Strange Places

events, events, and meeting people

Posted by Daniela Elza on Nov 09 2008

The night before last was the launch of the Rocksalt Anthology at the Vancouver Public Library. I read. There were probably about 70 people who came on such a rainy night.

This is going to be an ongoing project for me: connecting and getting to know the community of poets in the pages of Rocksalt. A kind of celebration, a kind of culmination. Thank you to those poets who made the time to comment on my poem.

I used to think that when you have your poetry published it is like being exposed in public, with out the adequate garments to cover what you normally would.

Now, every time a poem is out into the world it feels more like taking my five year old to his first day in kindergarden. A whole, beautiful, pure being is placed into a public space to be shaped, warped, shared, understood, and misunderstood. It is a being separate from me, even though we are connected by an invisible umbilical chord. And yes, you get those tears in your eyes that you heard people talking about, and thought you will not get (what is the big deal after all). But it is a big deal, you have created this life, this poem, and even if it feels it has come out of nothing, it hasn’t.

I enjoy meeting people face to face. At the Agro Cafe launch I loved Jen Currin’s poem and deliverance, also Betsy Warland, Elena E. Johnson, Maxine Gadd, Kate Braid. I started going around with my book and asking poets to sign it, as a sure way to touch base (or shall I say face) with everyone.

I enjoyed meeting Rob Taylor (co-founder and editor of One Ghana, One Voice ), Anna Wärje, Zachariah Wells and others. Understandably I can only mention a few at a time.
I also had a chance to meet some of the brain and man/woman power behind Rocksalt. Peter Haase (Mona Fertig’s husband) and their two beautiful children. Here I suspect there will be photos from last night and other launches as well.

I am looking forward to meeting a lot more of the poets in the small moments before and after readings. I also want to thank Berenice, a friend who came to see me.

Looking ahead, this coming Thursday, Nov. the 13th, I will be at the Jewish Community Center as part of a word and art event around the Echoes art exhibit to which a number of us wrote poems last week to the displayed art. We will read in the art gallery at 7:30 pm. Come and join us if you can. Yes, fresh from the over poems. Hope they can stand on their own two feet by then.