Some Gertrude Stein To Celebrate National Poetry Month

Listen to this recording of our Lesbian Icon Gertrude Stein reading her poem, "If I Had Told Him: A Completed Portrait of Picasso"




The work really struck me as so brave - and so like Picasso in it being an almost cubistic portrait in words.

You can learn more about Gertrude Stein and her love, Alice B. Toklas, here.

Here's to the power of poetry!
Enjoy,

Lee

Green Eggs And Ham, A Jazz Poetry Performance by Martha Graham Cracker

Some of my favorite poetry is Dr. Seuss.

So when I read in this Huffington Post article that a drag performer had been

invited to read a children's book to a New Jersey after-school kids program -- and then disinvited for being an "inappropriate" choice --

and then was invited instead by Philadelphia's Christ Church Neighborhood House to read Dr. Seuss's classic "Green Eggs and Ham" in front of an enthusiastic and appreciative crowd of children, I had to see it.

It's quite marvelous, and a wonderful way to continue celebrating National Poetry Month.

And so I give you...

Dr. Seuss. A Cabaret Drag Legend. Squalling Children. And An Inspired Jazz Reading...



Enjoy!
Lee

Shane Koyczan's To This Day Project: A Poem (and Animation) About Name Calling

This is remarkable, and reminds me of the power of Poetry:




You can find out more about Shane and the To This Day Project here.

Namaste,
Lee


ps - My thanks to Kris for sharing it with me, so I could share it with all of you.

Federico García Lorca: Poetry and Wisdom

“To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves.”

― Federico García Lorca, Blood Wedding and Yerma

I found this quote and the photo of the great Spanish poet Lorca as part of this LGBT History Month archive.

Badger Clark's Gay Cowboy Poem "The Lost Pardner"

The Lost Pardner

We loved each other in the way men do
And never spoke about it, Al and me,
But we both knowed, and knowin' it so true
Was more than any woman's kiss could be...

...The range is empty and the trails are blind,
And I don't seem but half myself today.
I wait to hear him ridin' up behind
And feel his knee rub mine the good old way.

-from 'Sun and Saddle Leather,' by Badger Clark

Badger Clark was the first Poet Laureate of South Dakota (in 1937) and was famous for his cowboy poetry.  I found this Library of Congress photo and this poem in this great Huffington Post article, "Gay American History: The Country's Gay Secrets"

Domicilium - A Poem by Gay Poet Steven Reigns Is Set To Music and Performed by the One Voice Charlotte Choir

Let's start off this month's USA celebration of poetry with our own celebration of LGBTQ poetry!



Here is the poem they're singing...


Domicilium
by Steven Reigns

We’ve been building a table
instead of waiting
for an invitation
to eat at yours.

We’ve been loving
and committing
and creating ceremonies
without needing your permission.

We’ve been talking
without raising our hand to speak.

We’ve been writing
not needing your ink

We’ve been singing
asking for no notes.

We’re building,
not a fortress
but a home.
Where we can be who we are,
love who we love,
and invite you in for a meal.


Steven writes...

The original title for this poem was Domicile. It’s one of the most anthemic poems I’ve ever written. I believe in legal gay marriage but I also believe in gay people not waiting for permission to live the lives we want to live. In this poem, I wanted to dignify all of the glbtq people who have built a community and home for themselves when most forces were saying they couldn’t. It was a great honor to have this poem put to music and performed.

Thanks, Steven!

You can find out more about Steven at his website here.

And to all, no matter where you are in the world, Happy Poetry Month!

Lee

Celebrating National Poetry Month: Jan Steckel's new book of poetry

Jan Steckel has a new book of poetry out, The Horizontal Poet. Published by Zeitgeist Press and nominated for a Lambda Literary Award, Jan says "It has poems in it about loving women and about loving men." My thanks to Jan for letting me share this poem from the book with you!

Pretending

My step-grandfather’s grandson
danced with my cousin at a Bar Mitzvah.
He held her too close and murmured
“We’re not really cousins, not by blood.”
“Let’s pretend we are,” she said,
inserting her elbow between them.

I’d been working for gay rights for years
before I worked up the nerve
to ask my grandmother to take me to the Castro.

“Where are you going?”
my step-grandfather called from the recliner.
“To Castro Street, dear.”
“What do you want to go THERE for?”
“To see fairies, dear,” trilled my grandmother,
and skipped out the door.

Her feet were so long,
she had to descend the basement stairs sideways.
Her shoulders were wide, her hips narrow.
She could pitch a baseball like a man,
had taught my father how to throw.

Her Mercedes launched like a torpedo
from the underground garage.

When we reached the Castro,
manly beauty sizzled. We held hands
to protect ourselves from glorious torsos,
spreading of feathers, the sheer display
of pierced and tattooed flesh
preening that day on the summer street.

I wondered if we looked like lesbians:
a baby dyke and her still-beautiful sugar-mama.

I pretended we were.

"Pretending" first appeared in Lavender Review.

Celebrate Nation Poetry Month with GLBTQ Poems... by our Gender Queer Friend, Lucy! And a Queer Poetry Roundup!

So if you've been following our video series Gender 101, you're familiar with Lucy (also known as Benji, pictured above.) In honor of National Poetry month, ze's kindly agreed to share two poems with me so I could share them with you.

So today, instead of a video discussion with Benji, we have some poetry written by Benji:

The Law of Conservation of Emotion

I am an artist, right?

I write these things and they are art

I have decreed that they be art, and so they shall stay


I swipe the beauty of the October leaves, not given to me

or made by me, and this too becomes art

I take the images dispersed in my brain, originally

chemicals in my veins, and I become a genius

I have never created new matter. Nature

was inspired, and created those leaves, and I take their

dying and create something new, and you take this paper

and continue the assembly line

Perhaps the beauty I absorb today will end up in a farm

in Iowa. Perchance the sadness I diffuse will be one

step in the funeral march of my great-granddaughter.


Yet there’s this passion for redirecting the route of emotions

leaving one's mark on them. That is my art.

and

Literate

I hereby enter the ranks of writers

too important for mere paper

who scrawl lines more important than literature

on the bathroom stalls

we are all nameless, except those initials bordered by hearts

set free to be

-Anonymous

We state our right-or-wrong ideas

for all to judge

but will never hear the criticism

of those not bold enough

to add their own rebuttals

and enter our ranks

our ‘meeting of the minds’

Thanks, Lucy!


And because the month has flown by and we haven't gotten to as much new GLBTQ Teen poetry as I'd planned, here are links to some of my favorite queer poems. Enjoy!





Sappho! Lesbian Poet of Ancient Fame


Rumi -

My Blog's very first "Great Queer Poem"

and

Three More Amazing poems by Rumi

and

More "essential" Rumi!





Quentin Crisp's World War Two Gay Experiences in London: Poetry where you don't expect it!





I Love Gay Poetry! Walt Whitman's "We Two boys Together Clinging" From Calamus

and

Celebrate Gay Poetry! Walt Whitman's "Calamus"

and

Walt Whitman Uncensored! His early Gay experience and the Poem through which it sang through him: "Once I pass'd Through A Populous City"




SHAKESPEARE: The Bisexual Poet and his Two Loves!



Celebrate Gay Poetry! Dennis Cooper's "James Kelly"



Poems can be Laser-like, cutting to the core: Kahlil Gibran's "The Prophet"




Celebrate Ancient Epic Gay Poetry! Homer's "The Iliad"




GAY POETRY IS ALIVE! Steven Reigns' "Joe!"

and his poem "Inheritance"




Lord Byron's Love Poems to John Edleston




Muhammed Shams ud-din Hafiz, Drunk with Pleasure



And some more:

A Gay Joke for National Poetry Month



Celebrate Gay Poetry! Robert Friend's "Shirts"


A Gay Pocahontas? A Beautiful Native American Man IS a Poem in Theodore Winthrop's "John Brent!"


CELEBRATING YOUR POEMS! "For Him, Disappearing Before Dawn" by j.e. robinson


YOUR favorite Queer Poems: Mark Doty's "TIARA" and CP Cavafy's "THE GOD ABANDONS ANTONY"


Maurice Kenny (Mohawk)'s Poem on the role of Gay men in Native American tribal life and history.


Celebrate Bisexual Poetry! Rumi's "The King and The Handmaiden and The Doctor"


Celebrate Lesbian Poetry! Paula Gunn Allen's "Some Like Indians Endure"


Jacqueline Lapidus' breath-taking Lesbian poem, "Athens"


Celebrate Transgender Poetry! Aaron Shurin's "Woman on Fire"

Gloria Anzaldúa's "La Prieta" - A Bisexual Poem that blew me away!


Lesbian Teen Poetry: Sarah Laurenson's "First Love" and "How Bare My Soul" - Poetry Across Time

Transgender Poetry 2010: Alex Davis is "Man of The Year"

And of course, some Langston Hughes.

So much queer poetry to celebrate!


Namaste,
Lee

Celebrate National Poetry Month with GLBTQ Poetry: Jan Steckel's INTERSECTION

It's April, and once again that means celebrating GLBTQ poetry - though this month I'll just be popping them in throughout the month rather than doing a solid week. Today's celebration contribution is by Jan Steckel:

Intersection

When I help a woman on with her jacket,
my sexuality grabs my gender identity
and waltzes it around the room.

I’m a woman, but there’s a man in me.
He’s a bit of a fop, sort of a pansy.
He might be a fag.

Why shouldn’t everything about me be fluid?
I’m a squishy skin-bag of water and salt,
ocean inside and out.

As a child, I was sure I was a boy.
The heroes of all the best books were boys.
I pretty much lived in my head, what I read.

Now I feel more like a woman –
except around straight women.
Then I feel like a butch lunk.

My husband thinks I’m a femme
because I wear lavender, (color and scent),
and ask him to open jars.

All roads meet in me:
butch when I wake up,
femme at lunch.

Androgynous at dinner,
totally trans all night .
Can I get that door for you?


Jan Steckel, 2010

Jan writes "My story Mixing Tracks (Gertrude Press, 2009) won the Gertrude Press fiction chapbook award for LGBT writers. My chapbook The Underwater Hospital (Zeitgeist Press, 2006) won a Rainbow Award for lesbian and bisexual poetry. My writing has appeared in Scholastic Magazine, Yale Medicine, Bellevue Literary Review, and elsewhere." Jan's website is here.


I was really happy when Jan shared this poem with me and agreed to let me share it with all of you. I thought this poem was a great match with our exploration of Gender in the new video series GENDER 101!


Be sure to check out these great kid lit celebrations of poetry, (My thanks to Irene Latham for spreading word about them):

Greg Pincus' amazing 30 poets 30 days (An annual event feature poetry by some AMAZING poets!)

Susan Taylor Brown will post Lessons Learned (Mostly About Me) in a Poem-a-Day at http://susanwrites.livejournal.com

April Halprin Wayland will be writing and posting an original poem a day during April.
http://www.aprilwayland.com/poetry/blog

Liz Garton Scanlon will give us her third year of a Haiku-a-Day every day in April!
http://liz-scanlon.livejournal.com/

Jone MacCulloch will post 30 Days-30 Students: A poem a day from students http://maclibrary.wordpress.com

A Poem A Day: A Personal Journey http://doewriter.wordpress.com

Poetry Postcard Project: Have a student written and decorated poem sent to your
home. Email her at macrush53 @yahoo. com.

Jama Rattigan will present her 2nd Annual Poetry Potluck (original poem and favorite recipe by guest bloggers) at http://jamarattigan.livejournal.com

Irene Latham will host a month-long Poetry Party: poetry quotes, trivia, craft tips, publishing resources & free books! http://irenelatham.blogspot.com

Andromeda Jazmon will be doing her fourth year in a row of haiga (original haiku + my photos) at A Wrung Sponge http://awrungsponge.blogspot.com.

Janelle at Brimful Curiosities will host a National Poetry Month Kids Poetry Challenge in which kids are invited to create pictures for the poems she posts each Friday. For details: http://www.brimfulcuriosities.com/2011/03/kids-poetry-challenge-national-poetry.html

Biblio File will be featuring a poem or review of a novel-in-verse every day in
April. www.jenrothschild.com

Anastasia Suen has set up a blog and a Twitter account for students (of all ages) to write
Haiku (about what they leaned at school that day).

Blog: http://eduhaiku.wordpress.com/
Twitter http://twitter.com/EduHaiku

Tricia Stohr-Hunt will host a Poetry in the Classroom series, which will highlight a topic, theme, poet, or book and talk about uses in the classroom. http://missrumphiuseffect.blogspot.com

Stasia Kehoe will be including poetry links, a giveaway of signed arc of debut YA verse novel AUDITION and reviews every Thursday of verse novels. www.swardkehoe.blogspot.com

The Poem Farm will introduce a different poem idea-strategy or poetic technique for children and teachers every day. Each idea-strategy/technique will be followed by links to a few poems from this past year. The blog will also feature poem sharing ideas through "Poetry Peeks" into classrooms. http://poemfarm.blogspot.com/

Mary Lee Hahn will be writing a poem a day again this year, and posting them at A Year of Reading. http://readingyear.blogspot.com/


If you're doing a celebration of kid lit and poetry at your blog/website, feel free to add it here in comments!

You should also check out the weekly Poetry Friday celebrations here:

National Poetry Month Poetry Friday schedule:
April 8 http://www.madiganreads.com/
April 15 http://randomnoodling.blogspot.com/
April 22 http://bookaunt.blogspot.com/
April 29 http://www.tabathayeatts.blogspot.com/


Namaste, and enjoy!

Lee

Steven Reigns Shares A Poem From His New Book, "Inheritance." Our GLBTQ Teen Poetry Celebration Finale!

Steven Reigns

Steven is a poet and a friend. I'm so excited that he's letting me share this poem with you!

6 T H D A T E

We sat on his couch, facing each other,

backs against armrests,

feet intertwined.

He told me he wanted to teach me Spanish pronunciations,

asked me to repeat after him.

I attempted to mimic his words like a parrot to its owner,

struggled with the rolling “R’s”.

The foreign words spilled clumsily from my mouth.

He suggested he name off animals

and I was to guess which one.

He changed the lesson plan.

My feathers ruffled as I assumed

it was because I wasn’t good.

He gave words for

cows,

penguins,

dogs, and

doves.

I was surprisingly good at assessing

and assuming translations.

But those weren’t the words

I wanted to know from him.

I wanted to ask about

trust,

attraction,

the meaning of our feet touching,

and most of all, I wanted

to know our future.

Steven's New Book of Poems:

Thanks for joining me for 7 days of amazing GLBTQ poetry by and for teens - it's been a great way to kick off National Poetry Month, and I hope it has inspired you, too.

So what are you waiting for? Go write (and read) some more great poetry!

Namaste,
Lee

Transgender Poetry 2010: Alex Davis is "Man of The Year"

Alex Davis

I met Alex, a heterosexual transman (female to male transgender man), last year and saw him perform this.

"Man of the Year" blew me away - it's poetry, it's a song, it's an anthem.

My thanks to Alex for allowing me to share it with all of you:

Man of the Year

When the fires hit the brush
Every sound became a hush
Making my way through the eye of a crowd
Finding myself lying down staring up at the sky
Breathing in all the light

I saw faces in the glow
Good people I used to know
When you glance at me and I look away
You remind me of a hell I won’t pay anymore
So, Crown me

The Man of the Year
Man of the Year
Man of the Year
I’ve never been happy, I’ve never been happier here

See the body I call home
Hear the voice I have sown
Tired of sleeping in hotels hard with hate
At the palace now I watch as the gate swings open
To Welcome

The Man of the Year
Man of the Year
Man of the Year
I’ve never been happy, I’ve never been happier here

Walking hands on the asphalt
Bare-chested in sea salt
Maybe not the guy you’d expect to see
Just the guy that I’ve been dying to be all my life
Thank you

Man of the Year
Man of the Year
Man of the Year
I’ve never been happy, I’ve never been happier here
(happier here) (happier here)
I've never been happier here
(happier here)
I've never been happier here

Langston Hughes kicks off our Tribute To Queer (GLBTQ) Teen Poetry! Just one offering in a whole Kidlitosphere of Poetry Celebrations!

I swear to the Lord
I still can't see
Why Democracy means
Everybody but me.

- Langston Hughes*

Langston Hughes

To Celebrate National Poetry Month here in the U.S.A., I'll be sharing 7 days of poems by and for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Questioning Teens.

And there are lots of other great celebrations of poetry across the world of Children's Literature Bloggers (the Kidlitosphere.)

Here are some I'm really excited about:

Greg Pincus of GottaBook is running his second annual "30 Poets 30 Days" Celebration, with original poems never before seen from luminaries like George Ella Lyon, Walter Dean Myers, Jacqueline Woodson, and Greg himself. It should be amazing.

Tricia Stohr-Hunt of The Miss Rumphius Effect will run a new season of her "Poetry Makers" feature, where she'll be interviewing 30 Children's poets (starting off with Mary Ann Hoberman, Children's Poet Laureate, U.S.A.!)

There's even a Write-An-Original-Poem-A-Day Challenge (dreamed up by Irene Latham) where a bunch of bloggers are not only going write an original poem a day for every day of April, but they'll be posting them on their blogs! Check out the poetry of Susan Taylor Brown, Mary Lee Hahn, Andromeda Jazmon, Irene Latham, Jone MacCulloch, Elizabeth Moore and April Halprin Wayland.

There's celebrations of Poems about Teaching, a Poetry book give-away, a Poetry Potluck (original poems matched with recipes), a game of Poetry Tag (refereed by Sylvia Vardell, and with players like Joyce Sidman and Lee Bennet Hopkins), and even a student poetry postcard project with an accompanying post of new student poem every day.

So enjoy, and who knows? Maybe you'll be inspired to write a poem or two - or 30 - yourself!

Namaste,
Lee


*This amazing poem is featured on pg. 3 of "Claudette Colvin: Twice toward Justice" by Phillip Hoose (the true story of a Black teenage girl, who nine months before Rosa Parks, refused to give up her seat to a white woman on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama. But instead of becoming a rallying figure, Claudette was shunned as a bad role model by many within her own community. Undaunted, a year later she again risked her life as one of four plaintiffs in the landmark busing case Browder v. Gayle.) This book won a 2010 Newbery Medal Honor as one of the 5 best children's novels of 2009, and was the winner of the National Book Award for Young People's Literature.

My thanks to Laura Evans, who's put together a whole list of great National Poetry Month events, for compiling and cheerleading the kidlitosphere to assemble all these great tributes and celebrations of poetry!

Sappho celebrates LOVE - LESBIAN LOVE - and we celebrate with her for National Poetry Month!

Sappho Portrait from Pompeii

There are those who say
an array of horsemen,
and others of marching men,
and others of ships, is
the most beautiful thing on the dark earth.
But I say it is whatever one loves.

It is very easy
to show this to all:
for Helen,
by far the most beautiful of mortals,
left her husband
and sailed to Troy
giving no thought at all
to her child nor dear parents
but was led...
[by her love alone.]

Now, far away, Anactoria
comes to my mind.
For I would rather watch her
moving in her lovely way,
and see her face, flashing radiant,
then all the force of Lydian chariots
and their infantry in full display of arms.

(LP 16; Groden 7)

I found this poem on page 225 of "Myths and Mysteries of Same-Sex Love" by Christine Downing. Christine's commentary on this piece is really powerful. It reads, in part:

"Valuing personal love above heroic glory separates Sappho not only from the epic tradition but from her only important lyric predecessor, Archilochus. The first woman poet is the first poet to give love this central place. Though she takes the figure of Helen from the epic tradition, she refuses to castigate her as the woman who betrayed her husband. Rather, she honors her as a woman strong enough to be led by love, by her own feeling."

And I believe in this day it is being true to ourselves and our queer love that is OUR heroic glory.

For me, this poem is all about honoring our loves. Sappho, and her place as the "Tenth Muse" as Plato called her, is perhaps so famous due to this shift she pioneered, of daring to put love (including her own queer love) above all the other wonders of the world.

Truly a poem, and a woman, to celebrate!

GSA Monday Topic: A 5 minute Poetry Challenge! Let's Celebrate National Poetry Month with a GLBTQ POEM of YOUR OWN!

Here's a fib I wrote for you, and yes, I only gave myself 5 minutes, too!

1/1/2/3/5/8/13

"Same
Sex
Marriage."
"Sex - Sex - Sex"
That's all people hear.
"Same Gender Marriage" lets them hear
"Commitment. Kids. Broken Dishwashers. And our Love, too."

(check out my friend Gregory K.'s amazing site for more fibs here!)

See if in your GSA meeting this week, you can have everyone write a poem for 5 minutes. Even if you don't share them aloud, taking the time to write and be creative can be really powerful! And remember, if the word "poetry" feels old and out of touch, every single SONG - including rap and hip-hop - is really a poem, set to music.

So go ahead, don't just celebrate other people's poems... BE A POET YOURSELF!

Go ahead and share YOUR fibs, haikus, sonnets, and all the rest in comments!

Fib structure for syllables per line:

1/1/2/3/5/8


Haiku structure for syllables per line:

5/7/5

Enjoy the poems!

Namaste,
Lee

Gay Poetry! Our GLBTQ Celebration of National Poetry Month Continues... with Steven Reigns and his heartachingly beautiful poem "100%"

Steven Reigns

Steven Reigns is a friend and one HECK of a poet. Here, to help us celebrate the GAY in National Poetry Month, is his poem, "100%"

100%

My grandfather pulls me aside,
shows me his cardigan,
baits me for a compliment.
I’m hooked.
I comply.
He tells me it is wool,
opens the right side, shows me the tag
100% virgin wool.
He brings out his charming smile,
“You know how hard it is to find a virgin these days.”
I laugh at his joke
and keep laughing as a reward to him
because I like that he has shared this with me.
I enjoy the role of grandson,
he is the only man who can take me there.
I fear my other relationships with men could end what we have together.
A man
whose 78-year-old body carries him through his weekly routine;
3 games of golf, 2 games of bocce ball,
and dancing on the ballroom floor.

His comment only to me,
his humor was not lost on his 20-year-old gay grandson.
He must know.
I’ve never said it;
I’ve never not said it.
The joke – universal.
Is that why he told it?

He had told me of times in the army,
his valued possession a photo of the green-eyed blond beauty with thin lips.
Who would become
his wife,
the mother of his children,
my grandmother.

He had told me of when he was 13 and understood why women were to be respected.
He saw a mare giving birth.
Stood there for hours
as blood, embryonic fluid, and water
poured out of her.
Finally a foal
and my grandfather was never the same.
“Stevearino, after that I never talked back to my mom, I always held the door for the ladies, I vowed to be a good husband. You see I realized that women create miracles.”

His life has been centered around women,
this is something we do not have in common.
We laughed over virgins
but thought of different ones.

My grandfather,
a man
who pats my head,
rubs my back,
kisses my cheek,
tells me he loves me,
and hopefully
isn’t ashamed that other men do the same.

WOW. I love poetry. I love gay poetry that speaks to me and speaks to who I was and who I am... I love this poem.

Steven's said that

"Some of the most powerful poems are mined from personal experience."

and I think he's proved that with "100%"

Thanks to Steven for letting me share this with all of you, and for being part of the celebration! (You can check out his website here!)

And for any of you lucky enough to be in the Los Angeles area on April 15th, 2009, Steven's leading a free two hour "Poetry as Memoir" Workshop (for poetry enthusiasts to those who have never penned a poem before) at the West Hollywood Public Library! Here's some more info on that:

Wednesday, April 15, 2009 from 6-8 p.m.
West Hollywood Library
[in West Hollywood Park]
715 N. San Vicente Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069
Please call (310) 652-5340 for further information

It's sure to be amazing!

Keep celebrating Poetry...

Namaste,
Lee