Poetry Matters featuring Bonnie Bolling March 30

Poetry Matters featuring Bonnie Bolling

March 30, 7-9 pm
Stay Gallery
11140 Downey Ave., Downey 90241

Poetry Matters will welcome back Bonnie Bolling as featured poet on the fifth Thursday in March. Bolling returns to us on a visit from Dubai, where she and her husband have lived for several years. When in Long Beach, Bolling is Editor of Verdad, an online, twice-yearly literary and fine arts journal. Bolling’s new book, The Red Hijab, has won the John Ciardi Prize for poetry. and is published by BkMk Press. 

Doors open at 7 pm
Open microphone session at 7:30 pm.
Poetry Matters is curated by Lorine Parks

In The Red Hijab, Bolling becomes a journalistic embed, who “stands on the corner, leaning next to the sign / that says in three languages: no uncovered women allowed / adjusting and re-adjusting my black hijab, me a white, female, United States citizen / on this narrow, broken footpath keeping my silence and distance.”

“This is one of the finest set of verses I have read in years. With the bitter-sweet melody of the philosopher and the outcast, the listener of a country’s moans, that is, the sweeper of grabbed-up joys those lost shredded flags of lettuce-like things people grasp before death, so, perhaps, they will blossom into something else that will escort them to life—this voice here, leaves it on this table, for us. A total masterpiece.”
Juan Felipe Herrera, Poet Laureate of the United States

 “These are points of meditation that sing with a quiet hope for us all. These are poems of experience, modest and exact—poems that achieve a brilliant, honest light.”
Christopher Buckley, Modern History and Star Apocrypha

 “All of her people resonate with remarkable depth and presence. There is no polemic here, no agenda, no travel narrative. The Red Hijab transcends all these. It is another remarkable book by Bolling, and it is a gift to us from a true artist. “
Frank X. Gaspar

red-hijab-sm

By Downey Arts Coalition

Downey Arts Coalition is a movement of several people, however this website is currently managed and updated by Andrew J Wahlquist.

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