It is spring. After so much rain, the birds are out conversing above the city, and botanical life is feeling lavish. I've been turning pages, writing pages, and dancing all over the pages. 2023 has been busy and fruitful. It deserves a recap. 

New Audio Book

Catastrophic Molting is now available in audio book. You can download your own copy or find it on the Libby App with the LA Public Library.

Book Reviews 

My first published book reviews arrived this spring for Catastrophic Molting. Diane Gottlieb wrote a great review for Literary Mama in “A Mother’s Resistance Poetry: A Review of Catastrophic Molting.” In Angela Maria Spring's response in the Washington Independent Book Review, she wrote that it "captures all the messy dichotomies of a profound, definitive moment on our lifetimes...Both a prayer and a benediction, blessing the poet and the reader…”

Interviews

I got to chat with Janet Rodriguez about the Catastrophic Molting in an interview with The Rumpus. Also, Àkpà Árinzèchukwu interviewed me with A’bena Awuku Larbi for Muqabalal about The Ocean Between Us. 

New Publications

I wrote an essay about my great great grandfather’s Mizrah that was published by the Jewish Museum, and Catherine J. Prinz of The Forward interviewed me about the piece. 

I co-authored an essay with Dr. Patricia Gonzalez titled “Good Troublemakers: Freedom School Servant Leaders as Change Makers.” Our work will be included in a special edition on Freedom Schools for the Urban Education Journal.

My poem “thesaurus” will be included in the anthology Reformatting the Pain Scale.

I completed two new book manuscripts and have sent them off to publishers for consideration. One is a book of essays on community and place, and the other is a book of ecology poems. 

Action Snapshot 
Spring has been a busy time of connection, touring, and teaching in community.

I enjoyed creative time in movement with 4 X 4 — a co-generated artists residency with Marina Magalhães, Tatiana Zamir, and Isis Avalos. We just concluded and will be composing written reflections and imagery.

I was invited by professors Ronit Eisenback and Brandon Donahue to serve as the first Guest Artist for the new Creative Placemaking Program at the University of Maryland. During my week in residence at UOM I worked with architects, dancers, designers, urban planners, creative writers, community activists, students and faculty. Here are images from the Story + Place workshop with MFA students. 

I offered a Global Community Writing Workshop through Creo Changemakers. It was fun to teach and read people in California, New Mexico, Arizona, Lagos, Accra, and Mexico City. 

March marked the launch of a collaboration with the Los Angeles Public Library and Writers Project Ghana. Check out our reading featuring: Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond, Boakyewaa Glover, Petra Aba Asamoah, and Nana Darkoa Sekyimah. I co-hosted the event with A’bena Awuku-Larbi. 

We gathered for Relatos honoring herstories hosted by Creo Changemakers at the Brasil Brasil Cultural Center. I read alongside, Jenise Miller, Lena Cole Dennis, Luivette Resto, Angelina Saenz, Karen Llagas, Jade Adia, Jireh Deng, Onyi Love, Reva Santo, Obiageli Iloakasia, Chekwube Danladi, and Zaynab Riba Dabup. Find our books on Bookshop.org. 

I read at the Claremont Public Library with Brendan Constantine, then headed to Northern California where I read with Tawanda Mulalu and Richie Hofmann at Green Apple Books in San Francisco. Eric Kupers invited me to speak with students and perform poetry and dance improvisation in their Love Fest at Cal State East Bay. After that, I read in Seattle at the national writing conference AWP with Women Who Submit and in the conference atrium with Unsolicited Press. 

I performed poetry and improvised dance in Eric Kupers’ production of Seder Apokalipsis at Highways Performance Space, read with Jessica Abughattas and Luivette Resto for Ladies of Courage with the City of West Hollywood, and Village Well Books featured me as a writer where I got to read from new ecology poems. On May 7,  I’ll be reading at Lit Fest in the Dena with Angelina Saenz, Luivete Resto, Jenise Miller, and Sarah Rafael Garcia.

I’m diving into kabbalistic study for a project with Etai Rogers-Fett on the Jewish letters. I chose the letter yud. While it is the smallest one in the alphabet, it shifts the sound and meaning of everything it is close to. It is also repeated in words for the most sacred, for language, and for identity. 

I'll be connecting with teaching artists this summer at Cal Arts with Alma Catalan, and am enjoying supporting Self Help Graphics & Art by coaching staff members as their space is being renovated. 

The view from midlife is fascinating. It is a time when one reaps the benefits of a devoted creative life, being a mom, and having been a teacher to phenomenal human beings. Avila and Reva are thriving, involved in great things, and are a source of tremendous joy and pride for me. My former students continue to teach, include, and inspire me. Spring is crawling over walls, blasting into bloom, and inhabiting life in unique and beautiful ways.

[ Photos by Bobby Gordon ]