This is the official blog of Northern Arizona slam poet Christopher Fox Graham. Begun in 2002, and transferred to blogspot in 2006, FoxTheBlog has recorded more than 670,000 hits since 2009. This blog cover's Graham's poetry, the Arizona poetry slam community and offers tips for slam poets from sources around the Internet. Read CFG's full biography here. Looking for just that one poem? You know the one ... click here to find it.
Showing posts with label nika levikov. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nika levikov. Show all posts

Saturday, August 21, 2010

"Over and Over" by Michael R. Brown

"Over and Over"
By Michael R. Brown

An aging poet and teacher born in 1940,
who fought against Vietnam at home
and for civil rights in the cities,
have I increased my chances next life
of coming back as a holy man, a woman, a gazelle?

That is progress on this wheel—
although most of us are stuck in millennial rounds
as mud-carrying coolies, mastodon bait,
spinning mill spindle girls, charcoal makers,
fast food clerks notching paper crowns for spoiled kids.

Born in 1840 I took a day and a half to die at Shiloh,
parched, blind, baked in dry rough wool, basted in my blood.

In 1740, fevered on a foul ship in foreign waters,
driven by a cutting lash to climb high spars,
I lost my grip in a yaw and fell to the wooden deck,
smashing my skull like an egg.

In Bavaria in 1640 it took me two weeks to die from blood
poisoning when an oxcart crushed my leg
and animal shit entered my blood.

In 1540 a Cossack stomped me because he was drunk and I
was not.

In 1440 large black blood-filled globules burst the skin
of my underarms and groin.

In 1340 an Asian horseman took my head for scimitar practice.

In 1240 Christians trampled me in the road.

In 1140 a fever within a week of birth.

1040 at birth.

940 at birth.

840 at birth.

740 I can't remember.

640 I can't remember.

But you can't even remember that I lived.

I was a pitch blender in the Phoenician trade,
a blood stain under a pyramid block,
scattered bones in the earth of a Yangtze dam,
torn by sharks after a typhoon,
somebody's idea of dog food.

Once in a distant historical instant, I was lifted
on murmured prayers and adored, the precious future
of a group of cousins who valued their families as much as sunlight,
but that was only in a small out-of-the-way place
before what you call civilization.

Copyright © Michael R. Brown



I met Michael R. Brown when the Save The Male Tour visited Cambridge, Mass., for a feature at the Cantab Lounge. Our feature was on par, and the slam was average, but the open mic still ranks as one of the best open mics I have ever seen.

This poem was one that I remembered specifically and in 2008, as asked Brown for a copy to show my friend Nika Levikov because I couldn't find it in any of Brown's books. He e-mailed it to me.

I worked with him at the 2003 National Poetry Slam as bout manager to one of the bouts he hosted. Incidentally, that bout was where I met Delrica Andrews and "Granma Dave" Schein from the Baltimore National Poetry Slam Team, who are wholly awesome people.



Michael R. Brown has been called the "the Jerry Garcia of performance poetry" by WBUR/NPR, "ein Dichter und Weltenbummler" by Die Welt, and a "rascal-artist-angel-wonder .. .at the same time" by Paul Stokstad of "Poets at 8." Michael R. Brown has published his poetry, fiction, travel articles and columns in wide-ranging periodicals all over the world. His fourth book of poetry, "The Confidence Man," was published by Ragged Sky in 2006.

In May 2007, Brown and his partner Valerie Lawson moved to Robbinston in Down East Maine, the easternmost point in the USA, where they have been granted the editorial and publishing privileges for Off the Coast, a poetry journal founded by Arlene and George V. Van Deventer 14 years ago.

Brown has returned to teaching, now at Shead High School in Eastport. As a correspondent for the local paper, The Quoddy Tides, his beat is the Passamaquoddy reservation at Pleasant Point.
He has also returned to the theater, acting in the Stage East production of It's a Wonderful Life and directing the Magnificent Liars Company in Mafia on Prozac.

Brown holds a Ph.D. in English and Education from the University of Michigan. His dissertation was a literary history of the poetry of the Harlem Renaissance directed by Robert Hayden. For 45 years he taught in high schools and universities from the South Side of Chicago to South Korea.

In 1999, he won the first Ronald J. Lettieri Award for Teaching Excellence at Mount Ida College.
Brown was a finalist in the 1991 individual competition of the US National Poetry Slam.

In 1991 he held the first poetry slam in Stockholm, Sweden, and lectured on African American Literature at Stockholm University.


In 1992 he organized the US national slam, and he was on the Boston slam teams that won the US Championship in 1993 and finished third in 1995. In 1998 he won the 6th International Slam in Amsterdam. Brown won the open slam at the 2000 Provincetown Poetry Festival, and he was the hit of the 2001 Rockland Jazz and Blues Festival in New York.
He has performed his poems from Jerusalem to Taipeh, Republic of China, and Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, to Key West, Fla. For 13 years he hosted the Boston poetry slam at the Cantab Lounge, Cambridge.

Brown was co-producer of The Culture of Peace, an international exhibit of art and poetry organized under the UN mandate for a decade of the Culture of Peace. This project has created an art and poetry exhibit and resulted in four exchanges of poets between Ireland and Massachusetts. He is general secretary of the Poetry Olympics, first held in Stockholm in 1998.

Brown's first published poem appeared in the first issue of
Beyond Baroque (1969). Recently published poems have appeared in "Sensations, 100 Poets Against the War," and "Spoken Word Revolution Redux." Forthcoming will be poems in the Sacred Fools anthology "Legendary" and a biker anthology to be published by Archer Books in San Francisco. Brown conducts workshops in writing and performance. He has several times performed his poem "Chorus" as part of Beat Cafe, an original ballet choreographed by former Joffrey dancer Anthony Williams. He appeared in the documentary film SlamNation.

In the past five years he produced and directed shows by the Off-Broadway Poets and Dr. Brown's Traveling Poetry Show, an ensemble who perform their own poetry in theaters. His full-length play, The Duchess of York,was a finalist in the Cape Cod Playwrights' Competition.

Thursday, October 15, 2009

The Art of Being an Atheist

Posit from a friend: "I have a very intellectual friend who labels himself agnostic. he claims that atheists are idiots in a sense because atheism is a religion. the belief in nothing, meaning there is no god, is a faith since there is no evidence that can prove the nonexistance of a god. what you say kind sir? (sorry that was poorly worded, but you get the idea i'm sure)

There are 'atheists' who subscribe to some sort of divinity or 'spirit' but they're not atheists in the true sense. Atheism isn't a religion. There isn't a book we all read or anything, it's just having a rational debate equatable to "Everyone believes in Santa. Never seen him and the only people who told me about him were my parents and friends, and Christmas songs, but they haven't seen him and there's nothing really out there."

That doesn't make an anti-Santaist, just someone who doesn't tell children there's a dude in red with an unhealthy addiction to stale cookies and dairy that's been out too long.

There are humanist atheists, Buddhist atheists, Jewish atheists, Taoist atheists and Christian atheists, some of them "strong" "ashes-to-ashes-dust-to-dust" atheists who find value in the specific teachings of their belief systems but deny any supernatural influence or existence.

The misconception that most people have about atheists is that there is a common belief system.

A number of atheists are really anti-Christian, anti-clerical or anti-theists, not true atheists, so they're fighting against Christianity specifically (other faiths have their detractors but Christianity seems to really bring it out).

As a 'strong' or 'hard' atheist, I lack an external belief system based around any theistic argument. I don't believe in anything, not "I do believe in nothing." It's a semantic argument, but one with weight.
Most atheists subscribe to basic conceit that "I don't believe there is any sort of spirit, God or life force" which is different than "I believe there is no sort of spirit, God or life force."

I see all faiths the same way we look back on extinct religions. We can derive moral stories from Zoroaster and the myths of Hercules, Gilgamesh and Mithras, but there's no need to slit a bull's throat on the winter solstice for prosperity for next year. Good stories, but so is "Lolita" and "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas."

The root of the issue beyond it all is the theocentric argument of "... since there is no evidence that can prove the [nonexistence] of a god." That's an agnostic cop-out based around a theistic belief system.

Agnostics are too cowardly to get out of the box and look at how the question is framed and theists assume they're right that they can ask a question that presupposes a deity and its up to atheists to prove them wrong with evidence that they themselves can find to argue the counterquestion. I respect devoutly religious people and atheists more than agnostics because the two factions have at least the conviction to settle on one side of the argument. Agnostics either haven't seriously explored the issue, don't want to, or choose to remain outside the argument altogether. Thus, I am far more likely to debate a religious person on merits than try to convince an agnostic to pick a side.

It's not up to us atheists to disprove god. There isn't one cause there isn't.
There isn't a monster under your bed either because there just isn't.
It's up to agnostics to argue that "there might be one but we can't prove it either way," or theists to prove, "there is a god, you can't see it, but trust us."

Being a fairly vocal atheist, I've heard the "prove to me that god doesn't exist" argument a lot. And the only rational answer is, "there isn't because you can't see one, feel one, touch one, or hear one. Prove to me that despite all the evidence of nothing that there is something. Then try to define its shape and behavior."

When this question is reframed, it can be pushed to the point of absurdity, "So god watches us? Like all the time? From where? And he knows all the things we do? And so he sees the times we 'sin' and the rationale we formulate, yet still act? Doesn't that seem counter-intuitive? Considering he knows we feel a little bad?" Etc.

If you like religion, great. Pray, hope, indulge in ritual. Just don't be a jerk.

If you can see the inherent human-centric arrogance in believing that an all-powerful deity has the time or interest in weighing the souls of people based on they think or feel then maybe you'll cross over into rational atheism. But at least explore all the options in your own head. When we die, we'll know what the real deal is.

Of course, as an atheist, it'll be slow fade, bright flash as neurons fire for the last time, then nothing.

Nirvana.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Nika Levikov video of "My Country"


For the past two weekends, my friend Nika Levikov has trekked down the hill from Flagstaff to Sedona for poetry events. She read a few poems at the GumptionFest IV pre-party at Ken's Creekside, then read the Cabaret Tent at GumptionFest IV Day One on Saturday.

This last weekend, she came down to keep score at the Sept. 11 slam I hosted at Studio Live.

We hiked to Devil's Bridge the next day.

Among the components of our friendship is critiquing each other's poetry. My favorite slam poem of hers is the identity poem "My Country," which I was glad she performed at both GumptionFest and as a calibration poem at the July 17 slam.

My Country
By Nika Levikov


Babushka likes to tell me about communism
the days when Ukraine was Russia.
The Soviet Union,
a name that has prevented me
from understanding who I really am.
Who I really am?
and sometimes I fear that stories
are the only things left to give me an insight.
Papa would always tell me how he dreamed of leaving.
life was rough and somewhere out there
America,
was an easier path
and that was really all he said,
his words flowed from his mouth like Matryoshka dolls,
never opened
and the layers upon layers of stories
he chose not to speak of.
And here I am, sitting in front of these faces
trying to explain why I must go there.

Dedushka laughs,
aside from my youth he says,
there is an identity that stays with you
before any Russian label.
And they aren’t ready for you yet.
They aren’t ready for you Jew.
They can see it in your face,
it’s written in your hair
and can’t you see how the letters are bolded across your jawline?
Jew, and they will hate you for it.

But I’m wondering how long
can you hide me from the ignorance of other’s.
How long papa,
will you shelter me from the judgment
that has slept under your very pillow
since the day you learned the meaning?
And can’t you see, mama
I’m not afraid anymore.
my only fear
is never getting the chance to understand,
to see you streets where I am certain
the sun still casts your shadow.

I want to go there
and feel your sweat, papa
that leaked from your hands
as you stood in line for days, waiting for your freedom.

I have heard other stories
and I am convinced that my eyes will burn
from shattered hearts still hanging on windowsills
and my ears will scream,
from the sound of tattered orange flags
still flapping from the signs that say “welcome”.
but I am also convinced,
that beauty thrives here still,
in the language whose voice cascaded over every Russian text,
in the dance
that has always broken free from Russian song.

mother, I come for you
and I do not forget you.
my family, born from you
my traditions, my tongue awakened by your distant breathes.

I want to see you.
I want to sleep in your skin
till the culture of my ancestors
becomes the air I’m breathing.
in you, rests a side of my family I have never known
and please, let me get on my knees,
bury my hands in their soil
and say “esvenee, esvenee mena”
sorry, for not having come sooner.

mother, I may not have been raised under your skies,
but I don’t think it’s too late to start learning.
to learn about your language, your song, your food,
and your independence.
I know that you will accept me
regardless of the blood that flows
with rituals of a different kind.
you have always been a part of me.
so I guess this isn’t an act of rebellion
against my family,
this isn’t for the justification that I am who I am,
I say to the world,
to my family,
this, is for my country.

Saturday, July 18, 2009

Results from the Sedona Poetry Slam

Results from the Sedona Poetry Slam

Friday, July 17, 2009, Studio Live, Sedona, Arizona, 7:30 p.m.

Calibration poet and host Christopher Fox Graham, "To the Girl Riding Shotgun"

Round 1
Mikel Weisser, 26.5 (1:55)
Ed Mabrey, 29.3 (3:08)
Markus Eye, 24.5 (1:04)
Gary Every, 27.5 (1:55)
Frank O'Brien, 27.4 (2:40)
Wendy Davis, 26.4 (3:02)
Norberto Cisneros, 24.3 after -2.0 time penalty (3:49)
Ryan Brown, 29.9 (3:05)
Maple Dewleaf, 27.9 (2:00)
Antranormus, 28.1 (2:13)
Jack the Mick, 28.0 (2:48)
---intermission---

Sorbet poet and host Christopher Fox Graham "We Call Him Papa"

Round 2
Jack the Mick, 27.2 (2:38), 55.2
Antranormus, 28.1 (2:27), 56.2
Maple Dewleaf, 28.4 (1:32), 56.3
Ryan Brown, 29.8 (3:03), 59.7
Norberto Cisneros, 27.9 (3:02), 52.2
Wendy Davis, 23.6 after -5.0 time penalty (4:49), 50.0
Frank O'Brien, 29.7 (2:37), 57.1
Gary Every, 28.6 (2:53), 56.1
Markus Eye, 25.4 (0:42), 49.9
Ed Mabrey, 30.0 (2:56), 59.3
Mikel Weisser, 29.6 (2:28), 56.1

Sorbet poet Nika Levikov, "My Country"

Round 3
Ryan Brown, 29.3 after -0.5 time penalty (3:13), 89.0
Ed Mabrey, 29.5 after -0.5 time penalty (3:16), 88.8
Frank O'Brien, 57.1 (30:0), 87.1
Maple Dewleaf, 29.8 (1:49), 86.1
Antranormus, 29.4 (2:30), 85.6
Gary Every, 28.6 (2:12), 84.7
Mikel Weisser, 28.0 (2:48), 84.1
Jack the Mick, 29.0 (1:28), 84.2
Norberto Cisneros, 28.3 (2:03), 80.5
Wendy Davis, 26.8 after -2.0 time penalty (3:41), 76.8
Markus Eye, 25.5 (1:35), 75.4

Final scores
1st: Ryan Brown, 89.0, $50

2nd: Ed Mabrey, 88.8

3rd: Frank O'Brien, 87.1

Maple Dewleaf, 86.1
Antranormus, 85.6
Gary Every, 84.7
Jack the Mick, 84.2
Mikel Weisser, 84.1
Norberto Cisneros, 80.5
Wendy Davis, 76.8
Markus Eye, 75.4

Slam staff
Scorekeeper and Timekeeper: Danielle "Deeds" Gervasio
Host: Christopher Fox Graham
Organizers:
Susan Schomaker, April Holman Payne, Jenn Reddington, Studio Live
Christopher Fox Graham, Sedona 510 Poetry

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

We Met in Sevastopol


Sevastopol (Ukrainian: Севастополь) is a port city in Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of the Crimea peninsula. It has a population of 342,451. The city, formerly the home of the Soviet Black Sea Fleet, is now a Ukrainian naval base mutually used by the Ukrainian Navy and Russian Navy. One of the most notable events involving the city is the Siege of Sevastopol (1854–1855) carried out by the British, French, Sardinian, and Turkish troops during the Crimean War, which lasted for 11 months. Despite its efforts, the Russian army had to leave its stronghold and evacuate over a pontoon bridge to the north shore of the inlet. The Russians had to sink their entire fleet to prevent it from falling into the hands of the enemy and at the same time to block the entrance of the Western ships into the inlet. When the enemy troops entered Sevastopol, they were faced with the ruins of a formerly glorious city.

We Met in Sevastopol
For Nika Levikov

We meet in Sevastopol
I discuss the politics of the place
while she talks about zoology
and a recent trip to Israel
I relate details of Dublin
to sound more worldly than I am

somewhere beneath the heavy jazz
and the lingering cigarette smoke
she takes my friend’s hand
and they dance hip-hop and salsa
to a song foreign to their footsteps
somewhere above,
Celia Cruz, Miles Davis,
and Saul Williams’ dead emcee
meet for the first time
smile and wonder why
they never met before
while down below
she ties my tongue with questions
I used to easily evade like a matador
but her horns clip my cape
and waking up in the ICU
I ask how she got so close so quickly
punched a hole in my chest
where my heart should be
I thought the cage I built around it
was impervious to impetuous inquisitors
but tin isn’t steel
and bruises with every beat

outside, I tell her tales
of peaches and breakfast cereal
to demonstrate that my grasp of romance
matches my skill in the kitchen:
wildly, absurdly reckless
and likely to leave bystanders sick

we pass letters of light
brief and instant
across the miles between us
condensing thoughts into seventeen syllables
and I still can’t say it right

“I like you but I
have no idea what I’m doing
please forgive me”

yet all the moments and words
seem right somehow
despite all my
over-thinking
stumbling awkwardly perfectly
toward wherever we’re meant to be:
friends or lovers
or poetic equals or forever strangers
or somewhere in between
and somewhere above,
Anaïs Nin, Anne Sexton,
and Simone de Beauvoir
meet for the first time,
smile and wonder
in whose footsteps she’ll follow me

from Sevastopol, she visits my city
the desert gallery soaking her to the bone
we traipse to Guadalajara suburbs
then travel to Chengdu
trading stories the way penpals trade letters
and I taste our future in the sweet and sour
on a mountain top freezing in the night air,
we search for Pluto among the stars
knowing they found it right here decades ago
I head home with my foolishness
as the only passenger

she visits when times are slow
and she needs someone to fill her loneliness
I bite my lip with the anticipatory heart-skipping pulse
of seeing her
of sharing poetry and stories
but bite my tongue near her
I need a smaller mirror or flexible camera lens
to see what’s written between tastebuds
it’s scrawled in Russian
but I forgot how to read Cyrillic alphabets
when my paternal bloodline said farewell
to the Ukrainian-Polish border
I would ask her to translate
but “you can’t say what you feel”
can only be read by her kiss
and
“you don’t know what you feel”
can only be read by her eyes on a page
and to ask her answer one way or another
would only ruin it all
it’s a fifty-fifty chance that I can’t afford to lose

this paradox of Russia has doomed men in uniform
since Napoleon visited Moscow
during the tourist off-season
with a million spring-breakers in tow
and a hundred years later when Hitler did the same
they both brought back postcards of dead boys my age
frozen in the snow
and the wisdom that a land war in Asia
only leads to failure in Risk

she hooks me like a fish
right through the lip
so that my words spill out sloppy
and any tricks I might use to move her
one way or another
only tear my skin wide open
so I just follow in her footsteps
try to lead her where’s she likely to follow
hope that her pet puppy remembers
the friendly familiarity of my scent
longing to treat her life kindly
bring along enough water to quench her thirst

somewhere in Sevastopol
echoes etched into brick walls
remember that on one Saturday during the siege
her great-great-grandfather and mine
saluted Nakhimov side-by-side
after hers returned from Shabbat
and before mine went to Mass
stood side-by-side bearing polished Warsaw muskets
that would fail to stop the citadel from falling
in the night, in the cold,
they shared Cossack and gypsy fiddle tunes
while watching Raglan’s troops shiver in the dark
and the scuttled Black Sea fleet sink into the harbor

two centuries later
I find the same ambiguity between us
as the muddled history between
Tatar, Ukrainian, Russian, Krymchak and Karaite
who can all call Eduard Bagritsky,
Taras Shevchenko and Hayim Bialik their poets
Leon Trotsky or Moshe Dayan their generals
make them their patriots
depending on context

I don’t know what to make of her
ally, lover, friend or stranger
but the poetry between us binds us
Anton Chekhov, Isaac Asimov,
and Vladimir Nabokov
meet for the first time
smile and wonder
in whose footsteps I’ll follow her
and through the haze I see her near
somewhere in Sevastopol
in the shadows of our fathers’ fathers tombs
beneath the dates that bookended their lives
in the whispers the grass
the answer lies
but Cyrillic is not my native script
so I must stumble onward
take note of the shape of characters
and play the cards she deals
wondering myself
if somewhere above
she and I will meet again
like it’s the first time
then smile and wonder
why it took so long
to learn who we were
meant to become

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Studio Live needs 12 spoken word poets for July 17 poetry slam

Studio Live needs 12 spoken word poets for July 17 poetry slam

Sedona's Studio Live needs 12 poets to compete in a poetry slam Friday, July 17, starting at 7:30 p.m.

In late June, a dozen of Arizona's best performance poets competed in a team poetry slam at Sedona's Studio Live. The event drew a packed house that enjoyed three hours of original spoken word as the teams vied for first place in a high-energy bout.

Before the slam was over, the leaders of the Sedona Performers Guild were so moved by the skilled poets' ability to emote that they offered to host a second poetry slam before the team heads off to the National Poetry Slam in West Palm Beach, Fla., in August.

Video from the June 27 poetry will soon be available on YouTube.

Proceeds from both the June and July poetry slams benefit the Flagstaff National Poetry Slam Team.

All poets are welcome to compete. Slammers will need three original poems, each lasting no longer than three minutes. No props, costumes nor musical accompaniment are permitted. The poets will be judged Olympics style by five members of the audience selected at random at the beginning of the slam. The top poet at the end of the night wins $50.

Already slated to appear are the five members of the Flagstaff Poetry Slam Team.

Jessica Guadarrama is a Sedona Red Rock High School alumna and current Northern Arizona University student. Guadarrama describes herself as a bilingual Mexican-American. She started writing in eighth grade but it wasn't until ninth grade that she discovered slam poetry when NORAZ Poets held a slam at the SRRHS auditorium.

Frank O'Brien is a 20-year-old student at Coconino Community College, focusing in the general studies and pre-nursing. Originally from Phoenix, O'Brien entered the slam poetry scene in fall 2007. In August 2008, he traveled with Cartier, Brown and Guadarrama to Madison, Wis., as a member of the 2008 Flagstaff National Slam Team. O'Brien is now an active poet and administrator of the FlagSlam Poetry Slam in Flagstaff.

Ryan Brown stated that he is a kid from Phoenix who spends most of his time posing as a writer and poet. He now goes to school and lives in Flagstaff, where he is the SlamMaster of the FlagSlam Poetry Slam.

Antranormus is a hip-hop artist who stated that he constantly seeks to redefine or blur completely the boundaries between hip-hop, poetry and absolute absurdity. Known for his complex, multisyllabic rhyme schemes and controversial subject matter, he has shared the stage with members of the Wu Tang Clan, Jurassic 5, Abstract Rude, Illogic, and Sole.

John Cartier helped revitalize Flagstaff's poetry slam scene two years ago and is on his second nationals team. Cartier is well-known for his politically savvy and socially edgy performance poetry.

The team will represent Northern Arizona against more than 80 other teams from around the country.

Also signed up to compete are:
Prescott Area Poets Association founder, Arcosanti Slab City Slam co-founder and seven-year host Dan Seaman


Sedona MC Fun Yung Moon






Kingman slam poet Mikel Weisser. Son of a nightclub singer, Weisser spent his teens as a hitchhiker. Since then Weisser has gone on to receive a masters in literature and a masters in secondary education, published hundreds of freelance magazine and newspaper articles and political comedy columns, along with seven books of poetry and short fiction. A former homeless shelter administrator, contestant on "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," and survivor of his first wife's suicide, Weisser teaches junior high history and English in Bullhead City. He and his wife, Beth, have turned their So-Hi, Ariz., property into a peace sign theme park.

FlagSlam poet Nika Levikov









Vermont slam veteran Kayt Perlman.Just in from Southern Vermont, Perlman aka Kayt Pearl, has recently relocated to Sedona with a deep sigh of relief. The north is cold. Co-founder of Women Divine Acapella & Rhyme, a traveling collaborative installment of all-women expression; Finder/Founder of Sound Foundation, an organization/movement for universal connection and cross cultural understanding through word and sound; northeastern regional slam poetess and co-master and founder of Martial Poetry Slams, the local slam scene in Brattleboro, Vt., local vocaless singer/songwriter and otherwise unknown human just trying to commun-i-kayt with the rest of us.

Recent Sedona Red Rock High School graduate Liana O’Boyle








two-time Haiku National Slam Champion and 2007-2008 Individual World Poetry Slam Champion Ed Mabrey, who has been a member of and coached several winning Rust Belt Regional Poetry Slam Teams out of Columbus, Ohio. Mabrey has released two books, "From the Page to the Stage and Back Again" to critical acclaim and "Revoked:My GhettoPass(ivity)" which was a limited release item.Maybrey has released two CDs of his own work, and has been on projects with other artists and DJs.

Mesa National Poetry Slam Team 2009 Grand Slam Champion Tufik "Tom" Shayeb. Shayeb has been writing poetry since 1997. His poems have appeared appearing in several anthologies, including "Lifelines" (2008) and "The Good Things About America" (2009). Additionally, he has published three chapbooks titled "Cracked Verses" (2007), "I'll Love You to Smithereens" (2008), and "How Did Things Get So Janked Up?" (2009); the second and third of which are selections from full-length manuscripts. Aside from slamming original poetry, from 2000-2008 Shayeb programmed the poetry of other authors into ten-minute selections for poetry interpretation performances on pre-collegiate and collegiate circuits. In 2007, he was one of the National Forensic Association's Poetry Interpretation semi-finalists, and then in 2008 he advanced to the American Forensic Association's National Poetry Interpretation quarter-finalist rounds.

Sedona Red Rock High School alumna Julio Perez is known for his graffiti art. His graffiti murals currently fill a 100-foot hallway at SRRHS and various arts venues around Sedona. As a bilingual poet, Perez cut his teeth on the stage performing poetry in both Spanish and English at the Sedona Arts Center, Tlaquepaque Arts and Crafts Village and the Sedona Poetry Open Mic. A lyricist, Perez and his band have also performed around Prescott and the 2007 and 2008 GumptionFests in Sedona.

Phoenix National Poetry Slam Team member Lauren Perry .








The slam will be hosted by Sedona poet Christopher Fox Graham, who represented Northern Arizona on the Flagstaff team in 2001, 2004, 2005 and 2006, attending National Poetry Slams in Seattle, Chicago, St. Louis, and Albuquerque.

Tickets are $10, available at Studio Live or Golden Word Books, 3150 W. Hwy. 89A. The team needs to raise around $2,000 to fund the trip.

Studio Live is located at 215 Coffee Pot Drive, Sedona. For more information, visit http://studiolivesedona.com.

For more information about the 2009 National Poetry Slam, visit http://nps2009.com.

Monday, June 22, 2009

Hiking with Nika

Nika Levikov was down in Sedona last week and called me up to hike on Wednesday. We headed up Schnebley Hill Road and got out to hike about 2 miles up the trail along with poodle, Timothy.
When we got to the Cow Pies, we were both blown away by the view and she ordered me to compose a haiku on the spot and she did one, too.

Mine was:
Outside my city
most will never see this sight
a good day to live

Sigh, I have a crush on her. She's also Ukrainian ... perhaps she's the Amidala to my Jedi ...
Photo from Facebook.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Nika's Haiku

Nika Levikov wrote this haiku in Russian back to me while in a chemistry lab.

Sontsa svetet
ya sezhu v nutri zdaneye
e honetsa spat

(sun is shining
i am inside a building
i would like to sleep)

Nika Haiku #3

Crush deepens with time
must find phrase for "awesomeness"
in Ukrainian

Nika Haiku #2

Flagstaff girl is board
so my words entertain her
and time seems to fly

Monday, September 29, 2008

"Freedom, Revolt, and Love" by Frank Stanford


Frank Stanford was a poet Nika Levikov told me about in Flagstaff. She was talking about the poets she had read and dropped his name. One of the problems in talking about favorite poets is that there are so many poets in so many genres that's it's impossible to know them all, or to judge their work accordingly. I try to read "good" poets and desperately try to be aware of them all. Invariably, though, when someone asks "have you ever read ... " we almost always have to say "no." It sucks because we look like flakes only pretending to be poets.

Nika sent me an e-mail today, which included this poem as a attachment. She said it is one of her favorites. I really enjoyed it, in part because it meshes with much of my romantic work which often deals with the dual factors of the play between love and death. A good death, while in love, is worth all the days before it.


Frank Stanford (Aug. 1, 1948-June 3, 1978) is best known for his modern epic poem, "The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You." He committed suicide at age 29 after a reported argument with his wife over his infidelity. Three rounds to the chest, which can't be easy to do, especially after the first two shots. I digress.

Freedom, Revolt, and Love
by Frank Stanford

They caught them.
They were sitting at a table in the kitchen.
It was early.
They had on bathrobes.
They were drinking coffee and smiling.
She had one of his cigarillos in her fingers.
She had her legs tucked up under her in the chair.
They saw them through the window.
She thought of them stepping out of a bath
And him wrapping cloth around her.
He thought of her walking up in a small white building,
He thought of stones settling into the ground.
Then they were gone.
Then they came in through the back.
Her cat ran out.
The house was near the road.
She didn't like the cat going out.
They stayed at the table.
The others were out of breath.
The man and the woman reached across the table.
They were afraid, they smiled.
The other poured themselves the last of the coffee.
Burning their tongues.
The man and the woman looked at them.
They didn't say anything.
The man and the woman moved closer to each other,
The round table between them.
The stove was still on and burned the empty pot.
She started to get up.
One of them shot her.
She leaned over the table like a schoolgirl doing her lessons.
She thought about being beside him, being asleep.
They took her long gray socks
Put them over the barrel of a rifle
And shot him.
He went back in his chair, holding himself.
She told him hers didn't hurt much,
Like in the fall when everything you touch
Makes a spark.
He thought about her getting up in the dark
Wrapping a quilt around herself.
And standing in the doorway.
She asked the men if they shot them again
Not to hurt their faces.
One of them lit him one of his cigarettes.
He thought what it would be like
Being children together.
He was dead before he finished it.
She asked them could she take it out of his mouth.
So it wouldn't burn his lips.
She reached over and touched his hair.
She thought about him walking through the dark singing.
She died on the table like that,
Smoke coming out of his mouth.

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Nika and the Yavapai College Poetry Slam

I went to the Yavapai College Poetry Slam on Sept. 26. I had spoken to Paula Blankenship with the college a few months ago about her slam. I had agreed to perform whenever she wanted.

The night before I had gone to Flagstaff with Manifest Destiny and my soon-to-be new roommate, Molly Berg, to Mia's Lounge. We met up with Nika Levikov, a severely cute and unbearably intelligent Flagstaff girl that Manifest and I met on Wednesday. The whole night Manifest and I flirted back and forth with Nika. It's not that often that a someone I meet can keep my mind on my toes with questions. She made me belabor my responses.

I'm attracted for certain, but wary. I have an unbearable insecurity about intimacy. For the most part, I've sworn off relationships because of my bad run in Sedona. With few exceptions, the women here are 1) already married or in relationships; 2) woo-woo or crazy; 3) enduring their third divorce before age 30; 4) under 18 but trying to pass as 25; 5) tourists with only a few days in town. It's just been safer to not engage with anyone on a romantic level. Perhaps I'm over-thinking it, but such is my nature.

In any case, I really like Nika, but I have no idea about her status. I'll flirt and see where that leads. If she has no interest beyond poetry, I am content. If she is interested, I am content to pursue wherever that leads. Relationships and friendships with me tend to settle to level that they are destined to.

In the interest of full disclosure, I hope she follows the link in my e-mail address and discovers my blog link to read this; there's no point in playing games, and she should know what I'm thinking.

Manifest Destiny stayed in Flagstaff at Nika's. He called on the 26th to say he was staying in Flagstaff for another slam at Applesauce and would head down to Phoenix with one of the poets.

I called Apollo Poetry and Sean Mabe about the Yavapai College Poetry Slam, which started at 7 p.m.

SLAM:
Band
1) Set draw, 5 max.
Band
2) Set draw, 5 max.
Band
3) Set draw, 5 max.
Band
4) Set draw, 5 max.
Scores

The format was untraditional. The YC people hadn't hosted a slam before, so the didn't conform to traditional rules. They had scores of scorepads so anyone could judge. We didn't quite understand the "rounds" so we initially only signed up for the first round. Once Blankenship and Terrence Pratt explained the format, we signed up again, Sean and Apollo in round 3 and all three of us for round 4.

I opened with "We Call Him Papa." I had the piece perfectly memorized from the FlagSlam, so it was an easy opening. I also wanted to test it with the crowd, which was rowdy from the band sets.

Apollo and Sean opened with peace poems, also to gauge the audience reaction.

For round three, Apollo hit "Rusty," one of my favorites. I think the poem's weakness is that it has several strong endings, so listeners aren't sure where it ends. It's kind of like watching "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King." I personally think the line "... but you just saved mine," is the strongest.

Sean picked a poem to mock Sedona. It was also a test run for curse words. He tripped up a lot, but it was a funny poem, especially for a Cottonwood crowd who may not necessarily think of Sedona fondly.

For the fourth round, I picked "Peach," mainly because Apollo hadn't heard it, and I don't often read for him. My other options for memorized, ready-to-slam poems were "Three Minutes for Dylan," "Spinal Language," "They Held Hands," "In the Corners of This Room," "A Poem About Clouds," "Manifesto of an Addict," "Breakfast Cereal," and "Coming Home."

Sean followed my with Saul Williams' "Ohm," which he performed flawlessly. Apollo followed with a poem whose name I did not catch, but whose performance I really enjoyed.

I wound up winning, which came with a nice trophy. Two slam victories in three days. I guess I'm back.

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Nika Haiku #1

Text from Nika Levikov: A writer at a loss for words? Come now. I expect something unique and original within the next 5 min.

Christopher Fox Graham's reply:
Nika’s Haiku:
Dancer ties my tongue
smitten by texting fingers
and a deadline too