Waves Breaking

I got to talk on the phone with poet Kenyatta JP Garcia and their most recent collection Slow Living.

Kenyatta JP Garcia is the author of They Say, Slow Living and ROBOT. JP was raised in Brooklyn but currently resides in Albany, N.Y. where they received degrees in English and linguistics. They are an editor at both Rigorous and Five 2 One Literary Magazine. In a past life, they were a cook for about a dozen years. In this modern incarnation, they get paid to put boxes on shelves by night and by day they read comics, pine, worry, and attempt to craft something worth reading.

• JP's Website
• Slow Living
• ROBOT: The Waste Land Reimagined
• Yawning on the Sands
• Frank O'Hara
• Oscar Wilde
• Jean Genet
• Alice Notley
• an article about queer death in the media, not the article JP mentioned, but hopefully helps some
• Michael Sikkemma
• Danielle Pafunda
• Mark Lamoureux
• H.D.'s Helen in Egypt
• Moss Angel Witchmonstr
• Jean Toomer's Cane
• Here by Richard McGuire (not Bill Kartalopoulos like I said in the episode!!)
• Hank Williams Sr.
• Joy Division
• Brooklyn Radio's History of Hip-hop
• Johnny Cash & Family "Will the Circle Be Unbroken"
• Claes Oldenburg
• Andy Warhol
• If you can, check out Dr. Schoerke's essay, "The Divided Heart," specifically examines the sentimentality-vs-modernism forced schism more clearly than how I articulated it

In this interview, I get to talk IN-PERSON with Julian Shendelman about his new chapbook, Dead Dad Club (Nomadic Press, 2017).

Julian Shendelman has a weird looking dog (part fawn, part fruit bat) and a nice Jewish boyfriend. After 10 years of living in Oakland, where he was an organizer for the Bay Area Trans Writers Workshop, Julian is relocating to Philadelphia with hopes of having more time to write. He was a 2016 Pushcart nominated poet for his piece in Bat City Review, and won a Literary Death Match with a true story about queer punk cannibalism. His first published chapbook, "Dead Dad Club," was released by Nomadic Press in March of this year.

Poets and groups mentioned in this episode:

Cam Awkward-Rich (check out the interview I did with Cam here)

Zach Ozma

Thel Seraphim

Bay Area Trans Writers Workshop (if you're in the area, not-cisgender and not a jerk, please come!)

"Welcome to the Dead Dads Club" scene in Gray's Anatomy

Seahorse by Natasha Dennerstein

Quiéreme by Juliana Delgado Lopera

Timeless Infinite Light (sign up for a subscription!)

This month I had the pleasure of interviewing Ching-In about their recent publication, recombinant. We got to talk about archive, language, history, and gender.

Ching-In Chen is the author of The Heart's Traffic (Arktoi Books) and recombinant (Kelsey Street Press) and co-editor of The Revolution Starts at Home: Confronting Intimate Violence Within Activist Communities (South End Press; AK Press) and Here is a Pen: an Anthology of West Coast Kundiman Poets (Achiote Press). A Kundiman, Lambda, Watering Hole and Callaloo Fellow, they are part of the Macondo and Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation writing communities. Their work has appeared in The Best American Experimental Writing, The &NOW Awards 3: The Best Innovative Writing, and Troubling the Line: Trans and Genderqueer Poetry and Poetics. They are a senior editor of The Conversant and poetry editor of the Texas Review. They serve on the Executive Board of Thinking Its Presence: Race, Advocacy, Solidarity in the Arts as the Director of Membership and Social Media. www.chinginchen.com

Have a listen, spread the word!

Artists and works mentioned in this episode:

• Ching-In's book recombinant
• Ching-In's book The Heart's Traffic
• The Peabody Essex Museum's collected artifacts of the basket and fan
• Milwaukee lynch mob information
• Cheng Chui Ping aka "Sister Ping"
• Golden Venture Disaster
• Michael Lin's artwork at Peabody Essex Museum
• I Was Born with Two Tongues
• Tyehimba Jess's Olio
• Syncopated Sonnets
• Kunidman
• Cathy Linh Che
• Wo Chan
• Jai Arun Ravine
• Trish Salah
• conference: Thinking as Presence, creative writing, race and the arts. CFS!

The Sound of Waves Breaking this week is from Jon Jang and the Pan-Asian Arkestra's "Night in Tunisia," just in case you're curious. This episode was edited by Mitchel Davidovitz, whose sound project you can find here on bandcamp

While I was on the East Coast to attend/table AWP, Tyler Vile and I got the chance to meet up with each other in D.C.'s Green Lantern bar to talk poetry and punk. The photo for this month's episode was taken just after our interview.

Tyler Vile is a writer, performer, and activist from Baltimore, MD whose novel-in-verse, Never Coming Home, is available on Topside Press. She is a member of the Baltimore Transgender Alliance leadership team and the vocalist in a punk band called Anti-Androgen. Her interactive poetry zine, Hassidic Witch Murderer is available on her website. She aspires to one day become the world's greatest transsexual yenta.

Artists/Bands Mentioned in the show:

• Tyler's Wesbite
• Never Coming Home
• Hassidic Witch Murderer
• Anti-Androgen's bandcamp
• Cat Fitzpatrick
• Punk Globe
• Cpunk or CripplePunk movement
• the Sidebar
• Media Pigs
• the Germs
• Jayne County
• Ginger Coyote
• Operation Ivy
• The Fags
• Raped (UK band)
• Minor Threat
• Black Flag
• Marginal Man
• Government Issue
• John Stabb
• John Berry
• The Slickee Boys
• Iron Cross
• the Twats
• Mischief Brew
• Bad Brains
• G.L.O.S.S.
• Venus Selenite
• Lady Dane Figueroa Edidi
• The Baltimore Transgender Alliance
• KOKUMỌ
• Kay Ulanday Barrett The Sound of Waves Breaking this week was a demo version of "FUCK THE WOLVES" by Anti-Androgen.

It was such a gift to speak with emerging-talent Aristilde Kirby for this month's episode! Aristilde Kirby is a twenty-five year old lesbian trans-woman poet and songsmith originally from Bronx, NY, but now resides from Carrollton, GA. She is a UGA Master Gardener. She is working on a chapbook entitled [bitácora total bust] and an EP entitled [LA POESÍA DEL CANTE JONDO], which will be out sometime in future recent history, hopefully.

Authors, artists, and books mentioned in this episode:

• Aris's twitter account
• Mei-Mei Berssenbrugge
• Jamie Berrout's translation of Esdras Parra's Este suelo secreto/ To Be Human Once More
• Frederico Garcia Lorca's Poema del cante jondo
• Trans Women Writer's Collective website
• Kay Gabriel's "Untranslating Gender in Trish Salah's Lyric Sexology Vol. 1"
• The name of the woman whose name escaped Aris's mind was we were talking about Aris's recent publication was Ralayzia Taylor. You can donate to her YouCaring for her to help cover medical expenses, food, and secure housing.
• Vetch Journal
• Nina Chaubal has been released! You can still help her cover lawyer fees!
• Peachy Parade / ピーチー・パレード
• Allen Thomas Void Scrolls I
• Frida Palacios
• No Name's Telefone
• Mitski's Puberty 2

The Sound of Waves Breaking is Aris's poetic soundscape "Opaline Y Hyalite" which you can find here at her bandcamp. Editing was done by Mitchel Davidovitz.

This month's interview is with none other than Jayy Dodd! In this episode we talk about their work in other genres of art and critique, compensation for labor, and their newest chapbook, [sugar in the tank].

[sugar in the tank] can be found here

Jayy Dodd's website

"All my exes look like mass murderers"

Jayy as an editor

Jayy as a graphic designer

Jayy as Social Media manager

Donate to Jayy for their work here and here

Georgina Arroyo's website

The Shade Journal, issue 1

Langston Hughes' "I, Too"

"Hyel's Zumbi"

Tafisha A. Edwards

Morgan Parker

Danez Smith

Joshua Jennifer Espinoza

Luther Hughes

The Sound of Waves Breaking is Lucille Clifton reading her work "blessing the boats," a poem I return to often in this post-election climate.

I am so honored to get to speak with Vita E. Cleveland about her recent chapbook Dedications. The conversation, of course, wanders toward her percussion expertise, musings on art's intersection with activism, slut shaming in activist circles, and more.

Notes of Poets Mentioned in this episode: Vita E's tumblr Vita E's youtube Vita's new ebook, Dedications Saul WilliamsJ Mase III Regie Cabico Kavindu Ade awQward Talent Agency TaneshaNicole Tyler's performance at TED Talk Timothy DuWhite CeCe McDonald giving a talk at the Humanist Hall Dane Figueroa Edidi Ashleigh Shackelford Capturing Fire 2016 Kay Barrett Kit Yan Venus Selenite Linette Reeman Nik Moreno Edited by: Mitchel Davidovitz, whose experimental audio work you can check out at his bandcamp. "The Sounds of Waves Breaking" was Vita E's drum solo "Clave." You can listen to the entirety of "Clave" at her SoundCloud page. Transcripts forthcoming.

In this month's episode, Jay Besemer and I talk about his recent book, Chelate, along with other topics, including: living with chronic illness, our relationship with nature, sci-fi, poetry comics, and time.

Books and things mentioned in this episode:

• Jay's Tumblr
• Samuel Delany's Babel-17
• Petra Kuppers' essay in Transgender Studies Quarterly
• Oliver Baez Bendorf's poetry comics
• Clover manga
• Bianca Stone's poetry comics
• Warren Craghead III's poetry comics

Theme Music is by Bahati Kiro

Music throughout is by Chris Zorn

Transcripts forthcoming from Amir Rabiyah

The Sound of Waves Breaking is the ambient noise of Terok Nor from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

In this episode I talk with Cameron Awkward-Rich about his approaches to poetry and theory, and the poetry in his new book Sympathetic Little Monster.

Cameron has published poems in The Journal, cream city review, Muzzle Magazine, Hobart, The Seattle Review, The Offing and elsewhere. He is a Cave Canem Fellow, a poetry editor at Muzzle Magazine, and currently a doctoral candidate in Modern Thought & Literature at Stanford University. Cam is the author of the chapbook Transit (Button Poetry, 2015) and his debut collection, Sympathetic Little Monster, was published by Ricochet Editions in 2016.

Go check out Sympathetic Little Monster, its a wonderful collection.

Writers who were mentioned in the shout outs:

James Baldwin's essay "Here Be Monsters"

Aracelis Girmay

Ari Banias

Danez Smith

Franny Choi

Sam Sax

Justin Phillip Reed

Fatimah Asghar

Aziza Barnes

Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib

The Sound of Waves Breaking this week is the sound of opening an attic, as found on freesound.org

Jai Arun Ravine talks to me about their newest book, The Romance of Siam, just released from Timeless, Infinite Light. We talk about their use of humor in critiquing orientalism, the tourist industry in Thailand, and their process as an interdisciplinary artist.

The sound of waves breaking is "Once in a Lifetime," the theme song for Thailand's tourism campaign.

Jai's website: http://jaiarunravine.com/

The Romance of Siam: http://timelessinfinitelight.com/collections/frontpage/products/romance-of-siam

Jai's performance piece from 2010, "TOMBOIGATOEYMANGO": https://vimeo.com/15429089

Once in a Lifetime Commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5_zFBH4wqU

Ambient Asian Space: noodlecroons.tumblr.com

Jo Ann Wasserman's book of sestinas, "The Escape": http://www.futurepoem.com/books/the-escape

Gabriel Ojeda-Sague & Jai Arun Ravine in conversation about adjacency: https://medium.com/drunken-boat/a-conversation-between-gabriel-ojeda-sague-and-jai-arun-ravine-fea4b9c44842#.cgsw305tg

Gabriel's book: http://timelessinfinitelight.com/products/oil-and-candle

Jim Thompson, the Unsolved Mystery: https://www.amazon.com/Jim-Thompson-Unsolved-William-Warren/dp/9813018828

Information about W. Somerset Maugham in Thailand: http://padraigrooney.com/journalism/a_literary_journey_through_thailand.html