Tag: Occupy movement

Posted in Guest Writer, Poems/Poetry

(pre) occupied

Posted on by The Bardo Group Beguines

Banks-to-Jail

(pre) occupied
by
Luke Prater (WordSalad)
Reblogged with permission
.
(out)classist Zen, dour Marxist yen
  unwelcome resting here
night:stick the pigs back in the pen
  torn figments of a year
.
no turning back, no pushing on
  unwelcome resting here
the sink-sunk rides old suns outshone
  torn figments of a year
.
to watch and flinch while women, men
  unwelcome resting here
stand weak in words beyond their ken
  torn figments of a year
.
the lighting flickers, then it’s gone
  unwelcome resting here
the power’s out for Jane and John
  torn figments of a year
.
preoccupied with Occupy
  unwelcome resting here
as Occident’s wrung wraithly dry
  torn figments of a year
.
police-guard-bull-statue-occupy-wall-street-1

©2012, Luke Prater, All rights reserved

9cdbb60f2264b266b199b0c889fba15a-1-1Luke Prater’s (Word Salad) poetry is ever fascinating. Luke will often tackle the same subject in more than one poetic form. Dedication, patience, and a singular irreverence are the hallmarks of this thirty-five year old English poet who took a degree in English lit with creative writing and performance and subsequently went to SOAS, London to study ethnomusicology at the master’s level. At twenty-seven he took up poetry, which he says saved his life – a thing it has done for many of us.  J.D.

Posted in Guest Writer

DO WE STAND TO BE COUNTED?

Posted on by The Bardo Group Beguines

DO WE STAND TO BE COUNTED?

by

Marilynn Mair (Celebrating a Year)

Do we stand to bear witness, or stand to be counted? Is it just because we’re tired of sitting down, or do we feel a real need to step into history? When do we say– no, that’s enough? When does it get to the point where nothing is more important than being there, even our regular lives. I have been there in the past and sometimes I bear witness now, but never to the point of letting everything else go. I watch others stand up today, and wonder if this fight is mine, is ours, or if it’s just the grumbling of a few moderns who suddenly lost their easy-button. In my class the students worry out loud that future generations will forget how to remember since their smartphones always remind them. Or that their younger cousins know about things, but not how to actually do them. Will the Occupy movement have any large-scale effects? No answers here. But I’m thinking a few days in a park actually talking, a few nights in a tent lacking the isolating comforts of home, just might be a good thing for those who perhaps have never before been there.

© 2011 Marilynn Mair, All rights reserved

♥ ♥ ♥

I am pleased to introduce for the first time here: Marilynn Mair (Celebrating a Year), also known as the “angel of the tremolo” and “the first lady of mandolin”. Marilynn is Professor of Music at Roger Williams University, Bristol, Rhode Island, U.S.A. Her most recent CDs are Meu Bandolim and Enigmatica. Her most recent book is Brazilian Choro – A Method for Mandolin. This post and photograph entered here today are from Celebrating a Year. They were posted by Marilynn on October 18 and are re-blogged with her permission. For more of Marilynn’s story, link HERE.  Jamie Dedes

_____

“Best known for her performances and recordings of chamber music, Ms. Mair has also, in recent years, become increasingly involved in the field of Brazilian music, performing and recording “choro,” an early-20th-century style of Brazilian jazz that features mandolin. She has researched choro extensively, and her articles on its history and music, published in Mandolin Quarterly and elsewhere, are some of the most complete available in English.” Max McCullough (Mandozine)

Video uploaded to YouTube by .