Yes, I am alive. Yes, there is a hurricane on either side of this country. But by the time the hurricanes reach Cuernavaca, they are long, calm, "female rains" as Emily would call them. They've already combed their eyelashes with the coastal trees, as Jewel would put it. My second night back I ended up at an art opening at La Casona Spencer, where we throw the CuernaSlam. As I was leaving, my friend John said to me, "Well, welcome home." And I realized that I've never come home to Mexico before. But here I am.
I'm teaching three classes at the university this semester: English Literature I, Translation Resources and Translation III. I dig teaching, though it isn't my focus anymore. Why? Well,
2007 Tour By the time it was all over I had done 23 shows in 30 days. I played an abandoned KOA Kamp off I-40 at Two Guns, Arizona at a rock fest run on generators and whiskey. I made the pilgrimage and featured at the Bowery Poetry Club in NYC. I did an entire show with my fly unzipped in metropolitan Tempe. Puro exito. Prescott and Bisbee and Silver City reminded me why I love small towns. Albuquerque felt like family. Through they were only printed last April, I've all but sold out of "This Line Drawn Across Footprints" and "Where Do Airplanes Build Their Nests?"
Verbobala A lot has changed this summer. Though I'm in Cuernavaca again, some big opportunities have come up, and the future has started to take a bit of shape. Verbobala Spoken Video is consuming me, which is part of the reason not much has been happening on this site. Moi and Adam consistently blow me away. Collaboration is the only way to go, and it's an honor to be working with them. We're playing Poesía en Voz Alta at Casa del Lago in Mexico City at the end of the month. It's the very same festival that I flipped over last fall. What a difference a year makes. Oh, and speaking of a year: Verbobala university tour, fall 2008? It just may be. I love you AJ Lefty.
TipofyourTongue Festival, Penzance, England I've been waiting to mention this for awhile, but here it is, something I'm extremely excited about: I'll be featuring at the TipofyourTongue Festival in Cornwall, England next month. Verbobala owes its existence in part to this gig, which has been in the works the better part of a year. Verbobala will play on Thursday, I'll do a solo show on Friday, give a workshop and host a show on Saturday. They're putting me to work. It's going to be a great time.
Mexican National Poetry Slam, diciembre 2007 Along with Cara Cummings and a few other asskickers, I am helping to organize the first-ever national poetry slam in Mexico. We're still in talks with potential venues, but it will be the 7th or 8th of December. All are invited. The idea is to send a Team Mexico to the American National Poetry slam in Madison, Wisconsin in August 2008. You'll be hearing more about that. Here's some video from the CuernaSlam de Poesía, which just had its second show last week. I'm pretty proud of how it's been going. You can be our friend on MySpace and feel involved.
Spoken word festival at Arcosanti, mayo 2008 Can't say too much about this yet, but cool things are happening. Stay tuned.