Monday, April 21, 2008

7:30pm This Mother's Day Sunday Life-long Press Live at Pegasus !

Life-long Press Live at Pegasus ! w/ /Back Room Live/ contributors !
Janet Hardy ! Sara Mumolo ! Lucas Champagne ! Jack Morgan !
V.E.Grenier ! Sunday May 11th ! 7:30 PM

Janet W. Hardy is the co-author of "The Ethical Slut: A Guide to
Infinite Sexual Possibilities," which will be published in a new
updated edition in 2009 by Ten Speed Press; she has also authored or
coauthored nine other books about sexuality and relationships. She is
an MFA candidate at St. Mary's College in Moraga, CA, and is hard at
work on a very strange book called "Girlfag."

A scholar and a gentleman
Jack Morgan's work has appeared
The most hated poet in the San Francisco Bay Area
Jack Morgan coedits
Sorry for Snake

V.E. Grenier is the editor in chief of Life-long Press, a poet,
painter and bartender. She holds a B.A. in English from UCB and is in
her last semester of MFA work at Saint Mary's. She curates the
multi-genre reading series Back Room Live and is currently promoting
/Back Room Live/ a publication comprised of the writing of 26 of Back
Room Live's Readers.

Lukas Champagne would have authored his memoir /The Face of
Insurmountable Drunkenness/ had he persevered in said face.

Sara Mumolo teaches at Studio One Art Center in Oakland CA. She
attends the MFA program at St. Mary's College of CA. Poems have
appeared in Shampoo, Hoboeye Arts Journal, Article Journal, Berkeley
Poetry Review, Rock Heals (A Narrow House Weekly), Indelible
Kitchen and others. She co-edits the poetry journal Sorry for Snake
and curates with the Mission Arts & Performance Project.


LIFE LONG PRESS ! OAKLAND ! APRIL ! 2008

So that's,
Sun. May 11th at 7:30pm
Pegasus Downtown
2349 Shattuck Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94618
(510 )649-1320

DON'T FORGETT ABOUT OUR TWO EVENTS THIS WEEKEND!!!

FRIDAY Book Zoo
April 25th at 7pm ~ with /BackRoomLive/ Contributors ~ Trevor
Calvert ~ Challen Clarke ~ Zach Demby ~ Eleanor Johnson ~ Blake
Ellington Larson ~ Sarah Garrigan

SATURDAY Mc Nally's
BACK ROOM LIVE ! April 26th 7pm ! Linda Norton ! Ben Perez ! Ben
Prickett ! Sarah Fattig !

Monday, April 14, 2008

! BACK ROOM LIVE ! SATURDAY NIGHT ! April 26TH 7PM!

BACK ROOM LIVE ! Saturday Night ! April 26th 7pm ! Linda Norton ! Ben Perez ! Ben Prickett ! Sarah Fattig ! We'll have copies of /Back Room Live/ available for $8 !

Ben Prickett is an MFA student at St.Mary's College. Originally from Birmingham, he lives in Oakland.

Sarah Fattig is a poet whose work has been featured in Laurus and Octopus Magazine. Originally from Nebraska, she currently lives in Berkeley with her husband and their two dogs.

Benjamin L. Perez's poems have appeared in various print and on-line publications, including Watchword, Sacramento News and Review (SN&R), and Ishmael Reed's Konch. In 2005 Spuyten Duyvil published his experimental and transgressive novel, The Evil Queen: A Pornolexicology (making Dennis Cooper's top 10 list for that year). His main literary influences are the Oulipo movement and his dyslexia, which is quite severe.

Linda Norton is the author of /Hesitation Kit/, a chapbook of poetry published by Etherdome Press in 2007. Her essay and collages, called /The Great Depression and Me/, are posted online as a web exhibit at Counterpath Press. She is currently completing /My Little Brown Book/ a memoir and /The Public Gardens/ a full-length collection of poetry. She works at the Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley as an editor in the oral history office, and prior to 2002, she worked for many years for the University of California Press. Norton is a lyricist member of ASCAP. She wrote the text for Landscaping for Privacy, set to music by composer Eve Beglarian. Along with music for poems by Csezlaw Milosz, Stanley Kunitz, and William Blake, Landscaping for Privacy is available on Beglarian's CD Tell the Birds (2006).
LIFE LONG PRESS ! OAKLAND ! APRIL ! 2008

So that's,
Sat. April 26th at 7pm
McNally's Irish Pub
5352 College Ave
Oakland, CA 94618
(510) 654-9463
Minutes from the Rockridge BART Station
and on the 51 bus line
BACK ROOM LIVE IS A 21 AND OVER EVENT

3 LLP EVENTS SOON ARRIVING!!!

Book Zoo
Friday April 25th at 7pm ~ with /BackRoomLive/ Contributors ~ Trevor Calvert ~ Challen Clarke ~ Zach Demby ~ Eleanor Johnson ~ Blake Ellington Larson ~ Sarah Garrigan

Pegasus Downtown
Sunday May 11th 7:30pm ~ with /BackRoomLive/ Contributors ~ Janet Hardy ~ Lukas Champagne ~ Sara Mumolo ~ Jack Morgan ~ V.E. Grenier

Back Room Live
Saturday May 31st with ~ Veronica Carlos ~ Victoria A. Hudson ~ Zach Demby ~ Rebecca Guyon ~ Amanda Benson ~ Daniel Andrews

CHECK OUT OUR EXTENDED SHED. OF EVENTS TO THE RIGHT

Dislocated Elbow

Poet on Guard

I’m starting to count some money

Hallee hollers my name and flicks the lights

So I lock the cage and run up

Hallee’s on the phone Emily’s on the mats face down

Her arm

I run back down stairs to get my cell phone

I ‘m confused I don’t know what I’m doing
my phone is up stairs my keys are in my hand

I make one call Hallee makes the rest and I keep my hands on Emily

I tell her to try not to hold her breath and go ahead and breathe
and holler and cry

Emily has a keen sense of humor and we laugh

I go ahead and ask Hallee to go ahead w/ opening up the pub
she looks at me

I’m sorry I say I know it’s hard I’ll help you as soon as I can
I just need to stay down here with her right now

Emily asks me to go out to her car so I can change out her flower caked converse
I take charge of her keys and blue tooth and cell phone
She keeps her hat on

Me and the two women that have arrived help her sit up

Two men are here too to help get the pub up and running

Holding Emily up reminds me of holding up my grandmother
during a heart attack

“Why do I feel like I can’t breathe Valy?”

“Just try to relax Gram I’ll rub your hands just try to relax and breathe
slow and deep”

I needed to hold her so she could sit up so they could help her
we movie her from room to room they decide on a breathing tube


Once we have Emily safely on the stretcher one of the EMT’s asks me if I’m a mother

I told my mom that I love women yesterday

No I say
She looks me in the eyes she says “You should be”

I ride in an ambulance for the first time and stay with Emily until her sister arrives

I keep my hands on her tell her to breathe to try not to hold her breath and go ahead
and cry and holler

“I know it doesn’t seem like it but you’re ok”

At a certain point one of the doctors says the drug they’re going to give her
to put her elbow back in place may cause her to stop breathing

“you’re not going to let me go are you doc”

“We’ll breathe for you”

And Emily in the middle of it all says to the doctor
“Can I just tell you one more thing— eventually I’ll be wanting to know
if I’ll ever be able to pee again”

On my way back to work I hold myself together I walk not in a hurry and feel tired
8 hours of sleep over the past few days

I pick a young fennel sprig to roll between my fingers and look at the people I pass by

Back in the restaurant Hallie and I have a hug I tell her to go ahead and take a break
a walk around the block, she asks me if I’m sure I don’t need one

“I just had one but I’ll pee and then you can go”

We all make it through the day not to busy not too slow Emily comes through
She’ll be back to her other job in a week or two

Round about the 5 o’clock rush the kitchen computer goes down
I use my cell phone to sort out computer issues
field to go orders on the house phone hand writing tickets and hope
all the food makes it to the tables

My relief arrives we have a hug I fill her in on some things, have a pee, go to grab
my stuff

I sit down on the steps to breath and cry

Another co-worker comes in to grab something she sees me we don’t say anything
she squats down to wrap her arms around me

I clock out and rest at the end of the bar w/ a Picpoul spritzer and though I could just
sit home and sob I go to hear three women read poetry