lost to resistance as it flows
from source to use. 99% of all TVs are unsold.

Ninety nine percent of all personal care products
contain 9,350 chemical compounds untested for safety.
99% of all abortions are performed prior to 20 weeks.

Ninety nine percent of all great inventions
weren't perfect the first time. 99% of all
plastic bags in the US are not being reused.

Ninety nine percent of all Americans listen
to the radio. 99% of all bottled water sold
in the US has only been filtered.

Ninety nine percent of all ingredients in consumer
products are inert or inactive, thus protected
by trade secret. 99% of all wills are uncontested.

Ninety nine percent of all plants still use
3 instead of 4 atoms of carbon for photosynthesis.
99% of all farm animals killed are birds and fish.

Ninety nine percent of all people trying
out for a role in TV, theater or film will not
get the job. 99% of all new businesses fail.

Ninety nine percent of all professional speakers
earn less than $1 million their entire career.
99% of all capital exists only as processor entries.

Ninety nine percent of all tobacco-related
deaths are caused by inhaling tobacco smoke.
99% of all cervical cancer is caused by a virus.

Ninety nine percent of all television sets owned
are in color. 99% of the people who produce,
write and direct for television are white males.

Ninety nine percent of all goods produced in
the world are trashed within six months. 99% of all
US businesses are small and create 75% net new jobs.

Ninety nine percent of all electricity in the world
is produced by running a wire through a magnetic
field. 99% of all baking is applying heat to starch.

Ninety nine percent of all fires on the planet
are lit by humans. 99% of all mothers' milk
contains detectable levels of DDT.

Ninety nine percent of all pesticide poisoning
deaths are caused by developing countries. 99%
of all adverse drug reactions are unreported.

Ninety nine percent of all eligible American
Indians registered to fight in WWII. 99% of all
privately owned hand guns are never used.

Ninety nine percent of all footwear sold in the US
is made by foreigners overseas from foreign goods.
99% of all transactions take less than a minute.

Ninety nine percent of all Medicare dollars
spent are linked to chronic illness. 99% of all
healthcare dollars are spent on illness, not prevention.

Ninety nine percent of all genetics
have been mapped. 99% of all wireless
calls rely upon fixed fiber optic lines.

Ninety nine percent of all US households
purchase milk. 99% of all uranium in the human
body will exit through the evacuation of fecal waste.

Ninety nine percent of all pumpkins
are sold for decoration. 99% of all
people talk to their dog or cat.

Ninety nine percent of all stars will end up
as a white dwarf. 99% of all human
history is a hunter-gathering way of life.

Ninety nine percent of all connections
are now done digitally. 99% of all active
genes in the body are not human.

Ninety nine percent of all problems
can be identified. You are 99% of the
problem If you are not 99% of a solution.

If ninety nine percent of the whole
can be equal to its part, than 99%
of us can be equal to any and all.



Lorna Dee Cervantes
11/29/11

Lorna Dee Cervantes Book Launch for CIENTO: 100 100-Word Love Poems in SF 10/27

"Between The Rapture And The Rose" (poem draft)

Between the Rapture And The Rose



Who can believe
between the rapture
and the rose? The road
winds through the brambles,
caramel and sudden, thrushed
and carbon, between the tweeting
and the caverns, between the ash
and the healing waves of rain.


Who can believe? Between
the rapture and the rose,
between the window and the summer
sun, between a child's winnowed
smile and the fallen leaves,
who can believe in the simple
science of you, your turning gyre?


Who does believe
threading their way through folly
and the falling? It's as easy
as the way rainbows slide
their magic, the way I am
into you, the startled starlings
settling home, the flush of bloom,
a filling room. Between the rapture
and the rose is a garden
and a blush.


The softening touch, so much
the sibilant rush, a sensuous
lush response. Something
like belief, like the rapt
heavenly way the earth smells:
the loam of loving you, the pebbled
path of pardon, leafing, like music
between the rapture and the rose.




Lorna Dee Cervantes
5-21-11

Lorna Dee Cervantes Reading at Stanford Floricanto TONIGHT With Stephen Cervantes, Casa Zapata, 8 pm

Floricanto

an evening of poetry, song, and dance

Featuring
Lorna Dee Cervantes


Steve Cervantes
Dreamer Monologues
Media Luna
Mariachi Cardenal

Casa Zapata Dining Hall - Stanford University

Friday, May 6th, 2011|8:00pm

delicious home-made desserts will served

Where In The World Is Lorna Dee? April 5-8th, UC Riverside, Loyola Marymount University, 34th Annual Hispanic Women's Conference

Spring Reading Schedule, April 5-8th, Los Angeles



Lorna Dee Cervantes

Tuesday, April 5, 2011
1:30–3 p.m.


Location: Arts Building 335
University of California, Riverside

Category: Reading
Description: One of the preeminent voices in Chicana literature and American poetry,
Lorna Dee Cervantes is a dynamic poet whose work draws tremendous power
from her struggles in the literary and political trenches. Her power is channeled
by a keen intellect and careful attention to craft, which allows her to explore the
boundaries between language and experience. Joy Harjo says of her poetry,
"Lorna Dee Cervantes is a daredevil... We are transfixed as she juggles rage,
cruelties, passion. There is no net. Seven generations uphold the trick of survival.No one is alone in this amazing act of love."

Cervantes' first book, Emplumada (University of Pittsburgh, 1981), was a
recipient of the American Book Award. Her second collection, From the Cables of
Genocide:Poems on Love and Hunger (Arte Público, 1991) was awarded the
Patterson Poetry Prize, the poetry prize of the Institute of Latin American
Writers, and the Latino Literature Award. Her most recent work, Drive: The First
Quartet, was published in 2006.

Sponsored by Chicano Student Programs, the Department of English, The Center for Ideas and Society, the College for Humanities, Arts, & Social Sciences, and MALCS de UCR.

For more information contact llasa001@ucr.edu

Open to: General Public
Admission: Free
Sponsor: English Department

Contact Information:
Lisette Lasater
x21456
llasa001@ucr.edu

___________________________________________________________________
Lecture: Lorna Dee Cervantes, Apr. 6


Lecture: Lorna Dee Cervantes

Date: Wednesday, April 6

Time: 4:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.

Description: Lecture

Location: Hannon Library, Von der Ahe Family Suite, 3rd floor
Loyola Marymount University
1 LMU Drive
Los Angeles, CA 90045

Admission: Admission and parking are free

Contact: Dr. Eliza Rodriquez y Gibson
Chicana/o Studies
erodri37@lmu.edu

More about this event:

Lorna Dee Cervantes will read and discuss her book, "The Poetry of Improbability: Art Activism & Beauty." Lorna Dee Cervantes is an internationally acclaimed poet.

Refreshments will be served.


________________________________
"Poetry Coffee House" with Lorna Dee Cervantes

34th Annual National Hispanic Women's Conference

Date: Friday, April 8

Time: 2 p.m. - 2:45 p.m.

Description: Poetry Reading & Workshop

Location: Salon 2, 1st Floor
Quiet Cannon
Montebello, CA

Contact: Tatiana Villanueva
Event Coordinator, Mexican American Opportunity Foundation
tvillanueva@maof.org

"Plans" (7-Minute Poem For NaPoWriMo)

Plans (7-Minute Poem For NaPoWriMo)



What plans do the dead make?
They wile away in their silver linings.
They don't speak, even when spoken to.
Who would believe they matter?
They, who are so sorry and sorrowed.

Fortune today, dust tomorrow.
How many furtive longings? How much
their weight in pennies? Their well-made
beds, waiting in the ether. Royalty
or poverty, the results are always the same

ash. Ash in the ice-tray of forgiveness.
Ash in the spiral galaxy of love. Ash in
the core drum. Ash falling down. Ash
becoming a sea after tsunami.
Wet coal in the lump of the heart.

What plans after the wake
and rush, the sudden hush?

Ask.



Lorna Dee Cervantes
4/3/11

"Galaxy" (7-Minute Poem For NaPoWriMo)

Galaxy (7-Minute Poem For NaPoWriMo)



Into your galaxy I fall
heartfirst, fear akimbo,
over and over the tumbling falls
of sensuous rivers inside me.

Take me to your forked places
where the tongue seeks refuge.
Take me into precious highways where
the macadam vanishes into layers of distance.

Lead me to your past, to your dream
sequences, to your black holes
of remembrance. I will mark the trail
with the breadcrumbs of knowledge.

This journey leaves only once. We
are the destination. Here in this sparkling
sea of sky, your shimmering eyes
weave a map of sighs, night whispers.

If I could feel you here: the slow swirl
of your ticking time, the windy whirl of
your breath panting above me, I would
be home, landed. I would plant my flag.



Lorna Dee Cervantes
4/2/11

"Ego" (7-Minute Poem For NaPoWriMo)

Ego (7-Minute Poem For NaPoWriMo)



Don't go. Refresh yourself.
Be a river through the mesquite
forest, a single tree of wind.

Don't stop. Rehearse your
becoming on a stage of dead leaves.
Take the shell. Speak the entire emptiness.

Don't fall. Sleep in time's shadow.
Be a whale, bask above the tidal
wave. Be frothy and wild. Fly up.

Don't let go. Hold fast
to anger for an instant, love
for as many miles as she takes you.

Don't live alone. Embrace
the wee lives between the boards,
the many mice in the mind's larder.

Don't laugh alone. Tell!
Tell apart the loaves of bread
from the fishes. Be vicious to your sadness.

Don't remind yourself of others,
of lazy ashes in your days, of the way
we live: pomegranates, a single rubied seed.





Lorna Dee Cervantes
4/1/11

Big Poetry Giveaway! Get Your Hot Books of Poetry Now! Celebrate National Poetry Month With FREE Books of Poetry!

I'll be participating in this year's BIG POETRY GIVEAWAY thanks to one of my favorite po-bloggers, Kelli Russell Agodon at "Book of Kells" (love that name!)

You can win one of my books of poetry along with another book by one of my favorite poets just by commenting below any time in the month of April, National Poetry Month. On May 1st I'll choose someone at random. I'm not yet sure which books. I'm tempted to choose based on who wins. I'll send both books to you absolutely FREE (my current favorite word.) ¡Órale! What do you have to lose but your shelf space?

Good way to give me a shout-out, too. I've missed you all as I've been shut-out of my blog for months until yesterday. But some of you know, I've been playing on Facebook all this time. Friend me there, while I still have about 20 friend spaces yet before reaching the limit. You can also "like" my fan page, and join my group, "I Took A Poetry Workshop With Lorna Dee Cervantes!" (Uh, anyone know how to post a "share" button for Facebook and Twitter on this page?)

"Angels And Saints" - Link To My Poem For ronnie burk (April 1, 1955-2003)

"Angels and Saints", Poem For ronnie burk

Click the link to read my poem for my friend, Chicano poet & artist, ronne burk, and read about ronnie. (You can also just search my blog for "ronnie burk" to pull up other posts about him. He was a big part of the reason for me starting this blog six years ago: to keep alive the dead. Isn't that the impetus for all poetry? ronnie might add: to keep the planet alive! Gracias, ronnie. You won't be forgotten.

"Angels and Saints" (for ronnie burk, 1955-03)

ronnie burk at MySpace


ANGELS AND SAINTS

for ronnie burk


Ronnie, they never knew you,
knew the volcano that was you
the Maui Zowie of your wizardry.
Ronnie, they never knew you,
knew the glue that was you
pasting it all together into a collage
of our shredded lives. They never knew
the fine art of you, the fire out
of you. You were the first outlaw.
You were the first out.
You were the first to get sick, the first
to heal us all with your words.
You were the first figure of the barrio.
You, the you they never knew,
what was slammed into the frame
of a not-nice picture. They never knew
the Tejano you, the hick wit you,
the sophisticated lit you, the grinning
through the bite of teeth you.
You were the first, ronnie,
to act out, to act up, to take
your heart into the streets.
You were at home here, ronnie, and
at Spirit with the voice of the sea.
You were a fathom too long,
a galaxy too far, a feeling
too close for the noose.
Ronnie, they never knew you,
knew the passion fruit nopal
that was your prickled heart,
never knew how they locked you
out on the balcony in your underwear
in the icy 'Bur'que night , and
left you there, a sleepless poet
before his first Floricanto. (Where
was la Unidad then, vatos?) Ronnie,
they never knew the real you. They knew
your loving but they never knew
your love. Ronnie, they never
knew you, the loco you, the brujo
you, the you you let loose in the crystal
madrugada. They never knew you.
But I knew you, ronnie. I know.
How well you did know
us then.




Lorna Dee Cervantes
6/26/08
San Francisco


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'm remembering ronnie this fifth year anniversary of the blog. Ronnie was the impetus for beginning it, for writing for and to and of The Dead, beginning with ronnie. I'm remembering ronnie, too, or rather, he comes to me when I need him, holding my hand as I once clasped his in my own, trying, somehow to pass my strength on to him, to keep him on the planet just a little while longer, just so I could keep hearing those marvelous things coming out of that beautiful head. He was as close to a "Soul Mate" I've ever experienced, my in lak ech, my other I. I saw my beauty in him. Please join me in remembering him this 7th year of his passing. Remember all the Billie Holliday songs you can think of, and sing them loud with us: heartfelt; that's the only way ronnie knew to do things, con ganas. Gracias, ronnie, for our interesection. It was an honor to publish your 1st book. 

You can read what I wrote then "The Dead Reux; Or, Remembering ronnie burk" You can also just search this blog for his name.

I'm staring out at the Pacific ocean he so loved, remembering him speaking of the ocean speaking to him once on a ship across Hawaii, how it called out to him for help, for salvation. He spoke of a lifeless swirling widening hole of dead sea that the ocean was showing him. "I'm dying," it said. That was decades before the scientists found a dead hole the size of Texas off the coast near Hawaii.

His advice to young poets: "Learn the mysteries of your ancestors. Go to the root, and you will be blown away at what you find."

"To feed the planet we'll probably all have to quit eating meat." ~ ronnie burk

"On Happiness"

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1251711/Every-dolphins-gone-surfin-Stunning-pictures-hundreds-glide-monster-waves.html


On Happiness



Dolphins taught the apes to speak
To take comfort in the wait for waves
To flow together in an arch of forgiveness
To pay attention to the past, past
Envy into the hilarity of a new revelation

Joy is the natural state, a constitution
Written with the rags of war, the pangs
Of indecision and a decisive dividing
On the plate. Bliss is the ride in, the free fall
All together now, singing in the element of birds.


Lorna Dee Cervantes
2/21/10

Latina/o Poets Celebrate San Francisco's New Poet Laureate, Diane di Prima, TONIGHT, 6 pm (7 reading) w/ Lorna Dee Cervantes & former SF Laureates

100-Word Love Poems to Strangers: Poems for Francisco X. Alarcon On His 20th Anniversary

100-Word Love Poem to Javier

for Francísco X. Alarcón



I was alone in shadows,
a thief in the shadows,
a regiment of one in
the shadow of you on
the night you appeared. You
grasped me from the shadows
like the migra grabs lives
out of the transatlantic water.
I am no longer drowning
in the shadow of you.
I am alive to your
shadow, to your flank and
file. I am no longer
groveling in anyone's shadow while
yours lies luxuriously in my
sun. I am enormous with
shadows until the sum of
your tongue. You lick up
the galaxies in my me,
my confidant, compañero de sí.



8-15-09
Lorna Dee Cervantes


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Luna: 100-Word Love Poem to Francísco

For Javier on the 20th Anniversary


All my life I have longed
to touch it, to place
my hands upon its face,
to look up into stars
and rise above it all.
I have longed to tell,
to moonquest and shadow envy,
to lay down in silver
glow, to expand into my
hands. I have touched earth.
I have handled the mud
and daub. I have waited
too long to become what
I am. Before your glow
I was no one at
all. I was a lone
supernova waiting for your comet
as an animal awaits in
the shadow of your eclipse—
Moonlove, longing for your face!




8/25/09
Lorna Dee Cervantes

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You, too, can get some love. Send $10 or more to:

Lorna Dee Cervantes
3181 Mission Street, #16
San Francisco, CA 94110

(or drop a check in the mailbox at 2983 24th Street, next to Precita Eyes Muralists Center, SF)

And I'll write you a love poem, to you or yours. Hey, I'll even write one to your little dog, right, Linda? Include your name, name of love, email, date, and what you'd like the poem to express. You can also add any images, phrases, thoughts, including words for the senses: touch, taste, sight, sound, smell; and even if there's any particular form you'd like. Or, you can just say, right me a poem however you want, as Francisco and Javier did. Be sure and include your mailing address so I can send you a hand-written copy of the poem on nice paper. Guaranteed to be valuable. And, don't be surprised if you and your poem get in the book, 100 LOVE POEMS TO STRANGERS.

Love,

Lorna Dee

LornaDeeCervantes at mac (you know what)

Michael Jackson: Defense Rests

This is a poem I wrote in May, 2005, right after Michael Jackson's acquittal and after a collage portrait of Michael Jackson by Rosie O'Donnell which is no longer available. I thought I'd post it here again. RIP. LDC
http://lornadice.blogspot.com/2005/05/michael-jackson-defense-rests-mixed.html

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael Jackson: 'defense rests' (a mixed media on wood, a 3x5 Portrait)

~~~~~(from a portrait by the artist, Rosie O'Donnell)



You, laid out like a crazy
pathwork quilt on a bordered bed, a number
stamped in the left-hand pocket: "to prison,
with love." They got yours
slapped on like brown pigment,
the stain of your famous face
in caricature, a caricature of Am I Blue,
Little Boy? Little bouy, (blue?)
bobbing in the photos, the snap
shot of you, a graffittied plaque against
the Real McCoy. Perpetrator
of a Love Supreme fractured
against the pawl. Against the pale
portraits of a king, recessed
in flame and flourish, hides a checker
board past flaring in the distance
between a father and his dancing
son.... Between the sheets, a child's love
lies. Between the press, the next morning,
of the palate knife, centuries aged,
some duotone of passion and burn, some law
writ in the land and heart, that forgiven
species. And health: the child. What lies
ahead?




c May 27, 2005 by Lorna Dee Cervantes
All rights reserved between consenting adults in the privacy of your own home.