New York (Manhattan) 27 March
The reading at Cornelia Street Café – it was the last place where I met Jayne Cortez, almost a year ago with Rosamond King, when they asked me to be involved with Yari Yari.
http://www.sablelitmag.org/jayne-cortez-10-may-1936-28-december-2012/
Before arriving at Cornelia St café, I had my first experience of a Manhattan ‘cross-town bus’; something I won’t be doing again! I was on my way to meet Melanie Goodreax at Steve Collin’s house and gallery on the east side, near the Nuyorican Poetry Café – which I’m told, sadly, is not what it used to be. We forgot to ask Steve, about it or maybe we just ran out of time. Steve is – what can I say – quintessential new york art scene –– his space is used for anything from poetry readings, artist launches; floor sleeping space for Icelandic hiphop artists… his door is always open so that people can drop in and out . On our way in, Melanie and I met a theatre practitioner friend of Steve’s who shared her Green and blacks chocolate with me – on our way out – students from Sarah Lawrence College and a traveller who’d just published her first novel.
I had heard about A Gathering of the Tribes but never seen it, so was pleased to have the opportunity to see where it is birthed. It’s published once a year; with a new team each issue, then they have a big party to celebrate… It has made me do some re-thinking around SABLE. It’s good to talk.
Sharing the stage were Marc Jaffee – a founding editor of Box of Jars, an online journal of art and literature started about a year ago, Mukoma wa Ngugi and Libby Hodges, the publisher, herself of the St Petersburg Review. Mukoma and I met several 10 years ago online – we finally got to meet in person – both of us excited – yeah! Even though he had to go straight back to Ithaca the same night so I was SO pleased, that he made such a massive effort to come. It was only that evening I realised he had a collection of poetry published with Africa World Press, Hurling Words at Consciousness.
Maria Snelling now at SLC was there – she was in a class of Ellington High School in DC when I did a session there a few years ago. She’s working with an interesting journal,untapped cities, a web magazine dedicated to art, architecture and design that helps people rediscover their city.
Friend and fellow writer Anton Nimblett came too, with a couple of friends and flowers!
Mukoma wa Ngugi and Kadija Sesay