Quiet Lightning, California State Parks, and the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy present: Poetry in Parks 2016
October 9, 2016
This 3rd installation of Poetry in Parks took place in the historic Cushing Memorial-Mountain Theater in Mount Tamalpais State Park, on the occasion of Quiet Lightning’s 100th show and as part of the Arts in the Parks initiative celebrating the centennial of the National Parks and the connection between the wilderness experience and the inspiration parks provide to everyone, including artists of all genres.
This free event, part of the Litquake festival, was all-ages, with children’s activities provided by Bread & Roses, featuring Bri Crabtree and Andrew Skewes-Cox, an interactive art station by ArtSpan, books for sale and author signings by Booksmith, local food from D’Maize Catering and Sneaky’s BBQ, beer by Lagunitas Brewing Co., wine by Kevin Olson Vineyards and Stirm Wine Co., House Kombucha, and a booth by The Bloom Equation, using the lost language of flowers to create fun and connection!
You can watch and/or read the entire show below; beneath that, find bios and more:
[archive below]
*** FREE EVENT: Tickets are not required ***
11:00 – 11:30 Welcome and introductions
11:35 – 12:40 Prartho Sereno MCs youth poetry readings, with the Marin County Free Library, California Poets in the Schools, The Marin Poetry Out Loud Project, and Marin Poetry Center High School Poetry Project
12:45 – 1:05 Kim Stanley Robinson: tribute to Kenneth Rexroth
1:10 – 1:25 Jack Foley and Rosetta Egan: tribute to Adelle Foley
1:30 – 1:45 Musical performance by Classical Revolution
1:50 – 2:30 Literary Mixtape featuring: Margaret Spilman, Karen Penley, Heather June Gibbons, Yxta Maya Murray, Bj Dubin, Lisa Piazza, Tara Dorabji, Zack Haber, Rohan DaCosta, Brian DeMarco, and Dean Rader
2:35 – 2:45 Musical performance by Classical Revolution
2:45 – 3:35 Neighborhood Heroes, set 1: Dana Gioia, Arisa White, Prartho Sereno, Alejandro Murguía, Jane Hirshfield
3:35 – 3:50 Musical performance by Classical Revolution
3:50 – 4:40 Neighborhood Heroes, set 2: Brynn Saito, Charlie Getter, Andrew Paul Nelson, Tongo Eisen-Martin, Matthew Zapruder, Barbara Jane Reyes
4:45 – 5:00 Closing remarks / cleanup / info on transportation
The first 300 people will receive not one but two books, featuring writing by all of the authors and artwork by Matt Lewandowski and Paula Morales!! Book printing provided by Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy and National Park Service Centennial Arts in the Parks Program.
The literary mixtape was curated by Chris Cole, Christine No, Kelsey Schimmelman and Evan Karp, through a blind submission-based process, from 147 submissions.
Submit to Quiet Lightning’s next show!
GETTING THERE
- FROM SF: Thanks to the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy’s programming celebrating the Centennial of the National Parks and Arts in the Parks, and to the San Francisco Public Library, we are offering a free shuttle service from San Francisco. An rsvp is only required if you plan to take this shuttle from San Francisco (meeting at the Main Branch of the San Francisco Public Library—100 Larkin St.—at the entrance on Fulton, between Larkin & Hyde at 9:30am and leaving promptly at 9:45 a.m.). This shuttle has limited space and can reduce automobile commuters from San Francisco. It will stage at the Rock Springs lot and return people to San Francisco at approximately 6:00 p.m.
- PUBLIC TRANSIT: Marin Transit operates a public bus, the West Marin Stagecoach: South Route 61 on weekends through October beginning in Marin City at 10:00 a.m. making stops at the Manzanita Park and Ride, Tamalpais High School and arriving at the Pantoll Ranger Station at 10:46 a.m. Public Bus riders can then make a short hike (.5 miles) on the Old Mine Trail to the Mountain Theater.
- BICYCLES: We will also provide bicycle parking for those who wish to bike up the mountain to Poetry in Parks 2016. We will maintain a bicycle parking lot at the end of the Rock Springs Lot closest to the Theater.
- DRIVING: Parking is available for free at 3 locations on Mt. Tam: Rock Springs lot, Quarry Lot and the Airforce lot. From Highway 101 take Highway 1 to the Stinson Beach exit and follow signs up the mountain. Here’s the map; simply enter your starting address. A shuttle service (that does not require an rsvp) will transport people from the Airforce lot to the Theater. Each shuttle can carry approximately 40 people at a time. These shuttles will run at 20 minute intervals beginning at 10:30 a.m. and concluding at 6:00 p.m.
Other ITEMS TO BRING AND NOT BRING
- WATER or you can purchase at the theatre
- PICNIC LUNCH or you can purchase at the theatre
- CUSHIONS or low chairs for seating
- BEVERAGES – Alcohol (NO GLASS) may be brought in or purchased at theatre
- PICNIC/BEACH BLANKET
- LAYERED, COMFORTABLE CLOTHING – weather can be unpredictable
- DIRECTIONS to theatre or shuttle parking
- CASH (some vendors will accept cards)
- SUNSCREEN
- HATS and SUNGLASSES
- HIKING MAPS and GEAR
- ALLERGIC TO BEES? Bring your EpiPen/Benadryl
PLEASE DO NOT BRING
- Glass Containers
- Pets & Dogs – Do not leave unattended pets in your car or bring into the amphitheater
- Smoking is NOT allowed in the amphitheater area at any time.
VOLUNTEERING
We could use some extra hands! Modest but delectable compensation 🙂 If you’re interested, send a short note to evan [at] quietlightning [dot] org.
Sunday, Oct 9 2016
RSVP now!
Poetry in Parks 2016 made possible in part thanks to:
NEIGHBORHOOD HEROES
Originally from San Francisco, Tongo Eisen-Martin is a poet, movement worker and educator. He has taught in detention centers from New York’s Rikers Island to California county jails. He designed curricula for oppressed people’s education projects from San Francisco to South Africa. His latest curriculum on extrajudicial killing of Black people, We Charge Genocide Again, has been used as an educational and organizing tool throughout the country. His latest book of poems, Someone’s Dead Already, was nominated for a California Book Award. He recently lived and organized around issues of human rights and self-determination in Jackson, MS.
Charlie Getter rides his bicycle around San Francisco with a bag of tools with which he fixes cars. His oft delayed book, How to Arrange Physics and Geography to your Advantage was released in late September by Seventh Tangent Press. A frequent contributor to Quiet Lightning, you can hear him speak every Thursday night 10pm to midnight…
Dana Gioia is Poet Laureate of California. An internationally recognized poet and critic, he is the author of five collections of poetry, including Interrogations at Noon (2001), which won the American Book Award, and 99 Poems: New & Selected (2016). His critical collections include Can Poetry Matter? (1992), which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Award. He has written three opera libretti and edited twenty literary anthologies. He served as Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts from 2003 to 2009. He has been awarded 11 honorary doctorates. He is the Judge Widney Professor of Poetry and Public Culture at the University of Southern California where he teaches each fall semester. He divides his time between Los Angeles and Sonoma County, California. danagioia.com
Jane Hirshfield’s newest books are The Beauty (poems) and Ten Windows: How Great Poems Transform the World. Her many honors include fellowships from the Guggenheim and Rockefeller foundations, NEA, and the Academy of American Poets. A current chancellor of The Academy of American Poets, Hirshfield’s work appears in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New Republic, Harper’s, The Paris Review, Poetry, and eight editions of The Best American Poetry.
Alejandro Murguía is the author of This War Called Love, City Lights Books (winner of the American Book Award,) and The Medicine of Memory: A Mexica Clan in California, University of Texas Press. Last year City Lights Books released his new book Stray Poems. In May 2014 the SF Weekly named him Best Local Author. He is the author of the short story “The Other Barrio” which was filmed in the Mission District. Currently he is a professor in Latina/Latino Studies at San Francisco State University. He is the Sixth San Francisco Poet Laureate and the first Latino to hold the post.
Andrew Paul Nelson was born in the desert. He is currently working on a series of eulogies for people who are still alive. So far, none of his subjects have died. He is not afraid of you.
Barbara Jane Reyes was born in Manila and raised in the Bay Area. She is the author of To Love as Aswang, Diwata, Poeta en San Francisco, and Gravities of Center. She teaches at University of San Francisco and San Francisco State University, and lives with her husband Oscar Bermeo in Oakland.
Kim Stanley Robinson is an American science fiction writer who lives with his wife and family in Davis, California. He is the author of Three Californias, the Mars trilogy, Galileo’s Dream, 2312, Shaman, Aurora, and other books. He was sent by the National Science Foundation to the Antarctic as part of their Antarctic Artists and Writers’ Program, and serves on the advisory board of the Sierra Nevada Research Institute. He also edited In the Sierra: Mountain Writings by Kenneth Rexroth.
Brynn Saito is the author of two books of poetry, Power Made Us Swoon (2016) and The Palace of Contemplating Departure (2013), which won the Benjamin Saltman Poetry Award from Red Hen Press and was a finalist for the Northern California Book Award. She also co-authored, with Traci Brimhall, Bright Power, Dark Peace (chapbook, Diode Editions). Originally from Fresno, CA, Brynn lives in Los Altos and teaches and works in San Francisco.
Prartho Sereno is current Poet Laureate of Marin County and author of two prize-winning poetry collections: Elephant Raga and Call from Paris, and author/illustrator of an award-winning gift-book, Causing a Stir: The Secret Lives & Loves of Kitchen Utensils. Long-time Poet in the Schools (for which she won a Radio Disney Super Teacher Award in 2005), Prartho also teaches The Poetic Pilgrimage at the College of Marin.
Matthew Zapruder is the author of four collections of poetry, most recently Come On All You Ghosts (Copper Canyon 2010), a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and Sun Bear (Copper Canyon, 2014), as well as a book of prose, Why Poetry (Ecco Press, 2015). He is also co-translator from Romanian, along with historian Radu Ioanid, of Secret Weapon: Selected Late Poems of Eugen Jebeleanu (Coffee House Press, 2007). His poems, essays and translations have appeared in many publications, including Tin House, Paris Review, The New Republic, The New Yorker, Bomb, Slate, Poetry, and The Believer. He has received a 2011 Guggenheim Fellowship, a William Carlos Williams Award, a May Sarton Award from the Academy of American Arts and Sciences, and a Lannan Foundation Residency Fellowship in Marfa, TX. An Assistant Professor in the St. Mary’s College of California MFA program and English Department, he is also Editor-at-Large at Wave Books and Editor of the New York Times Magazine poetry column. He lives in Oakland, CA.
Cave Canem fellow Arisa White received her MFA from UMass, Amherst, and is the author of Black Pearl, Post Pardon, Hurrah’s Nest, and A Penny Saved. She teaches at Goddard College in Vermont. You’re the Most Beautiful Thing that Happened is her newest collection from Augury Books.