Poetry Playhouse feature is former Albuquerque poet laureate Mary Oishi
and selected One Albuquerque, One Hundred Poets Anthology poets
First hour has featured poets
Second hour is open mic
6 pm Pacific, 7 pm Mountain, 8 pm Central, 9 pm Eastern
Event will be recorded
Hosted by John Roche and Jules Nyquist
Mary Oishi
Featured poets reading list for the first hour:
1. Eileen O’Connell
2. Viola Morris
3. Sylvia Ramos Cruz
4. Gabino Noriega
5. Gina Marselle
6. Jesse Ehrenberg
7. Margaret Randall
8. Rich Boucher
9. Kathryn Paul
10. Anushah Jiwani
11. Felicia Caton-Garcia
12. Kristian Macaron
13. Amanda Ranth
14. Kharlos Panterra
15. Bill Nevins
16. Sirena Reyes
17. Scott Wiggerman
18. Sandra Vallie
19. Rebecca Aronson
20. Leslie Fox
21. Juba Clayton
Eileen O’Connell - is a library professional who has been writing poetry for 30 years. She is the author of Visions and Revisions, a book of poetry and essays published in 2017.
Viola Morris began writing poetry in her 80's, while taking classes with Dodici Adzpadu. She was a member of “Voices of the Valley,” which met for many years at North Valley Senior Center, and had poems published in their monthly newsletters. Also, as a member of that group, she read at several Senior Centers. Her work was published in "Encore" Prize Poems, 2018 by the National Federation of State Poetry Societies. She is a current member of New Mexico State Poetry Society.
Sylvia Ramos Cruz is inspired to write by art, women’s lives and everyday injustices. Her poems have been published in Artemis Journal 2020, Choice words: Writers on Abortion, Southwest American Literature, and Journal of Latina Critical Feminism, among other places, and read at venues around New Mexico and, most recently, on Rattle: Poets Respond Live on YouTube.
Gabino Noriega is an Albuquerque native, PhD Candidate, Educator, and Artist. He is also a family man focused on connecting his family to the Earth and traditions of our ancestors. He has performed as a musician and poet in various events locally and regionally.
Gina Marselle - resides with her family, her rescue horse and dogs. She’s a teacher, poet and photographer. She has published poems and photographs in local anthologies and her book is, A Fire of Prayer: A Collection of Poetry and Photography.
Jesse Ehrenberg’s poems have been published in multiple local anthologies. His book SURPRISE! won several prizes in the New Mexico Press Women contest, and a Silver Award in the inaugural Margaret Randall Poetry Book Contest.
Margaret Randall is a poet, independent scholar, photographer, translator, and social activist who was born in New York City and grew up in New Mexico. Taking an active part in the Mexican student movement of 1968 and then living in Cuba for eleven years and Sandinista Nicaragua for four, Randall returned to the United States in 1984, only to face deportation when the government declared her writings “against the good order and happiness of the United States.” With the support of many, she won her case in 1989. Randall is the author of more than two hundred books, including Che on My Mind (2014), Time’s Language: Selected Poems 1959-2018, and I Never Left Home: Poet, Feminist, Revolutionary (2020). Her most recent titles include Artists in My Life, Luck, and Home. She has received the Poet of Two Hemispheres award from Poesía en Paralelo Cero, Quito, Ecuador, AWP’s George Garrett Award, Albuquerque’s Creative Bravo Award, and an Honorary Doctorate from the University of New Mexico, among other recognitions.
Rich Boucher - resides in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Rich's poems have appeared in The Nervous Breakdown, Eighteen Seventy, Menacing Hedge, Drunk Monkeys and Cultural Weekly, among others. Rich serves as Associate Editor for the literary magazine BOMBFIRE. He is the author of All Of This Candy Belongs To Me, a collection of poems published by Jules' Poetry Playhouse Publications. Peep richboucher.bandcamp.com for more. He loves his life with his love Leann and their sweet cat Callie.
Kathryn Paul - is a survivor of many things, including cancer and downsizing. Her poems have appeared in Last Leaves; The Examined Life Journal; Intima: Journal of Narrative Medicine; Rogue Agent; Hospital Drive; The Ekphrastic Review; Lunch Ticket: Stirring; and Pictures of Poets.
Anushah Jiwani - is a poet, community advocate, and a leadership coach. She has won several awards for her writing, including the 2018 Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award sponsored by Poets & Writers. Her poetry was most recently published in Arts & Letters. Much of her writing centers on the duality of her Pakistani–American identity and aims to create a safe space for the immigrant voice.
Felicia Caton-Garcia - lives, writes, gardens, and teaches college in the South Valley. Felecia’s poetry and fiction has been featured in The Indiana Review, Prairie Schooner, Blue Mesa Review, and Plume. Her collection of poetry, Say That, was published by The University of New Mexico Press. Felecia teaches American Studies, Chicanx Studies, Creative Writing, and English at Central New Mexico Community College.
Kristian Macaron - is the author of Storm (2015, Swimming with Elephants Publications) and Recipe for Time Travel in Case We Lose Each Other (2022, Game Over Books) She is an alum of the University of New Mexico (BA, ‘09) and Emerson College (MFA Fiction, ’12). Her work can be seen at Kristianmacaron.com.
Amanda Ranth started writing poetry when she was nine. Her first poems were anti-war poems. Working towards social justice on all fronts: economic, environmental and human rights, is her passion. She self-published at least a dozen zines, and during the time she detoured to her native Idaho, she was featured in galleries and an art museum, and received several residencies, awards, and arts grants. She has taught writing, performance and storytelling across the northwest and was featured at Out Spoken and Queer Gathering of Nations in Albuquerque. In addition to writing and rabble rousing, Amanda is also a seed saver, insect lover and mother of two poems named Saulito and Tomyris.
Kharlos Panterra - has published one chapbook, Autumn Equinox (2000). His work appeared in the Washington Daily News, in Albuquerque’s Two Way Street, and in Fixed And Free (2021). He has performed his poetry in Nuyorican Café, and in coffee shops and larger venues throughout Albuquerque.
Bill Nevins - moved to New Mexico in 1996. A lifelong peace activist, he is a “gold star” parent whose son died in combat as a US army commando in Afghanistan. He is a retired University of New Mexico instructor, a publishing journalist, a songwriter and a poet, with two books: Heartbreak Ridge and AWE, and a 2007 feature film, Committing Poetry in Times of War. His poems appear in many anthologies, including the 2022 Reimagine America anthology. He has performed poetry from New York to the Yucatan, and has hosted several New Mexico poet gatherings. He was a Board Member of New Mexico State Poetry Society, and founded and leads Vozclara Poetry & Song Project. He is an active member of Taos SOMOS, and is the Poetry Editor of Logos: a Journal of Modern Society and Culture online.
Sirena Reyes was born and raised in Albuquerque, and she hopes to have a book about that some day.
Scott Wiggerman - an Albuquerque resident for seven years after moving from Austin, is the author of three books of poetry, Leaf and Beak: Sonnets, Presence, and Vegetables and Other Relationships; and the editor of several volumes, including Wingbeats: Exercises & Practice in Poetry, Bearing the Mask, and 22 Poems and a Prayer for El Paso, winner of a 2020 NM/AZ Book Award. Poems have appeared recently in Rogue Agent, Impossible Archetype, Shot Glass Journal, Literature Today, and numerous haiku journals. In April he will be inducted into the prestigious Texas Institute of Letters for his contributions to writing during his 35 years in Texas. In Albuquerque, he chaired the largest chapter of the New Mexico State Poetry Society, and he co-directs the annual Poets’ Picnic at the Open Space Visitor Center.
Sandra Vallie has work in Adobe Walls, Airplane Reading, Last Leaves, The Más Tequila Review, The Malpais Review, and plumeforwriters.org. Originally from Michigan, she earned a BA in writing at Eastern Michigan University, briefly taught writing at Washtenaw Community College and in the community, and helped coordinate a monthly poetry reading series.
Rebecca Aronson - is the author of Anchor, Ghost Child of the Atalanta Bloom, winner of the 2016 Orison Books poetry prize and winner of the 2019 Margaret Randall Book Award from the Albuquerque Museum Foundation, and Creature, Creature, winner of the Main-Traveled Roads Poetry Prize (2007). She has been a recipient of a Prairie Schooner Strousse Award, the Loft’s Speakeasy Poetry Prize, and a Tennessee Williams Scholarship to Sewanee.
Leslie Fox - has an MFA in Creative Writing from UNM. While working on her degree in Fiction she wrote and read her poetry at RB Winning Coffee and other Open Mics around town. She is published in Earthships: a New Mecca Poetry Collection; Earth’s Daughters; and Red: A Journal of the Arts.
Juba Clayton - is a Griot, a Storyteller in the West African tradition of using Story as a tool for healing, educating, empowering and affirming her Community. Throughout her career, Ms. Clayton has been awarded many honors that reflect her devotion to improving the lives of the communities she serves. As for her poetry, Ms. Clayton says “Sometimes my stories become poetry,” as is the case with her first poem, “Wake Up Dancin.’
A FEW POEMS FROM SELECTED FEATURED POETS:
Felecia Caton-Garcia
Forlorn
In English now often in “forlorn hope”…and the sense of the whole phrase is of a suicide mission. The phrase more often than not is used in English as if it meant “a faint hope,” and the misuse has colored the meaning of “forlorn.” —Online Etymology Dictionary
I thought it was love, when you put your lips against my ear
and said, count to ten and then I’ll find you. It surprises
no one that I thought this was love (I think everything is love)
or that it wasn’t (it never is). It always makes sense at first
to buy attention with the currency of secrets. So I told you
about the high branches of the pine, the crawl-space
in the bales of hay, the hotel room in the center of town.
So when the governor tells us to shelter in place and you tell
me, sometimes things just end, there’s nowhere to hide.
The bars are all closed. The doors of all my friends
are closed. The lights are shutting off across the city.
One, I say, eyes shut tight. It’s a trick cruel children
sometimes play: hide-and-go-seek they say
to the youngest or the awkward child, you count, they say
to the one who doesn’t. Then they drift away. How long
does that child hide? The longest I ever hid was seven years.
Two. Ready or not, I’m digging tunnels in the floor of my home.
Nothing ever ends. Someone just leaves. But for the child
standing alone in the yard, eyelids pressed together so tightly
it hurts, everyone is still just out of sight, waiting for her.
She doesn’t know she is alone. She doesn’t know there is no one
to find. She doesn’t want to let anyone down. Three, she whispers.
And the light around her begins to fade. The nightbirds rise
and shine. She shivers, arms tight around herself. Four.
Rich Boucher
In Case of Glass, Break the Emergency
Have you ever had a bad dream
come back for one more night like your mind
was a stage it just loved performing on?
If you asked me, I wouldn’t know how to answer
without giving you something to work with later on
and like any decent and true American
I don’t want you to know everything
unless the lawyers tell me I have to talk.
Sometimes Miss Heston, the English teacher
I had in fifth grade comes back to me
in a vision (still wearing that same sainted sweater)
to tell me that I wasn’t a terrible person for staring.
My high school auditorium is no longer
big enough to hold all of the people
who think I’m old, and sometimes
when the news happens at me
I wonder if Lady Justice likes wearing a blindfold
for reasons that have nothing to do with being impartial.
Sometimes I’m not young enough
to handle the things I see; you don’t need to be me
to know exactly what I’m in the middle of meaning.
Nobody who watched the disaster
movie on Netflix died from seeing it,
which I think is an indictment of all of us.
On a night like tonight I want to commit some witchcraft,
sing a song under my breath that might awaken the stones,
awaken something real I need in me.
I didn’t think I’d live long enough
to discover that the Statue of Liberty’s first name
is Karen, but that’s where we are.
Anushah Jiwani
Mother’s Day
We take Nani out for Mother’s Day. Her and Nana’s visas to America
are finally approved, and they stay with us for a few months. Mom lives
with her mom again for the first time in a quarter century. I choose
a restaurant with South Indian food—idli, dosa, pakora.
For those of you who don’t know, think savory, spongy, fried;
white, yellow, brown. We sit after gathering the buffet.
Nani looks at her food, swirling it around her mouth.
Food brings us to place in memory. I am eager to know
our family’s origins. Dad asks about Nani’s brothers.
Her eyes light up and she gets a little taller. Her shoulders and words expand
until she remembers her losses. One brother perhaps in northern India,
a chai-wala[1] at a local train stop. Another dead from cancer, whom she found
after searching for twenty years. She would ask so many men and women
in Jamatkhana[2] if they had heard of men who had lost their family in ’71
during Bangladesh’s War of Independence. Her story joined those of thousands.
One is tall and funny, the other is short and serious, she’d say. Finally,
someone’s aunt’s friend heard of a man in India looking for his sister.
They spoke on the phone before his passing. She was not allowed to enter India
because she was now Pakistani, someone on the wrong side
of the border. Nani’s voice slows now, and I understand why we don’t talk
about where we’re from. How could we feel her pain? In this global age,
there is no losing someone, not in that way. Mom is upset that we’ve upset Nani.
Why did we have to bring this up? Nani sits silently,
shrinking slowly in her chair.
[1] Someone who sells tea
2 Religious center
Kathryn Paul
why not
why not dance aerobically in pink tutus with the archbishop while stars do-wop in the sky as
though some heavenly disco had dropped the velvet rope like teenage boys drop trou and let
the world all in, like a card game where you don’t know whether it’s poker, go fish, or duplicate bridge, but you toss your chips on the green felt anyway, absentmindedly scooping
onion dip with one, hoping aces are high and don’t just mean you’re the old maid again
do people ever say it without irony: why not without inflection, unselfconsciously willing to
try star-fishing right off the pier on a moonlit night like that kid on the movie screen tossing
hope into the sky hook line and it won’t sink us. who could love in this world if there were
only marching and no tap dancing with abandon so let’s all carry pink tutus in our just-in-
cases, along with peanut butter and jelly and champagne for the road that leads us up, unspooling from one single petal into the whole wide field
Kristian Macaron
When I dream of grandma, she is hiding from me
In my grandmother’s house the flowers don’t die
they and the wind chimes have survived her
when I dream of her she has always returned from hiding
from us somewhere far away and when we find her by accident
we ask where have you been but she does not answer
or she says nowhere, jita, and spirals her cold arm
tightly in mine her love immediate like I can’t tell her anything she
doesn’t already know mom says she was probably smoking
[always hiding] somewhere in the desert where it is warmer
in my memory, the house is summer of summer winter of winter
the sound of any pan on her stovetop everything sizzles and
tortillas breakfast tortillas lunch tortillas dinner tortillas
salt water baking powder flour lard
saltwater power flowers baking and her heart
she was alone here for so long and now I am alone here
I knead dough on her kitchen counter while the stove is hot
I make tortillas and I buy plants though I can’t
tend a blossom
I am trying
not to burn them to be warm here knowing
her perfume is still in the wind on the porch
and she is somewhere in the desert in my dreams
and if I can’t find her there maybe what knows are the wind chimes
Scott Wiggerman
The Mystery of Grief
starting with a Dickinson line (#1726)
If all the griefs I am to have would only come today.
Let me play Job with punishment premium today.
Another war, another bomb, another police killing.
I take them on, my mind a crematorium today.
We live beneath a sword dangling by a single thread.
Are drugs the answer, or will you be doused in rum today?
Oh, vinegar and honey, I’ve cried so much, I’ve lost my sight.
I try to speak of halcyon times, but I go dumb today.
Not proud of it, but I got used to living on a cross.
Let me take on your grief—I’m into martyrdom today.
Our sweet Silver disappeared a week ago without a trace.
The world has always been this random. Why so glum today?
Sorry business: what the Tiwi call their mourning period.
Don’t leave me alone, or can’t you stand this tedium today?
Why do you find it so hard to believe in bereavement?
I know grief is good—I wallowed in its medium today.
You’d like to ask God about loss, but that spirit has passed.
Have you prayed to find something lost? I found a crumb today.
Rebecca Aronson
Scansion
I am always doing this, badly. In every room
I take the pulse the best I can. What is the beat,
the pace, where must I stress and where
should I lean? I stumble
over new names, faces I can’t recall.
What am I supposed to know? The room’s a line
I scan for familiar sounds. I talk out of turn, laugh
too loud or too late or
miss it altogether. I am deaf
with noise, my ears oversaturated, my
brain bumping its own tune
out of synch. I think. No one dances
at these things anymore. I would,
but won’t. I long for cigarettes,
those old smoke screens I used to hide behind
so well. I never could
imbibe enough to get the rhythm
of other conversations. It’s just me,
sober, counting syllables by the snack table,
counting emphases in the workings of some jawer’s talk.
They have a lot to say that leaves me muttering
in counter-point. My heart beat dactyl, dactyl, spondee, full stop. No one
forgets to breathe, but thinking too much