Morning in Boston, Night in Australia, A Multi-National Online Poetry Reading

A Feature from the Archive, August 14, 2021

It was a memorable poetry reading I co-hosted today ‘From Boston to Oz’ with my long-time poet online friend from Adelaide, Australia, Deb Stewart who had the idea for the event and invited me.

🙏😊

And yes that was a book of hers on my shelf Slow Notes, a beautiful white & green poetry book I’ve had a long while that you might’ve found among the poets on my bookshelf in a photo from ‘A Photo Walk Inside.’

There was such a brilliant array of beautiful, lingering poems read aloud in this multi-national reading, including award-winning work in both Australia and the East Coast of the USA.

I read aloud my ghazal poem, (a traditional form started in early medieval Persia), which suddenly felt finished to me at the very end of the week! It’s my most recent poem and also the first ghazal I’d written.

I’ve enjoyed and shared work from early and medieval Persian and Middle Eastern poets awhile on this blog, beginning with Rumi, and also mentioning poets like Hafiz, Mir, May Ziadeh, Mimi Khalvati, Hedy Habra, Roula-Maria Dib, and Khalil Gibran.

This online reading today took place late Saturday night in the Australian states and during bright sunrise morning-time on the East Coast of the USA.

While we didn’t record the Zoom event today as we would’ve needed to announce that to the poets prior to signing up, I’d like to share my recent poem I’ve mentioned coming up on the blog, and we’d also like to host another event like this sometime in the future.

My cat Peeko, who likes hearing poetry read to him, was present with me for the event and was acting up just before it, leapt right on my chair with a near-arching back and slightly-raised fur, where I was set up, which he very rarely ever does—I lifted him up and off the chair swiftly but gently, and he was mad, looking at me with a threatening look and following after me, so I got my water spray-bottle the vet recommended to us for better behavior and said, ‘That’s not good behavior, Peeko; you need to show the good manners that you have’ and held the bottle up.

He looked back at me and was great after that. I tilted the camera to introduce him to Deb, the host in Australia as the event was almost ready to start. I could see he had rolled onto his side on the floor a short distance from the chair and tumbled over so very slowly enjoying a vibrant poem by an Australian poet who performed it with lines about ‘Boys and men’ which Peeko loved as he likes being referred to as a ‘boy’ and especially a ‘big boy’ himself, and was slowly turning over to one side at those points. And he’d not yet heard performance or slam-style poetry either. 😊

***

Yesterday my new oven was brought in and I am very happy with it is as it was so quickly replaced and it coordinates nicely with the appliances while brightening the kitchen in a new way.

I enjoyed the Gas company attendant arriving yesterday (and was the same one who had come the night before I didn’t meet then) to check the safety levels again with Carbon Monoxide for the new oven as I’d requested. This man was so vibrant and excited about his field, sharing little tips with us about fumes, surfaces, and levels, swinging that meter gun with great enthusiasm. He reminded me of myself, how I can be excited sharing my own knowledge of things, like poets and literature to someone listening or in writing.

He was impressed with it all remembering the night before when he’d received the emergency call then to us like— ‘Man, I put my face up to that oven and my head hurt after that! I got the gun up to it, right, checked the levels, and Man, that oven was bad! I couldn’t believe it, man, that was a bad oven!’

And me, Dan, the agent, and service worker from our complex were standing back as he’d continued as if like this is pretty theatrical and we hope this guy has this right! Looks like he does…And you see enthusiasm is a good thing, not necessarily getting one carried far away. And I’d asked him specific questions about this oven.

And the true test: We’ve woken brightly, although I am sleepy and resting nicely today as all the commotion with things breaking at home at the same time and busyness had stirred me. But I am well overall and I appreciate the air feeling so right.

🍃🌬😊💗🌤🙏

Yesterday: A Morning So New