3 posts tagged “poetry”

more from suheir who has been keeping busy:

Book Launch for Suheir Hammad’s “breaking poems”
Thursday, October 30, 2008 6-8pm
Bowery Poetry Club, 310 Bowery, New York City $20 (with a copy of breaking poems) $10 w/out

Guests include Paul Beatty, Patricia Smith, Roger Bonair-Agard, Patrick Rosal, Aracelis Girmay, Danny Hoch and others

Suheir Hammad's break introduces English to an Arabic vernacular that startles into being an altogether new language, bridging the archipelago of a Palestine under siege to the diaspora and beyond, breaking through convention, breaking open locks on mind and heart, breaking into a music inspired by the Coltranes, Sun Ra and free jazz, Lee Scratch Perry and Ravi Shankar, a music that is at once a joyous celebration of survival and a poignant cri de Coeur that cannot be ignored and that Mahmoud Darwish should have lived to see.  This is a poetry written for people who have endured the winds of hurricanes and invasions  What wisdom, energy, joy and poignancy Hammad brings to the page-for all of this, and for teaching me a new speaking, I give her my thanks.  – Carolyn Forché

Founded in 2003, Cypher Books, a New York City-based, independent publisher is proud to present breaking poems, the second collection of poems from Tony award-winning poet, Suheir Hammad.  Consistent with Cypher's mission to publish innovative and necessary poetry, Hammad departs from her previous books with a bold and explosive style to do what the best poets have always done: create a new language.  Using “break” as a trigger for every poem, Hammad destructs, constructs, and reconstructs the English language for us to hear the sound of a breath, a woman's body, a land, a culture, falling apart, broken, and put back together again.

Cypher Books has recently transitioned from being an imprint of Rattapallax Press to a full-fledged press under the sponsorship of Bowery Arts & Sciences.   This celebration will also serve as a fundraiser to benefit future publications and programming.

without doubt the greatest part of working in the 'culture industries' in dubai over the past few years has been connecting with passionate people pushing things forward around the world. we were honored to host a very special, intimate spoken work performance by suheir hammad years ago (2004 i think) at five green in dubai. suheir had just spent time traveling around palestine / israel and traveled straight to us practically performing on arrival. needless to say she was charged, the audience stunned.

i recently received an email from her updating me on her latest news:

last year i spent 3 months in palestine, the longest amount of time i'd ever been allowed to stay there.  i had the honor of working on annemarie jacir's film, salt of this sea.  the film is important to me for many reasons, and while i'm not an actress, the film's story and the larger story it was engaging in are very dear to my heart.  we all did our best, and cannes noticed by officially selecting it for the un certain regard category.

the film's site has a link to a facebook page which is updated with festival news, awards, press and photos. please fwd the links to your friends and groups of good folk.  there is info for festivals and distributors on the site as well.

other than a bit of press, i haven't talked much about my experience because it was so much.  it will take me years and times to express the magic fully.  in the mean times, holla.

one
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there's more info online: http://www.philistinefilms.org/ and the trailer is at: http://www.philistinefilms.org/salt_trailer.html