Monday, March 19
In Celebration of Women’s History Month
A Benefit Reading for
by
Traci Gourdine, Anna Marie Sprowl, and Sananaa Chochezi
7 p.m., Sacramento Poetry Center, 1719 25th Street
Donations requested to benefit WEAVE (Women Escaping a Violent Environment)
Guests are encouraged to bring poems about women to share at the Open Mic from 7-7:30 and after the features.
Co-sponsored by
through a grant it has received from The James Irvine Foundation
Traci Gourdine’s poetry and stories have been published in numerous literary magazines, and she has been anthologized within Shepard and Thomas’ Sudden Fiction Continued (Norton Publishing). She is co-editor of Night is Gone, Day is Still Coming (Candlewick Press), an anthology of writing by young Native writers, as well as We Beg to Differ, poems by Sacramento poets against the war. She has also co-edited the Tule Review with Luke Breit for the Sacramento Poetry Center. Traci Gourdine is a professor of English at American River College and chairs the Creative Writing department for the California State Summer School for the Arts. She was chair of the Sacramento poet Laureate Committee. For ten years she facilitated writing workshops within several California state prisons. Originally from New York, she lives in Davis, CA where she has raised two daughters.
Baby Got On
One of her legs is resting across a chair
girl teenager with the weeds setting in
she could lick your fingers
and tell you favorite stories
Her anonymity is easy
her straw words blow far across this city
mostly air ill-shaped with light
In Chicago the night bears wages
and she hunkers down
to fold as compact as nylons
careful to avoid getting torn
She wears other people’s hair
walks down stairs trailing dark grins
sheet of ice
pillow of razors
her blue-black eyeliner is streaming down
She’s learned this much
some rules are simpler than others:
chew words of violence then swallow hard
laugh when you fall off the curb
it can be a long train ride home don’t sleep
man is the name giver
listen
–Traci Gourdine
Sananaa Chochezi has resided in Sacramento for more than 20 years. For most of that time she has shared poetry and spoken word at countless venues including colleges and universities, K-12 educational centers, festivals and poetry features. She has been published in numerous publications including Speak, Write, Dream, an anthology of contributions from ZICA members, available on LULU.com. ZICA is a Sacramento based creative arts and literary guild with an eclectic, national membership. Chochezi also has been published in several issues of Drum Voices Revue, a publication from Southern Illinois University, Sierra College’s literary journal, and Poetry Now, a Sacramento Poetry Center publication, to name a few. When not writing and sharing poetry, Chochezi teaches public speaking and works as an editor, journalist, leadership development trainer and Myers Briggs Type Indicator practitioner. She holds a bachelor’s in journalism, a master’s in communication studies and is pursuing a doctoral degree in education.
Herd of elephants symphony
A herd of elephants stampeded
Through my living room again this morning
Humming a simple tune
They climbed up to the kitchen table
Devoured two bowls of oatmeal
And gulped down a tall glass of soy milk
They trumpeted loudly about the
Glory of a new day
Clanking the kitchen blinds
Then raced into the living room
Hopped up on the sofa
Bounced up and down
A few times and trampled
Through the toy box
Tossing puzzles
Toy cars and crayons Everywhere
As I timidly opened my
Bedroom door to peer at the
Wild and rowdy creatures
That had taken over my home
I discovered only my wide eyed
Two year old Grandson who called
Happily, Nani, you’re awake!
Wanna play match? (A game we
Used to call concentration.)
Truly a joyous symphony
To these grandmother ears.
Of course I do!
–Sananaa Chochezi
Annna Marie Sprowl has been writing and performing poetry for years. Her work ranges from the political to the domestic. Her pieces provide both warmth and fire for the reader. Anna Marie’s poetry flows with a smooth style and grace; she fills both pages and stages with her life experiences. Never shy to self-expression, she seeks to see understanding in the eyes of her audiences. Anna Marie has performed at The Show and Underground Books, as well as at the Crocker Art Museum, The Guild Theater, and at Jazz and Poetry 2010 and 2012 with the Brubeck Institute Jazz Quintet.
Playing Dress Up
She says when she grows up she wants to be just like me
Walking around in my barely used high heeled shoes
Reciting her own lines of poetry
and it’s far too soon she’ll be breaking ground in her own Jimmy Choos
She wants to work where I do
But I really don’t want her to
I tell her, think bigger
See, she thinks it’s so cool to have your own cubicle
But she’s only seven years of age and at this stage
Her dreams are still under construction
She is sensitive just like her mother is
Wears her heart on her sleeve and I have to
constantly remind her she needs
a coat outside in the wintertime…
and the real world
Because reality can be frostbite… amplified
She wants to play princess in my evening dresses
I’ve worn less times than she has
Obsessed with my purses, my little diva
The epitome of a drama queen
Which has me dreading dealing
with her first broken heart
For like me when she falls, she’ll fall hard
Tall in stature, strong in will
Right now she still believes in Santa Claus
and in time she’ll realize some laws
are meant to be broken
I tell her never settle for less, always do your best
Don’t be a follower unless it’s your dream
that will lead to your destiny and it will not be
in the form…of a man
Don’t get me wrong,
Yes, I want grandbabies but I rather her follow
in the footsteps of our first lady
and get a college degree first
See, I’m an ordinary wife, is it too much to ask
an extraordinary life for her?
It’s so cliché to say
I don’t want her to make the same mistakes I did
That old “I’m doing this for your own benefit” speech
that has been passed down from Grandma to Mom
and finally down to me
I’m not trying to live through her vicariously
I am just like every other mother who wants to see
her daughter grow up to be
A better, more successful woman than she
—Anna Marie Sprowl
Coming Events at SPC and Elsewhere:
All events are at Sacramento Poetry Center at 7:30 PM unless noted otherwise. Host name in brackets.
Poets Gallery [March]: Stan Fureby
March 17 [Bob Stanley in Carmichael][Sat.]: Jazz and Poetry with the Brubeck Institute Quintet
March 22 Literary Lectures with Judy Halebsky: Literary Traditions in West Coast Politics
March 26 [Tim Kahl]: Chad Sweeney and Catherine Daly
March 29 [Rebecca Moos and Paco Marquez]: Friends of SPC/Volunteer Meeting 6-7 p.m.
March 29 Literary Lectures with James DenBoer – Kenneth Rexroth: The World Outside the Window
March 30 [Valerie Fioravanti] [Fri.]: Stories on Stage with Rob Davidson, Max Boyd, and p joshua laskey
Poets Gallery [April]: Julia Connor
April 2 [Bob Stanley and Alexa Mergen]: Poetry from the writers at the New Folsom Prison workshop
April 5 Literary Lectures with Tim Kahl: Surrealism and its Academic Discontents
April 9 [Linda Collins and Theresa McCourt]: Readings by poets published in the latest Tule Review
April 14 [SPC Annual Conference] [Tim]: Steve Gehrke, Kate Gale, Christina Hutchins, Michelle Bitting and Christian Kiefer. [9:00 to 4:00]
April 16 [Rebecca Moos]: A Night of Fiction with Scott Evans, Bill Pieper and David Sutton
April 19 [Mary Zeppa and Lawrence Dinkins] Poetry at the Central Library, 828 I Street, 12 noon
April 23 [Tim Kahl]: Susan Cohen and Jeanne Wagner
April 27 [Valerie Fioravanti]: Stories on Stage with Lindsey Crittenden and Julia Jackson
April 30 [Lytton Bell and Frank Graham]: Benefit for the Sacramento Food Bank with Josh Fernandez, Rebecca Moos, Jen Jenkins, Allegra Silberstein, Trina Drotar, David Gay, and Todd Cirillo
