Foothill Writers’ Conference: Day 1

Good morning! I am still wiped out from yesterday, my first day teaching at Foothill Writers’ Conference. After teaching two workshops, I realized I hadn’t thought about what I was going to read for the faculty reading with Justin Chin and Scott Inguito that evening.

First thing. I have to say, I am really very impressed; I don’t know how many writers’ conferences located in Northern California actually prioritize bringing in the local authors as faculty, as opposed to flying in all these authors from so many faraway places, at the literal monetary expense of the conference attendees. I feel like this latter model promotes the opposite of accessibility.

And so not only am I impressed at this conference’s efforts to reach out to local authors, but on top of this, the authors were quite diverse, not just in terms of multiculturalism, but most importantly, aesthetically.

So, I was actually quite afraid that this conference’s attendees would simply not be open to what I had to teach (I titled my seminar “Poetry, Politics, and Prayer: the Litany and the Line,” though when it gets right down to it, I was teaching mostly political poetry, all written by poets of color), and what work I had to share. I say this, being quite pleased that there was no basis for my fear. My seminar attendees (about nine more people than I expected to show up) were so cool, energetic, articulate, and open to discussion.

The poems I used:

• Claire Kageyama-Ramakrishnan, “One Question, Several Answers.”
• Huu Thinh, “Asking.”
• Oscar Bermeo, “I’m Jus Askin.”
• R. Zamora Linmark, “They Like You Because You Eat Dog.”
• R. Zamora Linmark, “Bino and Rowena Make a Litany to Our Lady of the Mount,” which we actually skipped due to time.
• Nellie Wong, “Grandmothers’ Song.”
• Frances Chung, “Sa Gow.”

Discussion here was so energetic, and I was so glad that when someone would say, “this is so powerful,” s/he would qualify what s/he meant by that. “Powerful,” meaning what? And why, and how? We discussed the purposes and effects of the repetitions, the questions, the numerous answers or absence of answer. We talked about the concrete images and artifacts, the clues each poet gives us to ground us in the specifics of place  or idea, and the importance of place and idea for the speaker: barracks, peach trees, fire hydrants, worshiping blue passports, peeling shrimp for pennies a day. We talked about intended audience and addressee, and we talked about tone, how political poetry can be effective in its subtleties or in its use of irony, in its geographic focus or in its philosophical approach.

I added Wong and Chung, “two American girls,” as I described them to be perfectly clear on “foreignness” (born and raised in Oakland, born and raised in New York Chinatown, respectively), because of the pantoum and the way poetic lines work in this form. One student described the pantoum as a mandala. We even had time to do a writing exercise, and for most of the students to share what they’d come up with in the 10-15 minutes given.

My second session was manuscript workshop, for which one student, a local Pinay poet, showed up! I got to work one on one with her for over one hour, and that was very substantial and satisfying.

There is more, of course, about the reading with Justin and Scott, in which I actually think we were paired well (can three people be paired?), and in which the audience was very responsive to my set of only Diwata poems,  but my brain is tired so I will stop here.

Quick shouts out as well to Marianne Villanueva, Jane Ciabattari, and conference organizer Kella Svetich. Again, I highly recommend this writers’ conference.