09/01/2012: For the City That Nearly Broke Me (Free Writing Workshop and Chapbook Release Event)

Title: FOR THE CITY THAT NEARLY BROKE ME
Author: Barbara Jane Reyes
ISBN: 9780984441532
Price: US$13.95

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2012
FREE Writing Workshop by Barbara Jane Reyes 12:00 pm – 2:00 pm

Book Reading “For the City That Nearly Broke Me” new chapbook 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm

VENUE: Bayanihan Community Center
1010 Mission St. (& 6th St.)
San Francisco, CA 94103
For more information please call (415) 553-8185
or email us at arkipelagobooks@yahoo.com

To RSVP, please visit the Facebook event page.

Incantatory, gritty, at times heartbreaking, and, yes, celebratory, these poems are amulets for our broken world. –R. Zamora Linmark, author of Drive-By Vigils and The Evolution of a Sigh.

Scribe of global soundscape, Reyes builds upon the heartbeat of literary and blood ancestors, feeding her “mythic thirst for home” as she journeys back to cities devastated and torn by the politics of race, history, class and sexuality, greeting her like an outsider. And still, despite the cities’ fall from grace, each gritty image, drawn on multiple languages and rhythms, is a love song, a reflection, a naming of the self. Bittersweet, powerful and precise, I adore this important book and the work of Barbara Jane Reyes. –M. Evelina Galang, author of Her Wild American Self and One Tribe.

In this fierce, feisty, anaphora-filled shakedown serenade, Reyes hard-scrambles our senses to position us firmly in poetry meant to electro-charge our attention real. This is a fine book of verse, reminiscent of Juan Felipe Herrera, yet singly Reyes. The supple lines ring endless rounds, bringing us bits of battle-singing and words wound true. Packs an amazing delivery and guarantees impact. –Allison A. Hedge Coke, author of Dog Road Woman and Rock Ghost, Willow, Deer. 

A big thank you to Arkipelago Books for organizing this event and handling book sales.