August 7, 2024 • 24 mins
Vickie Vértiz curates poems that chart a path to a collective future where we can survive crises, connect with others, and see life’s beauty. She introduces Khadijah Queen looking to words as weapons amidst grief (“bloodroot,” “Dear fear…”), Lehua M. Taitano moving through the luminous ocean of time (“Queer Check-Ins”), and Angel Dominguez breaking through the world’s isolation (“What Does the Future Sing to You in Dreams”). Vértiz closes with her poem “Disco,” a celebration of discovery and delight.
Watch Suheir Hammad’s “Gaza Suite” from the 2009 Palestine Festival of Literature.
Watch the full recordings of Queen, Taitano, and Dominguez reading for the Poetry Center on Voca:
Khadijah Queen (February 18, 2016)
Lehua M. Taitano (July 25, 2019)
Angel Dominguez (August 3, 2023)
You can also enjoy a recording of Vickie Vértiz reading for the Poetry Center in 2016.
Read about the Voca captioning project here. Every recording on Voca now has transcripts and captions—dive in and enjoy!
Full transcripts of every episode are available on Buzzsprout. Look for the transcript tab under each episode.
Voca is now fully captioned, with interactive transcripts and captions available for all readings! Read more about the project here, or try out this new feature by visiting Voca.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
[MUSIC PLAYING](JULIE SWARSTAD JOHNSON)
(00:02):
This is Poetry Centered,bringing you archival recordings
of poets reading their work forthe University of Arizona Poetry
Center, curated for youby a contemporary poet.
These recordings cometo you from Voca,
the Poetry Center's onlineaudiovisual archive.
I'm Julie Swarstad Johnson,the Center's archivist,
(00:23):
here to welcome you.
We have another greatepisode for you today,
hosted by Vickie Vértiz.
But first, an extremelyexciting update.
After three years and literallythousands of hours of work,
every recording on Voca nowhas captions and transcripts,
every recording.
(00:43):
That's more than 12,000 captionfiles and around 6 million
words.
Search engines index thesefiles, meaning you'll
be able to findrecordings on Voca
by searching forwords or phrases.
We're pretty sure thatwe're the first of our peers
to complete a comprehensivecaptioning project like this
for a literary archive.
(01:04):
And I can't even expresshow good it feels
to have completed this work.
Huge shout out to SarahKortemeier, our library
director, for heramazing leadership
and dedicated workon this project.
She's written an informativeand entertaining blog post
about this work, and you canfind a link in the show notes.
We also want to thankthe Mellon Foundation
(01:25):
for the grant that made thisenormous undertaking possible.
So go check out thosecaptions and transcripts.
We hope it improveseveryone's ability
to access this unique archive.
All right.
Back to today's episode.
We are delighted to welcomeVickie Vértiz, author
of two books of poetry.
(01:46):
Her most recent is AutoBody published last year.
She teaches writingat UC Santa Barbara.
Vickie was the Poetry Center'ssummer resident back in 2016,
and you can watch the beautifulreadings she gave on Voca.
There's a link inthe show notes.
In this episode, Vickielooks to poetry as a path
(02:07):
to the future, one where wecan survive crises, connect
with others, andsee life's beauty.
She shows us that paththrough recordings
of Khadijah Queen, Lehua M.
Taitano, and Angel Dominguez,who we also heard in
the previous episode.
Vickie, Thanks somuch and welcome.
[MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)Saludos.
(02:30):
This is Vickie Vértizspeaking to you
from a summer night inEl Sereno, Tongva land,
also known as LosAngeles, California.
I'm beyond excited to share thework of these magnificent poets
with you.
The task of selecting onlythree poets from the archive
seemed too great at first,but I followed my heart
(02:51):
and selected people whose workwas personally meaningful to me
and my family andwhich also illuminates
a path to a collective future.
My selection of thiswork is a celebration
because I believe thatis what poetry is.
I come from a lineageof poetry that
is about valuing and elevatingthe beauty of everyday life,
(03:12):
especially that of Black,Indigenous, and people of color,
queer folks, workingclass people.
And so to my selectnumber of poets,
I will add one important voice.
I want to bring your attentionto the incredibly necessary work
of Suheir Hammad, a PalestinianAmerican poet, author,
and political activist.
(03:33):
She is the author ofBreaking Poems and Zaatar
Diva and several othervolumes for which she
was awarded an American BookAward and the Arab American Book
Award.
After she was hisinstructor at Vona,
a workshop for writersof color many years ago,
she sent a postcard toKenji Lu, my partner,
encouraging hiswriting to continue.
(03:54):
That postcard now sits on ouraltar, where everyday we pray.
During this time of ongoingbrutality and reckoning with US
complicity in the Gaza genocideand other atrocities abroad,
I especially want people tolisten to her performance
of the five poems "Gaza Suite."The series was written during
the August 2009 assault on Gazaand performed at the Palestine
(04:19):
Festival of Literaturethe same year.
Hammad reminds us to eachday pick faith over fear,
even when each day isalso a mirror of fire.
The Voca book of poet Iselected is Khadijah Queen.
(04:39):
In this excerpt,Queen is reading
from her book Fearful Beloved.
Queen is a multidisciplinarywriter and visual artist,
the author of six books.
Her fifth, I'm So Fine, a Listof Famous Men and What I Had On
is one of my favoritebooks of hers.
Radical Poetics, abook of criticism
is forthcoming from her in 2025.
(05:01):
So look out for that.
In the reading, Queencontextualizes a drawing
she made of herself ina performance art piece
about being in grief in publicas a Black woman in the world.
In this sharing, we are invitedto be in and with the feeling,
with the resistance to theviolences against Black women
(05:22):
by the state but alsopatriarchy or as some of us
know these spaces too well, thestreet, our homes, our schools.
I am always moved by her evershifting genres, ever feminist,
experimental and fearless,embodying her experiences
(05:43):
and transmuting them on the pagefor all of our transformation.
In one of the "Dear fear"poems she recites here,
we are left with thespeaker as she, quote,
"sharpens the leaden blade ofher voice so that we may too use
our words as weapons."Here is Khadijah Queen
reading, "bloodroot, dear fear,dear fear, and dear fear."
(06:09):
[MUSIC PLAYING](KHADIJAH QUEEN)"Bloodroot.
Our native bloodroot, a girlwhose loose tongue wrapped
in a single leaf reveals her.
Glinting surface, dissolutegut, each notched blossom snugly
tucked.
Hiding in trees, shelteredfrom the remnants of winter,
(06:31):
speaking to animals whobow their heads to listen.
Dear fear, a sound made bya living animal is a voice.
Sometimes pursuit is an animal.
A swing toward theessential scream.
A scream also is fire, anunpleasant consumption,
(06:52):
a scintillant avoidance.
Dear fear, true orfalse, you crawl
into the made upskin, your priority
potential, youractuality as potentate,
your carbon irasciblelike traffic.
We choose when youare in annoyance
and when to fallin step with you,
when to have somewhere to go.
(07:13):
On the slant, you point withhard fingers, the mirror swings.
My fingerprintsdoubled in the glass.
The bodies encroach.
I sharpen the leadenblade of my voice.
Dear fear, some fears existin space and not in the body.
In some bodies, youare not learned.
(07:35):
But I learned so much about you,I could never have loved you.
I have careened into thatknowledge like a real person.
I have gathered myselfinto that knowledge
without writing it down.
But now, I write allof it down, and it
will mean you still exist.
Your spectrality exists.
Your infinite veer."[MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)
(08:05):
The second poet I selectedis Lehua M. Taitano reading
at the Poetry Center in 2019.
Taitano is a queerCHamoru writer,
an interdisciplinaryartist from Yigu, Guåhan,
also known as Guam, andthe co-founder of Art 25,
art in the 25th century.
In 2018, I selected their workto receive the Poetry Center
(08:26):
residency in Tucson,which is a dream for poets
because you get to live just afew feet away from the Poetry
Center library and archive.
What a dream to contemplateand cherish time and the word.
I chose her workbecause it was luminous
and created pathwaysinto a very near future
that we need so much.
(08:46):
Her writing continuesto remind us of the ways we need
to get back in orderto survive all of the crises
we have created in the world.
This reading isespecially touching
because a young child comesup to select the final poem.
The child identifies theschool that they attend,
and they are so proudto be standing before us
curating our listening.
(09:09):
Because it is a video poem, wego on a journey with the writer
into a day in the life.
And we emerge atthe end, seemingly
from a very long swim in theocean across time and space.
The speaker remindsus of the power
at the end, their origin, theirskills, and their way forward.
The writer says, "Theworld spits, grapples,
(09:31):
tries to tie me up inbasements to rid themselves
of my insistence.
Ancestors wiredme a path within.
I expand.
I carry within 100,000wombs of spectacular light."
This video poem was created forthe Smithsonian Asian Pacific
American Center, and it iscalled "A Day in the Queer
(09:54):
Life."[MUSIC PLAYING](LEHUA M. TAITANO)
I have a very youngparticipant here
who is going to choose the lastpoem that I will share with you,
and then I'll read it.
Pick a good one.
OK.
Let me see what it says.
OK.
I'm going to look.
(10:16):
OK.
Pick another one.
[LAUGHTER]She didn't pick-- she didn't
pick the one she wanted.
You like that one?
I think the first onewas good, don't you?
OK.
Tell us your name.
Do you want to sayit in the microphone?
OK.
Tell us your name.
(BETTY REYES)My name is Betty Reyes.
(10:38):
I go at boarding school.
Dennehotso Boarding Schoolis where I go, in Dennehotso.
(LEHUA M. TAITANO)Betty, you're awesome.
Do you think thatI could give you
a small hug around the shoulder?
Thank you so much.
[APPLAUSE]So believe it or not, the thing
(11:03):
that Betty chose was a video.
And the slip ofpaper that she read
and not one that I picked forher said, tell us some things
that you're workingon right now.
So I'm going to share with you abrief video poem that I've been
working on for a project forthe Smithsonian Asian Pacific
(11:27):
American Center called "ADay in the Queer Life."
And there are 12 video poemsrepresentative of queer Asian
or Pacific Islanders.
The project is designedto give us visibility
and to give us the opportunityto tell our own stories
about how are you doing.
It's a check in.
What is it like to bequeer and you today?
(11:49):
All of the footage in thesevideos, these films that we
produce are taken by us.
So everything that you seeis probably from my iPhone.
And then there's astory that goes over.
Thank you very much.
"Current, I consider weare made almost entirely
(12:13):
of water and electricity.
So our vernacular of emotionemploys surge, wave, spark,
impulse, and current.
The flood of saltor rush of crackling
blue pulse, of arcing rivulet.
(12:33):
A measurement ofwith and without.
The ecstatic penetrationof sperm into egg.
We have all seen themicroscopic iconography.
The homeless statewill ordain this.
The electric momentof life will brand
each womb, sanctified property.
(12:57):
My mother was conceived duringa war waged on brown bodies
and birthed me under amoon obscured by flags.
Electric layers ofocean reveal themselves
as an ancestral codingof me and her and her
and her as the spearand the plunge.
(13:21):
The cavern of handprints,the caverns of decapitation.
The lightning spark cannot becreated because it was already
there.
In the glum, human nostalgiapresses to know where,
when, which gods touch the firstimpulse of light into darkness,
(13:44):
first enacted a separationof shadow into meaning.
Yet, I fork, bead, ribbon thelight into existence insistence
with each sloughingof saltwater blood,
each recollection of current,current, Tano I' CHamoru.
(14:09):
Our people were shaped fromstone and the pulsing sea.
Sisters crouchedbody wave kneaded,
salt lapped until we tumbledfrom her, of her, of them,
all strong, strongand hold together.
Birds regarded our sea foamanklets, our slippery ropes
(14:33):
of hair, our cheeksfull of pebbles
and scattered fromthe shore singing.
We opened our new mouthsto our own chorus,
crooning sister, brother.
We are sun, moon,sky, water, Earth.
All siblings.
(14:55):
Current, I believe inreincarnation in so much
as I know an ancestor passed tome the memory of making oneself
into a universe.
One self, current, connected to.
No.
Concurrent with every iterationof subatomic movement.
(15:20):
How then, am I queer?
Queer.
Queer.
I am also onlyqueer because there
is a world outside of mine.
If the world were onlyme, I would seem just so.
A microcosmos of animal,mineral, plant, light, electric.
(15:47):
I. Current.
Yet the world, hereis what I can say.
I am I. Warrior I. Glacier I.
Photon I. Vine I. Rivulet I.
Integer I. Summoner I. Wave I.
Exhalation I. Mother I. Lava I.
(16:17):
Hilum I. Hypha I.
I. I. I. Current.
Prism I and culturebending through me.
The world spits, grapples,tries to tie me up
in basements to ridthemselves of my insistence.
(16:40):
Ancestor wired me a pathwithin inside the brick
spaces throughout andbecoming the walls and clouds.
I swallow bolts,I expand, I empty.
I carry within 100,000wombs of spectacular light."
(17:03):
[MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)The final poet I selected is
Angel Dominguez, a Latinx poetand artist of
Yucatec Maya descent.
Born in Hollywood andraised in Van Nuys
by their immigrant family.
They're the author ofDesgraciado, The Collected
(17:23):
Letters, Rose Sun Waterand Black Lavender Milk.
I first met Angel at Cal StateMonterey Bay for a Latinx poetry
symposium that ended with anepic road trip to the Bay Area
in a van with Farid Matuk,Roque Raquel Salinas, Erick
Sáenz, TatianaLuboviski-Acosta, and myself.
Angel had invited all of usthere to that windy coast,
(17:46):
that foggy piece of land.
And just like the threadedbonds that Angel performs with,
we took our connection,our string of love
from Monterey to Berkeley towatch Angel read their work
and recreate their ancestralhomeland through their poetry.
We watched enraptured in a tinyroom in the Berkeley Art Museum
(18:06):
as Angel connectedus with strangers,
other writers, children, peoplewe would never see again.
And for me, this iswhat poetry can do,
connect us when wecan see no other way
to be connected ina world that wants
us to be increasingly isolatedand away from one another.
(18:27):
Here is Angel reading "WhatDoes the Future Sing to You
in Dreams."[MUSIC PLAYING](ANGEL DOMINGUEZ)
I had the great honor ofholding a poetry workshop here,
and I am so gratefulfor that time and space.
And I wanted to share apoem I came out of it.
(18:47):
It's called "What Does theFuture Sing to You in Dreams?"
"The future sings still here.
The future sings allthe demons are dead.
The future sings cloudnet full of trees.
The future sings Iremember you, dearest one.
(19:09):
The future singsthere is still poetry.
The future singswe never gave up.
The future singsyou never gave up.
The future sings and singsand sings and sings long
into the night of eternity."That's it.
(19:32):
[APPLAUSE][MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)
From my own work,I will be reading
from my recent book, AutoBody from Notre Dame Press.
Thank you for listening.
I hope that these works willinspire you to live more fully,
enjoy, and to see themany paths that poetry
(19:55):
creates to our future.
"Disco."One Saturday night, Mario
takes me to circus disco.
Our path is a smoke trailof bacon wrapped hot dogs.
We are really not on a date.
His muscle tank topis ribbed tight.
All eyes are on him.
(20:17):
Como copo de algodón,ay la verdolaga.
He spins me into the riot.
Men opening fast.
Cumbia hinges.
Bodies perfumed in high cinnamonand cool water eye scream.
Some women wearbutton-ups and newsboys.
Others, tacones and red enamel.
The lights go out and RocioDúrcal walks into the spotlight.
(20:41):
She drifts in an emerald dress.
Her neck is rhinestone vibrato.
This is my first drag showand I don't know the rules.
Rocio sings, Me gustas mucho.
Me gustas mucho tu.
Middle aged men and señoraswho look like my mom
hold up dollar bills.
(21:01):
Look at us, all regular degular.
We swoon and snap whenRocio takes our bills.
A kiss and another on the cheek.
Her lips quiver.
The room alight with splendor.
Sequins and khakis, tight blackskirts, and hungry paychecks.
(21:22):
Then my brain makesthe record skip.
A bald dude in a Dodgersjersey walks up to her.
Who's this fool?
I say.
Girl, Mario says, don't youknow everyone has a dollar?
The homey gently tucks thebill in the gemstone bosom.
Shit, I think.
(21:44):
If he can be gay,he who probably
drives a Caprice Classicor maybe a Honda Civic
with a loud, loud tailpipe.
If his bald headcan be gay, then so
can I. I can be a cumbia riot.
I'm not a playerlike some fools,
but I can be hot pantsand Rocio's lipstick.
I'm saying, I want tobe an emerald bosom.
(22:05):
Go, Dodgers! Play ball.
Play me love is the message,and I'll learn how to hustle,
how to push my hips sofar I'll knock fools down.
I am not afraid.
In this sparkle, in themiddle of all of us,
I am not afraid to burndown this and every song.
(22:26):
Did I find my light?
Is there one for me?
Is this the moon?
Or am I just born?"[MUSIC PLAYING]
(JULIE SWARSTAD JOHNSON)Vickie, I love that final line.
(22:47):
"Is this the moonor am I just born?"
Thank you so muchfor this episode.
Listeners, thank you.
We wouldn't be doing this if youweren't out there to hear it.
And we're so gratefulfor your time.
We'll be taking abreak after this,
but you can look forwardto new episodes this fall.
Until then, go enjoy thosecaptions and transcripts on Voca
(23:09):
at voca.arizona.edu.
We'll see you next time.
(ARIA PAHARI)Poetry Centered is a project of
the University of Arizona PoetryCenter, home to a world-class
library collection of more than80,000 items related to
contemporary poetry in Englishand English translation.
(23:32):
Located on the campus of theUniversity of Arizona in Tucson,
the Poetry Centerlibrary and buildings
are housed on the Indigenoushomelands of the Tohono O'odham
and Pascua Yaqui.
Poetry Centered is the workof Aria Pahari, that's me,
and Julie Swarstad Johnson.
Explore Voca, the PoetryCenter's audio visual archive
(23:55):
online at voca.arizona.edu.
[MUSIC PLAYING](JULIE SWARSTAD JOHNSON)
(00:02):
This is Poetry Centered,bringing you archival recordings
of poets reading their work forthe University of Arizona Poetry
Center, curated for youby a contemporary poet.
These recordings cometo you from Voca,
the Poetry Center's onlineaudiovisual archive.
I'm Julie Swarstad Johnson,the Center's archivist,
(00:23):
here to welcome you.
We have another greatepisode for you today,
hosted by Vickie Vértiz.
But first, an extremelyexciting update.
After three years and literallythousands of hours of work,
every recording on Voca nowhas captions and transcripts,
every recording.
(00:43):
That's more than 12,000 captionfiles and around 6 million
words.
Search engines index thesefiles, meaning you'll
be able to findrecordings on Voca
by searching forwords or phrases.
We're pretty sure thatwe're the first of our peers
to complete a comprehensivecaptioning project like this
for a literary archive.
(01:04):
And I can't even expresshow good it feels
to have completed this work.
Huge shout out to SarahKortemeier, our library
director, for heramazing leadership
and dedicated workon this project.
She's written an informativeand entertaining blog post
about this work, and you canfind a link in the show notes.
We also want to thankthe Mellon Foundation
(01:25):
for the grant that made thisenormous undertaking possible.
So go check out thosecaptions and transcripts.
We hope it improveseveryone's ability
to access this unique archive.
All right.
Back to today's episode.
We are delighted to welcomeVickie Vértiz, author
of two books of poetry.
(01:46):
Her most recent is AutoBody published last year.
She teaches writingat UC Santa Barbara.
Vickie was the Poetry Center'ssummer resident back in 2016,
and you can watch the beautifulreadings she gave on Voca.
There's a link inthe show notes.
In this episode, Vickielooks to poetry as a path
(02:07):
to the future, one where wecan survive crises, connect
with others, andsee life's beauty.
She shows us that paththrough recordings
of Khadijah Queen, Lehua M.
Taitano, and Angel Dominguez,who we also heard in
the previous episode.
Vickie, Thanks somuch and welcome.
[MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)Saludos.
(02:30):
This is Vickie Vértizspeaking to you
from a summer night inEl Sereno, Tongva land,
also known as LosAngeles, California.
I'm beyond excited to share thework of these magnificent poets
with you.
The task of selecting onlythree poets from the archive
seemed too great at first,but I followed my heart
(02:51):
and selected people whose workwas personally meaningful to me
and my family andwhich also illuminates
a path to a collective future.
My selection of thiswork is a celebration
because I believe thatis what poetry is.
I come from a lineageof poetry that
is about valuing and elevatingthe beauty of everyday life,
(03:12):
especially that of Black,Indigenous, and people of color,
queer folks, workingclass people.
And so to my selectnumber of poets,
I will add one important voice.
I want to bring your attentionto the incredibly necessary work
of Suheir Hammad, a PalestinianAmerican poet, author,
and political activist.
(03:33):
She is the author ofBreaking Poems and Zaatar
Diva and several othervolumes for which she
was awarded an American BookAward and the Arab American Book
Award.
After she was hisinstructor at Vona,
a workshop for writersof color many years ago,
she sent a postcard toKenji Lu, my partner,
encouraging hiswriting to continue.
(03:54):
That postcard now sits on ouraltar, where everyday we pray.
During this time of ongoingbrutality and reckoning with US
complicity in the Gaza genocideand other atrocities abroad,
I especially want people tolisten to her performance
of the five poems "Gaza Suite."The series was written during
the August 2009 assault on Gazaand performed at the Palestine
(04:19):
Festival of Literaturethe same year.
Hammad reminds us to eachday pick faith over fear,
even when each day isalso a mirror of fire.
The Voca book of poet Iselected is Khadijah Queen.
(04:39):
In this excerpt,Queen is reading
from her book Fearful Beloved.
Queen is a multidisciplinarywriter and visual artist,
the author of six books.
Her fifth, I'm So Fine, a Listof Famous Men and What I Had On
is one of my favoritebooks of hers.
Radical Poetics, abook of criticism
is forthcoming from her in 2025.
(05:01):
So look out for that.
In the reading, Queencontextualizes a drawing
she made of herself ina performance art piece
about being in grief in publicas a Black woman in the world.
In this sharing, we are invitedto be in and with the feeling,
with the resistance to theviolences against Black women
(05:22):
by the state but alsopatriarchy or as some of us
know these spaces too well, thestreet, our homes, our schools.
I am always moved by her evershifting genres, ever feminist,
experimental and fearless,embodying her experiences
(05:43):
and transmuting them on the pagefor all of our transformation.
In one of the "Dear fear"poems she recites here,
we are left with thespeaker as she, quote,
"sharpens the leaden blade ofher voice so that we may too use
our words as weapons."Here is Khadijah Queen
reading, "bloodroot, dear fear,dear fear, and dear fear."
(06:09):
[MUSIC PLAYING](KHADIJAH QUEEN)"Bloodroot.
Our native bloodroot, a girlwhose loose tongue wrapped
in a single leaf reveals her.
Glinting surface, dissolutegut, each notched blossom snugly
tucked.
Hiding in trees, shelteredfrom the remnants of winter,
(06:31):
speaking to animals whobow their heads to listen.
Dear fear, a sound made bya living animal is a voice.
Sometimes pursuit is an animal.
A swing toward theessential scream.
A scream also is fire, anunpleasant consumption,
(06:52):
a scintillant avoidance.
Dear fear, true orfalse, you crawl
into the made upskin, your priority
potential, youractuality as potentate,
your carbon irasciblelike traffic.
We choose when youare in annoyance
and when to fallin step with you,
when to have somewhere to go.
(07:13):
On the slant, you point withhard fingers, the mirror swings.
My fingerprintsdoubled in the glass.
The bodies encroach.
I sharpen the leadenblade of my voice.
Dear fear, some fears existin space and not in the body.
In some bodies, youare not learned.
(07:35):
But I learned so much about you,I could never have loved you.
I have careened into thatknowledge like a real person.
I have gathered myselfinto that knowledge
without writing it down.
But now, I write allof it down, and it
will mean you still exist.
Your spectrality exists.
Your infinite veer."[MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)
(08:05):
The second poet I selectedis Lehua M. Taitano reading
at the Poetry Center in 2019.
Taitano is a queerCHamoru writer,
an interdisciplinaryartist from Yigu, Guåhan,
also known as Guam, andthe co-founder of Art 25,
art in the 25th century.
In 2018, I selected their workto receive the Poetry Center
(08:26):
residency in Tucson,which is a dream for poets
because you get to live just afew feet away from the Poetry
Center library and archive.
What a dream to contemplateand cherish time and the word.
I chose her workbecause it was luminous
and created pathwaysinto a very near future
that we need so much.
(08:46):
Her writing continuesto remind us of the ways we need
to get back in orderto survive all of the crises
we have created in the world.
This reading isespecially touching
because a young child comesup to select the final poem.
The child identifies theschool that they attend,
and they are so proudto be standing before us
curating our listening.
(09:09):
Because it is a video poem, wego on a journey with the writer
into a day in the life.
And we emerge atthe end, seemingly
from a very long swim in theocean across time and space.
The speaker remindsus of the power
at the end, their origin, theirskills, and their way forward.
The writer says, "Theworld spits, grapples,
(09:31):
tries to tie me up inbasements to rid themselves
of my insistence.
Ancestors wiredme a path within.
I expand.
I carry within 100,000wombs of spectacular light."
This video poem was created forthe Smithsonian Asian Pacific
American Center, and it iscalled "A Day in the Queer
(09:54):
Life."[MUSIC PLAYING](LEHUA M. TAITANO)
I have a very youngparticipant here
who is going to choose the lastpoem that I will share with you,
and then I'll read it.
Pick a good one.
OK.
Let me see what it says.
OK.
I'm going to look.
(10:16):
OK.
Pick another one.
[LAUGHTER]She didn't pick-- she didn't
pick the one she wanted.
You like that one?
I think the first onewas good, don't you?
OK.
Tell us your name.
Do you want to sayit in the microphone?
OK.
Tell us your name.
(BETTY REYES)My name is Betty Reyes.
(10:38):
I go at boarding school.
Dennehotso Boarding Schoolis where I go, in Dennehotso.
(LEHUA M. TAITANO)Betty, you're awesome.
Do you think thatI could give you
a small hug around the shoulder?
Thank you so much.
[APPLAUSE]So believe it or not, the thing
(11:03):
that Betty chose was a video.
And the slip ofpaper that she read
and not one that I picked forher said, tell us some things
that you're workingon right now.
So I'm going to share with you abrief video poem that I've been
working on for a project forthe Smithsonian Asian Pacific
(11:27):
American Center called "ADay in the Queer Life."
And there are 12 video poemsrepresentative of queer Asian
or Pacific Islanders.
The project is designedto give us visibility
and to give us the opportunityto tell our own stories
about how are you doing.
It's a check in.
What is it like to bequeer and you today?
(11:49):
All of the footage in thesevideos, these films that we
produce are taken by us.
So everything that you seeis probably from my iPhone.
And then there's astory that goes over.
Thank you very much.
"Current, I consider weare made almost entirely
(12:13):
of water and electricity.
So our vernacular of emotionemploys surge, wave, spark,
impulse, and current.
The flood of saltor rush of crackling
blue pulse, of arcing rivulet.
(12:33):
A measurement ofwith and without.
The ecstatic penetrationof sperm into egg.
We have all seen themicroscopic iconography.
The homeless statewill ordain this.
The electric momentof life will brand
each womb, sanctified property.
(12:57):
My mother was conceived duringa war waged on brown bodies
and birthed me under amoon obscured by flags.
Electric layers ofocean reveal themselves
as an ancestral codingof me and her and her
and her as the spearand the plunge.
(13:21):
The cavern of handprints,the caverns of decapitation.
The lightning spark cannot becreated because it was already
there.
In the glum, human nostalgiapresses to know where,
when, which gods touch the firstimpulse of light into darkness,
(13:44):
first enacted a separationof shadow into meaning.
Yet, I fork, bead, ribbon thelight into existence insistence
with each sloughingof saltwater blood,
each recollection of current,current, Tano I' CHamoru.
(14:09):
Our people were shaped fromstone and the pulsing sea.
Sisters crouchedbody wave kneaded,
salt lapped until we tumbledfrom her, of her, of them,
all strong, strongand hold together.
Birds regarded our sea foamanklets, our slippery ropes
(14:33):
of hair, our cheeksfull of pebbles
and scattered fromthe shore singing.
We opened our new mouthsto our own chorus,
crooning sister, brother.
We are sun, moon,sky, water, Earth.
All siblings.
(14:55):
Current, I believe inreincarnation in so much
as I know an ancestor passed tome the memory of making oneself
into a universe.
One self, current, connected to.
No.
Concurrent with every iterationof subatomic movement.
(15:20):
How then, am I queer?
Queer.
Queer.
I am also onlyqueer because there
is a world outside of mine.
If the world were onlyme, I would seem just so.
A microcosmos of animal,mineral, plant, light, electric.
(15:47):
I. Current.
Yet the world, hereis what I can say.
I am I. Warrior I. Glacier I.
Photon I. Vine I. Rivulet I.
Integer I. Summoner I. Wave I.
Exhalation I. Mother I. Lava I.
(16:17):
Hilum I. Hypha I.
I. I. I. Current.
Prism I and culturebending through me.
The world spits, grapples,tries to tie me up
in basements to ridthemselves of my insistence.
(16:40):
Ancestor wired me a pathwithin inside the brick
spaces throughout andbecoming the walls and clouds.
I swallow bolts,I expand, I empty.
I carry within 100,000wombs of spectacular light."
(17:03):
[MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)The final poet I selected is
Angel Dominguez, a Latinx poetand artist of
Yucatec Maya descent.
Born in Hollywood andraised in Van Nuys
by their immigrant family.
They're the author ofDesgraciado, The Collected
(17:23):
Letters, Rose Sun Waterand Black Lavender Milk.
I first met Angel at Cal StateMonterey Bay for a Latinx poetry
symposium that ended with anepic road trip to the Bay Area
in a van with Farid Matuk,Roque Raquel Salinas, Erick
Sáenz, TatianaLuboviski-Acosta, and myself.
Angel had invited all of usthere to that windy coast,
(17:46):
that foggy piece of land.
And just like the threadedbonds that Angel performs with,
we took our connection,our string of love
from Monterey to Berkeley towatch Angel read their work
and recreate their ancestralhomeland through their poetry.
We watched enraptured in a tinyroom in the Berkeley Art Museum
(18:06):
as Angel connectedus with strangers,
other writers, children, peoplewe would never see again.
And for me, this iswhat poetry can do,
connect us when wecan see no other way
to be connected ina world that wants
us to be increasingly isolatedand away from one another.
(18:27):
Here is Angel reading "WhatDoes the Future Sing to You
in Dreams."[MUSIC PLAYING](ANGEL DOMINGUEZ)
I had the great honor ofholding a poetry workshop here,
and I am so gratefulfor that time and space.
And I wanted to share apoem I came out of it.
(18:47):
It's called "What Does theFuture Sing to You in Dreams?"
"The future sings still here.
The future sings allthe demons are dead.
The future sings cloudnet full of trees.
The future sings Iremember you, dearest one.
(19:09):
The future singsthere is still poetry.
The future singswe never gave up.
The future singsyou never gave up.
The future sings and singsand sings and sings long
into the night of eternity."That's it.
(19:32):
[APPLAUSE][MUSIC PLAYING](VICKIE VÉRTIZ)
From my own work,I will be reading
from my recent book, AutoBody from Notre Dame Press.
Thank you for listening.
I hope that these works willinspire you to live more fully,
enjoy, and to see themany paths that poetry
(19:55):
creates to our future.
"Disco."One Saturday night, Mario
takes me to circus disco.
Our path is a smoke trailof bacon wrapped hot dogs.
We are really not on a date.
His muscle tank topis ribbed tight.
All eyes are on him.
(20:17):
Como copo de algodón,ay la verdolaga.
He spins me into the riot.
Men opening fast.
Cumbia hinges.
Bodies perfumed in high cinnamonand cool water eye scream.
Some women wearbutton-ups and newsboys.
Others, tacones and red enamel.
The lights go out and RocioDúrcal walks into the spotlight.
(20:41):
She drifts in an emerald dress.
Her neck is rhinestone vibrato.
This is my first drag showand I don't know the rules.
Rocio sings, Me gustas mucho.
Me gustas mucho tu.
Middle aged men and señoraswho look like my mom
hold up dollar bills.
(21:01):
Look at us, all regular degular.
We swoon and snap whenRocio takes our bills.
A kiss and another on the cheek.
Her lips quiver.
The room alight with splendor.
Sequins and khakis, tight blackskirts, and hungry paychecks.
(21:22):
Then my brain makesthe record skip.
A bald dude in a Dodgersjersey walks up to her.
Who's this fool?
I say.
Girl, Mario says, don't youknow everyone has a dollar?
The homey gently tucks thebill in the gemstone bosom.
Shit, I think.
(21:44):
If he can be gay,he who probably
drives a Caprice Classicor maybe a Honda Civic
with a loud, loud tailpipe.
If his bald headcan be gay, then so
can I. I can be a cumbia riot.
I'm not a playerlike some fools,
but I can be hot pantsand Rocio's lipstick.
I'm saying, I want tobe an emerald bosom.
(22:05):
Go, Dodgers! Play ball.
Play me love is the message,and I'll learn how to hustle,
how to push my hips sofar I'll knock fools down.
I am not afraid.
In this sparkle, in themiddle of all of us,
I am not afraid to burndown this and every song.
(22:26):
Did I find my light?
Is there one for me?
Is this the moon?
Or am I just born?"[MUSIC PLAYING]
(JULIE SWARSTAD JOHNSON)Vickie, I love that final line.
(22:47):
"Is this the moonor am I just born?"
Thank you so muchfor this episode.
Listeners, thank you.
We wouldn't be doing this if youweren't out there to hear it.
And we're so gratefulfor your time.
We'll be taking abreak after this,
but you can look forwardto new episodes this fall.
Until then, go enjoy thosecaptions and transcripts on Voca
(23:09):
at voca.arizona.edu.
We'll see you next time.
(ARIA PAHARI)Poetry Centered is a project of
the University of Arizona PoetryCenter, home to a world-class
library collection of more than80,000 items related to
contemporary poetry in Englishand English translation.
(23:32):
Located on the campus of theUniversity of Arizona in Tucson,
the Poetry Centerlibrary and buildings
are housed on the Indigenoushomelands of the Tohono O'odham
and Pascua Yaqui.
Poetry Centered is the workof Aria Pahari, that's me,
and Julie Swarstad Johnson.
Explore Voca, the PoetryCenter's audio visual archive
(23:55):
online at voca.arizona.edu.
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