Archive by Author

Streckfus, Peter 2004

Monday, February 2, 2004
with Dan Beachy-Quick and Arielle Greenberg

Trust the moth that flutters in your shirt. Its branch
is nearby. Secondly, you must fix your guitar.

– Peter Streckfus, “Memories are Nothing, Today is Important”

Broadside of Peter Streckfus’ poem, Memories are Nothing, Today is Important.”

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Read this interview with Peter Streckfus from The Conversant:

http://theconversant.org/?p=7742

Last night, my father came to my dreaming
self in the form of a vampire.
A vampire’s position is liminal—
neither alive nor dead, both and neither,
nini-funi in Japanese, two-but-not-two.

– Peter Streckfus, “Body Dreams”

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Watch Peter Streckfus read some of his poetry:

More info on Peter Streckfus ⇒

Strand, Mark 1982

Friday, April 2, 1982

It is evening in the town of X
where Death, who used to love me, sits
in a limo with a blanket spread across his thighs.

– Mark Strand, “2032”

Broadside of “2032” by Mark Strand

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Vintage poster of Mark Strand’s reading at the Poetry Center of Chicago.

Not the attendance of stones,
nor the applauding wind,
shall let you know
you have arrived,
nor the sea that celebrates
only departures,
nor the mountains,
nor the dying cities.

– Mark Strand, “Black Maps”

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Read this interview with Mark Strand from Guernica:

Mark Strand: Not Quite Invisible

Pultizer Prize-winner Mark Strand on falling in love, leaving the U.S., and the next chapter.

It shines in the garden,
in the white foliage of the chestnut tree,
in the brim of my father’s hat
as he walks on the gravel.

– Mark Strand, “The Garden”

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Watch Mark Strand talk about his work:

Romero, Anthony 2013

Friday, December 13, 2013

Watch a Performance Art Symposium that Anthony Romero took part in:

In>Time Performance Art Symposium from SAIC Performance on Vimeo.

Read an interview with Anthony Romero from Sixty Inches From Center:

Archive Lovers Night + Project Premiere with Media Burn and On The Real Film – May 19 – Sixty Inches From Center

The opening night of the Chicago Archives + Artists Festival features the screening of a new video work from a collaboration between Media Burn and On the Real Film.

More info on Anthony Romero⇒

Rorem, Ned 1980

Friday, November 21, 1980

I was a musician who happened to write, not an author who happened to compose. Thus the diary, being random and bloody and self-indulgent, answered to different needs than the music, which was planned, pristine, objective.

– Ned Rorem, “Setting The Tone, Essays and a Diary”

Continue reading the prologue of this book⇒

Listen to the New York Philharmonic perform Ned Rorem’s “Symphony No. 3:”

Ned Rorem / Symphony No. 3 (Bernstein)

Ned Rorem (b. 1923) Symphony No. 3 (1958) 00:00 – Lento appassionato 06:49 – Allegro molto vivace 09:10 – Largo 12:00 – Andante 16:38 – Allegro molto New York Philharmonic, dir. Leonard Bernstein (world premiere broadcast performance of 18 April 1959) “Rorem’s Third Symphony is much related to the last phase of his residence in France in 1957.

Read an interview with Ned Rorem from the Paris Review:

The Art of the Diary No. 1

ldquo;I am a composer,” Ned Rorem once said, “who also writes, not a writer who also composes.” His music-hundreds of ravishing art songs and instrumental scores, one of which won the 1976 Pulitzer Prize-has brought him fame. But it is his diaries that have b…

More info on Ned Rorem⇒

Sawyer, Larry 2014

Thursday, December 11, 2014
with Tyler Mills and Lina Ramona Vitkauskas
Chicago Cultural Center

Upstart cartoon morning;
these various roosters scratch inside the eyelids
and declare beneath the streetlamps that their
moats are filled with vowels.

– Larry Sawyer, “Sundial”

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Listen to Larry Sawyer’s 2014 reading for the Poetry Center of Chicago, with Tyler Mills and Lina Ramona Vitkauskas:

Larry Sawyer begins at 16:25 minutes.

The pentagon is a drop of amber
In which is preserved the animal mind

– Larry Sawyer, “A Cold Hand Draws the Covers Over the Moon”

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Watch Larry Sawyer read some of his work:

More info on Larry Sawyer ⇒

Stafford, William 1979

Friday, May 11, 1979

According to the silence, winter has arrived—
a special kind of winter. I, its inventor,
watch it freeze in calendars and stare
out of clocks. I do not feel its cold.

– William Stafford, “Shepard”

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Vintage poster of William Stafford’s reading at the Poetry Center of Chicago.

William Stafford’s poem, “Captive,” from “Traveling through the Dark,” handwritten.

Watch William Stafford read some of his work:

More info on William Stafford ⇒

Rollings, Alane 2006

Wednesday, March 15, 2006
with Ted Kooser

Have you noticed how when you see two people talking
anywhere in the world, one is almost always smiling?
Half of us are alive now; it’s hard to say
what we have least of. Children come into the world
by themselves. My family began with me.

– Alane Rollings, “When Single Rooms Can Spring to Life So Easily”

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Listen to Alane Rollings’ 2006 reading with Ted Kooser at the Poetry Center of Chicago:

Rollings begins at 22:20 minutes.

More info on Alane Rollings⇒

Spender, Stephen 1983

Monday, October 24, 1983

The I is one of
The human machines
So common on the gray plains—
Yet being built into flesh
My single pair of eyes
Contain the universe they see;
Their mirrored multiplicity
Is packed into a hollow body
Where I reflect the many, in my one.

– Stephen Spender, “The Human Condition”

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Read this interview with Stephen Spender from the Paris Review:

The Art of Poetry No. 25

The strength of Mr. Spender’s literary reputation, which is international in scope, has made him something of a nomad as scholar and poet. His homes are in St. John’s Wood, London, and Maussanne-les-Alpilles, France, where he spends his summers; but he is often on the road, giv…

More info on Stephen Spender ⇒

Rogers, Pattiann 1998

Wednesday, March 18, 1998

Consider the statement of bone:
Calcium and mineral gathered together and bound
Against the pressures of space, a latched
And maneuverable allegiance to the vertical,
That inner frame of stone determined
To keep constantly in its core the breeding
Red clay of the sea. I can believe
In an assertion like that.

– Pattiann Rogers, “Being What We Are”

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Read this interview with Pattiann Rogers from the Missouri Review:

http://www.missourireview.com/anthology/interview-with-pattiann-rogers

Each single spill of rain makes
many ringing water gongs on the pond,
and the calls of the crow are simply one gong
sounding after the other, circling wider
and farther, rippling the sky
above the rippled pond. Below, a toad bug
swivels near the shore, and many sand grains
shiver like cymbals with the force
of that mallet.

– Pattiann Rogers, “Design of Gongs”

Continue reading this poem⇒

Watch Pattiann Rogers discuss her early writing ambitions:

Pattiann Rogers | On Science and Art

Pacific University faculty from the MFA in Writing program talk about the program, writing, and their experiences at Pacific. http://www.pacificu.edu/mfa

More info on Pattiann Rogers⇒