Hello and welcome.
I'm Frances Sjoberg, the Literary Director
of the Poetry Center.
It's a delight to see you all tonight.
And we are very, very excited to present the first recipient
of the Mary Ann Campau Memorial Fellowship
for Southern Arizona writers.
I'm certain that everyone who knows Maria Elena Wakamatsu
agrees with me that she does, indeed, strengthen and inspire
our literary community.
She really does embody the goal of this fellowship.
Ms. Wakamatsu will be introduced tonight
by Pamela Yosuke, one of the visionaries
behind the fellowship, and a juror on the selection
committee.
But before I hand over the mic to her,
I have just a couple of announcements.
First is that the Mary Ann Campau Fellowship
is sponsored by individual donors
in our community who have come together
to create this award to recognize our strongest
poets and community leaders.
We're still several thousand dollars short
of an endowment, which would allow us to offer
this award in perpetuity.
And that is something we'd like to do.
We'd like for Maria Elena to be the first
in a very long, long line of fellowship recipients.
And if anyone in the audience is interested in learning
more about how to contribute and ensure that the Mary Ann Campau
Fellowship does sustain, please feel
free to talk to me after the reading.
Tonight we are selling Like a Waterweed Ghost,
both in book format and CD format, as well as the--
Is it the new issue of cutthroat, that--
it's the one that's--
The issue of Cutthroat Magazine dedicated to Mary Ann Campau,
after whom the award is named.
And all of the proceeds from sales
of these books and CDs, journals,
will go directly toward sustaining the fellowships.
So take a look at those.
Books are $20, CDs are $10, as is the journal, $10.
And, we're continuing Stanza Bonanza.
Those of you can come to our readings
regularly know about Stanza Bonanza.
It is a K through 12 book drive to seed local-area schools
with great books of poems.
And one thing that we do is we offer challenges.
And tonight's challenge is this--
we need 10 copies of Pablo Neruda's 20 Love Poems
and a Song of Despair.
This is for high school libraries.
Which is available for sale for $10, a discounted price.
And there's a bonus--
Pat Brooks has offered to match every single donation
of Pablo Neruda's book of 20 Love Poems
and a Song of Despair with Pablo Neruda's Book of Questions,
which will be donated to middle school libraries.
That book is on sale for $12, which means for every $10 book
that you purchase and donate to a school library,
you're actually purchasing two books for two different age
levels, and $22 worth of books for libraries.
So, it's a pretty good investment.
Not to mention the investment of just building the repertoire
of great poems in the minds of our students.
And we trust that there are probably several high school
students here.
We hope that, I think that I see some in the audience.
And we have a special challenge for high school students.
We also need 10 copies of Rudyard Kipling's Gunga Din
and Other Poems, which is on sale tonight for only $2.
And for every copy of Gunga Din that is bought and donated
to middle school libraries, Helen Shafer
has agreed to donate a copy of Poetry Comics:
An Animated Anthology, which is a $15 book, also
to school libraries.
Plus, if you purchase a book, you get this great sticker,
that I'm not wearing because I haven't actually purchased,
yet tonight, but I will, that says
"bookworm conservationist".
[LAUGHTER]
Great thing to have on your lapel.
And one final thing, if there are other high school
teachers aside from Maria Elena tonight,
I wanted to draw your attention to the fact
that Taha Muhammad Ali and Peter Cole are coming,
a Palestinian and Israeli American poet,
are coming later this month.
And included in their visit is a high school matinee performance
on a Friday morning.
So if you might be interested in bringing your class,
you can talk to me about that.
And now, please welcome Pamela Yoshuke.
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you, Frances.
It's nice to be back in town, nice to be back home.
Thank you all for coming to the first Mary Ann Campau
Fellowship reading.
We're delighted that this is happening.
There are so many people to thank for this.
First, I'm deeply grateful to the Poetry Center staff.
To Frances Sjoberg and Gail Brown
for making this reading possible.
This night has been incubating for nearly two years,
since Tony Luberman, over there at the table,
originally suggested that we ought
to do something like a fellowship
through the Poetry Center in Mary Ann's name.
We took Tony's advice.
Bill Rupert is right here.
Bill Rupert and I met with Gail and Frances
and we started fundraising for this fellowship.
I personally would like to thank all of you who
have contributed to this fund.
There are several of you in the audience tonight,
and we're eternally grateful for that.
To see this project come to fruition
is more than gratifying.
As most of you know, Mary Ann Campau
was a resident of Tucson for 40 years.
A devoted supporter of poetry and poets
in our community, Mary Ann began taking writing workshops here
at the Poetry Center, where she studied with Richard Shelton
and Richard Siken.
Then she took workshops at the U of A Writing Work Center
with my husband, Bill Root, and myself.
When Bill was named First Poet Laureate of Tucson,
Mary Ann was tireless in her promotion of,
and participation in, as many community-oriented projects,
including The Poetry Chorale, The Annual Free Word
Festival in Hymnal Park, and a Quadrilingual Poetry Festival
featuring Joy Harjo, Demetria Martinez, and Leslie Silko,
as well as high school students from Southwest Arizona, which
was held at Sunnyside High School.
Mary Ann hosted countless workshops in her home,
providing mini-grants to those who could not afford them.
She attended, supported, and participated
in numerous local readings.
Her poems were published in local journals,
including Sandcutters, I think.
And in 2001, she published a full-length collection,
Like a Waterweed Ghost, which is over here, this blue book.
It's a limited edition, and we're
selling those tonight for $20.
And all the proceeds, of course, as Frances said,
go to this fund.
In the spirit of Mary Ann, this fellowship
recognizes poets who work actively
and consistently to support poetry in the Tucson area.
I am thrilled to be here to introduce our first recipient,
the recipient Maria Elena Wakamatsu,
a fine and passionate poet who has unselfishly
done so much to promote poetry in the greater Tucson
community.
Born in Sonora, Mexico, Maria Elena
is of Japanese-Mexican descent.
She teaches creative writing at Desert View High School,
where she has been employed the past 20 years,
and where she continues to instill a love of poetry
in her students.
She is quoted as saying, "while much of society
believes that poetry is dead, I have discovered
a place where poets are not even an endangered species,
much less extinct."
At Desert View High School, poetry and poets
are alive and well.
Wakamatsu is a member of "Mujeres que Escriben",
a long-time Latina writers' group in Tucson.
Of the many worthy and wonderful poets
who were nominated for this year's fellowship,
we felt that Maria Elena best embodied
what Mary Ann Campau admired.
Maria Elena is a working poet, who
has long served the community in a variety of ways,
and has made poetry more accessible to everyone
in our community.
In making our choice, Bill Root, Tony Luberman and I
felt that Maria Elena is a poet who
is dedicated to affirming the perilously beautiful complexity
at the core of our human family.
A teacher-poet, Maria Elena has inspired and helped
countless students and fellow poets in Tucson in order
that their voices be heard.
As president of the Ocotillo Literary Endeavors Board,
Wakamatsu has taught poetry workshops at the Latina Writers
Summer Retreat since 2002.
She has participated in countless community reading
series.
Wakamatsu has also won several awards
in recognition of her dedication as a teacher,
including the 2006 Scarlet and Gray Award for Southern Arizona
Teacher of the Year, and the 2005 Sunnyside School District
Star Teacher Award.
You are in for a treat tonight.
I have read my work with Maria Elena
and know her to be an ardent reader of her own poetry.
On behalf of the other judges, Bill Root and Tony Luberman,
and of the Mary Ann Campau Fellowship Committee,
it is my privilege to welcome to the stage, Maria Elena
Wakamatsu.
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you, very, very much for those very, very kind words.
A treat, huh?
I hope so.
I'm just glad I made it, quite frankly.
I thought I was losing my voice earlier today.
My students, in fact I think I have three my students
here this evening.
They said, they said, you know Miss Wakamatsu,
we think that you should just be quiet today--
[LAUGHTER]
--and save your voice for tonight.
[LAUGHTER]
They're so thoughtful.
[LAUGHTER]
I have a few pieces to read to you, to share with you tonight.
The first one is called "Americana".
And this piece is--
the first few pieces I'm going to read
are just pieces that I just absolutely, just love.
This one I love because, besides writing, I love jazz.
"Americana"
"From under eye-length bangs he peers into a crowd
that neither looks nor listens into the dim.
Under stark white spotlight he plays ill, at ease.
Bass, tight against bird-like chest.
He is not of this place.
Didn't even like this place until the vamp goes on
for 20 bars, or has it been two minutes?
And he's ready to jump off into Spain,
where he's never been, except with Miles.
Where dark, sultry women drip voices.
Where forests are cool and air, musky.
Where Andalusian horses are white and toros de Miura,
midnight black.
Where Madeira wine runs red and accents ooze like honey.
Dark, cherry wood and copper strings take off like that.
They transfix like that.
They transform melody into mantilla, Spanish cones
and little Goya men.
Bass imbues the bottom with light.
Melds hazards into possibilities that the bare-legged girl,
that gypsy girl, might dance for him.
That the red ruffles might snap for him.
That the long bear arms might rise above her head,
offer tightly-strapped breasts for him.
Heavy lids, almond eyes, a stolen glance,
all just for him.
Fury of raven hair and beautiful red swirls and whirls,
adding tidal pools, vamp in six eight
for 20 bars or 20 minutes?
Until fingers smoke.
Blonde arm hairs bristle and he jumps off
into her skin, and Spain."
[APPLAUSE]
Just some gorgeous gringo playing this jazz bass.
Just fell in love with it.
This next piece is called "Quinceañera" and it's about,
again, another piece about things that I love.
Yeah, I'm Mexican.
Got to write a piece about quinceañeras.
May be a little different, but still.
"Quinceañera"
"At 15, her dreams were of Fidel and Che.
Not blue-black nights of romance.
Not knights in shining armor.
She wanted to fly on the back of a quetzal.
To soar like Icarus on milk-proof wings.
Among white doves, Olympic spirit,
and corn-blue Mexican skies.
She wanted to March con intelectuales y campesinos
through Tlatelolco, down ancient streets once paved
with gold, now bathed in blood.
Central cultural turned slaughterhouse.
A few escaped, clutching dreams of peace and justice for all."
[APPLAUSE]
"This is Home, Too."
I wrote this after a road trip that I took up to San Francisco
and around Monterrey.
And those trees, those beautiful cypress trees, it
just seemed to be carved and perched on mountainsides there.
Just, it looked like giant bonsai.
"This is Home, Too"
"Above Big Sur, you cling to craggy soil,
your sinews remember black loam.
Your lace canopy, cherry blossoms in the air.
A distant flute trills.
And the kimono of an eight-year-old, that aqua
and melon one, flutters under glass.
The baby doll from Tokyo rustles in his case.
Home is in the air.
And so as not to scare anyone, you wait until late at night,
when winds are still and fog veils the coastline.
You pull up on ancient routes, tiptoe inland,
and graft yourself onto American soil.
You travel in the mist like that.
Implant yourself before dawn like that.
Then you rush back to your perch on cypress-covered ridges
and coastal morning fog."
[APPLAUSE]
This is a piece that--
well, it's a bunch of dreams that I had right after 9/11.
"One.
It rained tonight.
The amber street light, the feathery leaves of mesquite,
the soft wisps of rain.
We're talking again, he said.
Me and Sonya.
We broke up, you know, when she laughed over 9/11.
Is that good?
I said.
Did you smooth it out?
Yeah, he said.
But I don't know.
She brings up this love thing again.
How'd you do that, I said.
I don't know, he said.
Picturing the rain in her hair, 5,000 miles away.
Two.
Sedona is the only landscape of red Steve knows.
And the summer tide, the only sea of red he knows.
He's sound asleep by nine.
Three.
Peter Jennings sports a 5 o'clock
shadow around the clock, these days.
His once honeyed voice drones and cracks
over pictures of a fairy tale gone wrong.
Bastards, Steve says.
Lucky, I said.
That you've gone this long.
Four.
Perhaps the Sikh killed in Phoenix yesterday
means less than Wall Street crashing today.
Just ask the women in Juarez.
Mindfulness is trivial when collective passions
seek revenge.
The president might be tempted to declare war, I said.
Find any excuse, I said.
You always have to be so negative, he said.
Five.
Larry's worried about me.
Can't you just avoid talking about it?
He said.
Avoid it?
I sighed.
Carmen snuck out of Santiago into exile
in the middle of the night.
René slipped into El Salvador, into the waiting arms
of Contras.
And Chaz's skeleton is missing both hands.
Six.
I called Irma last night to talk.
Do you want to meet?
She said.
The tension is familiar.
I grew up half-breed, among fair-skinned girls.
I learned English with a twisted tongue and a forked pen.
I was born on the border, where folks meet in mistrust.
I traveled, secretly, to Russia.
I cannot be too careful.
Only in my dreams do I speak freely at home.
Seven.
The first day of the 11th month is overcast.
In crisp, autumn air and corn-blue sky,
I swaddle memories of the dead.
My heart quivers with gratitude, swells with blessings.
I have no reason to mourn."
[APPLAUSE]
Things get harder.
You know, the things that I love, well I love hard.
And it's interesting to see how some of the hardest things
to love, and to deal with are the things that just, they
demand that you write about.
This piece is called "Lazaram."
Like Lazarus, only well, she's a woman.
This is for all the women out there
who have had to face some really, really
difficult challenges and come out the other side.
"Lazaram"
"She was barely six weeks along when she told him
and he chased her out the trailer into the swamp,
where she sloshed through greenish-black muck, the color
of alligators she'd seen come right up to the trailer
and snap up small dogs.
So she ran and ran, picking up her feet as soon
as they lightened, wishing she could fly.
Instead, she stumbled over fallen branches,
through velvet curtains of brown leaves,
through sea of darkness and air too thick to breathe.
Wide-mouthed she gasped, and wetness dripped down temples,
down chicken neck, down hair stuck in long strands that
flapped against her back, plastered with mustard
and memories of asthma and other vises,
like his knee on her cracking sternum.
Like his fingers around her scrawny neck.
Like blood bubbling in her stomach,
crawling up her throat, and gurgling in her ears,
where Atlas stirs and boyish shoulders broaden
and internal bleeding becomes the body and blood of Christ.
Amen.
They were barely six weeks out of the hospital
when the baby got sick, and he threw her
out the red-floored bedroom.
And she landed, arms here, legs there, in the tiny bedroom.
Levántate, vete a la chingada, boomed the Red Wing boot,
as it rolled her onto the linoleum floor kitchen,
where she finally got to her feet and ran through the living
room.
You should go to the Y. Maybe they
can teach you to be a mother.
Cucarachas y culebras, he spat at the back of her head,
now whizzing out the Arizona home, just
beyond his mother's hand around his head, pounding,
pounding the floor of his Adobe childhood home.
He didn't want to move to the house on [INAUDIBLE],,
no matter how nice it was.
He was the man and she had found it.
She had rented it.
Y él era el macho, ¿qué no?
Pues, tendrás que empacar tú, porque yo me voy camping.
She should have left his ass, then.
Llevarse a su hijo y dejarlo, pero no.
Ahí va con todas sus garras, hasta que cayó rendida en su
nueva casa, donde la cultura de la sevillana,
que en realidad es una gitana disfrazada de española,
lo observa todo.
Mientras duerme, lo desviste con los ojos
y bajo el traje, descubre llagas, supurientas que le
arden con el aire, con la luz.
Las gitanas curan con las manos.
Y con el alma cauterizan lo malo y lo feo también.
A los 6 meses, la arrancó de la pared y con la rodilla la hizo
ciscos, lanzándolos a la chimenea hasta varla
achicharrar, como a tantas mujeres del esquema por
sabelotodo.
Ande, cabrona.
Lo que no sabía, es que there's more where she came from.
It was six weeks after they moved into 6th Street
and he came home smelling of the ocean,
and threw the glass of Merlot against the wall
because her cousin was just too hard to resist.
And it was her fault for moving them there, anyway.
So that settled it.
She was stupid.
Even if fea, hija de la chingada.
So she threw her into the shower, ay,
cómo caiga contra la tina.
Elbows and knees retumban.
So he turned on the hot water to drown it out.
Para que se quite lo negro a la cabrona.
Maybe a scalding shower will do her good.
Make her guera, like her cousin.
Sí, ¿no?
A la otra, lichucara.
Six weeks after they moved to Encanto, she left.
The ribs healed, the bruises faded, the swelling down.
Gone were the thugs against porcelain
tub, the crash of glass against the wall,
the blow of fist into belly, boot on ribs,
palms smacking cheekbone, fist in eye sockets,
knuckles against lip.
Gone was the wild smell of blood, the salt of tears,
and mocos.
Gone were memories of fideo, first grade, Arnold.
So she took to the sea, like a lemming.
Pero la revolución requiere destrozar lo malo y conservar
lo bueno probado.
Lenny.
She had such silky skin.
He could pretend he was in Persia, inside a tent of veils,
where Sherezada told her 1,001 tales, but unlike the sultan,
she forced the issue.
And she thrashed like a shark.
And that brought him back to the brown foothills,
where the clay is black and good for sculpting.
Back to the leather couch, where she lay pinned inside.
Back to the passion, or rage, he felt for her.
And that last bastion of resistance,
the one that dared him, that mocked him in his sleep,
awoke him in the middle of the night.
He was being nice.
He wanted her to stay.
But there she went, thrashing about
until he couldn't stand it anymore.
So he flung the whiskey in her face, and her corneas sizzled.
And she smiled.
The cleansing she needed.
Burned through layer upon layer of inertia, of paralysis.
Burned.
On the sixth day, God said let us make man
in our image and likeness.
And when she rose, he saw that she was good."
Whew.
That one's hard to read.
[APPLAUSE]
The next-- I've got a few poems here
that I've written as a collection,
as part of the collection on border issues.
And specifically the migration issues.
This one is called "For Darío."
And this was the first documented case,
this gentleman here, was the first documented
case of a border patrol agent shooting someone
who threw a rock at him.
"For Darío."
"He came from a long line of ilusos, provincial folk,
unsophisticated, unsuspecting.
Never expecting to be shot in the back
in the middle of the night, by his own brother, or primo,
or father.
I forget whose crosshairs he walked into.
Who just followed orders that night.
Whose heart exploded like a watermelon
falling from the truck."
This next one is called "Covenants".
And it also has another angle.
And I've gone back and forth.
Accomplices, covenants, agreements,
parties to contracts.
Accomplices, yeah.
"Covenants"
"His grandfathers did your work in México.
In World War II, you had them remove my fathers from Tíjuana,
from Mexicali, from San Luis.
You had them piled into cattle trucks.
Interned in Mexico City, where my father found his father
in some colonia where men with names
like Katsuyama and Tenaca, slept like sardines on dirt,
packed tight.
After your war, Miguel Alemán baptized his
grandfather's, Bracero, and sent them to you,
to harvest your lettuce, your citrus, your apples,
wherever you need.
These days, the odds are still the same in desert black jack.
Where you lie in wait under the cover of darkness,
under the color of the law.
Accomplices."
"Family Album."
This next piece, I don't know if you guys
remember Scott Stanley.
He was here for a while.
And he was doing a project with the Penal County attorney's
office.
And he really fought, remember?
Long and hard to get those photographs released.
Anyway, this is called "Family Album."
"He studies pictures of [INAUDIBLE]..
Round obsidian holes on his back.
Opaque film over his eyes.
Thick, raised marks about his neck.
The loose pile of gray that is now his face.
He studies pictures of Rosaura, purplish pools
around her breasts.
Bite and scratch marks on her sides.
Inner thighs, black and blue.
Nails, once manicured, now muddy brown.
Perhaps the man would want to look at these.
These photos, of my mother, at the border
crossing station in the 56 Bel Air.
She'd been across the line all day, helping Grandma, all day.
Starched, khaki green official makes a face,
holds his breath, waves her through.
Would he want to look at these?
These pictures?
Of indignities dripping off her face, like spit?
How about these?
These photos of my father, in the driver's seat.
White knuckles on the steering wheel.
Stoicism and ulcered gut, he stares straight ahead, frozen,
like on his green card.
How about this picture?
Of a samurai heart, ribboned with razor wire?"
Scott.
I wonder what he's doing these days.
Scott Stanley.
This war that's going on in the border is one thing,
but then there's another war that still goes on.
That's the war on drugs that I lost
so many friends, schoolmates, and kids
that I went to school with.
This first one is called "For Raúl".
"It happens on a work day, early afternoon,
as his mother offers Rosario after Rosario at church,
and mangy dogs amble down the sidewalk
in front of the Rosa's cafe.
Two scrawny men sit on the piss-stained floor
of the dark apartment, tied-off above the elbow, coaxing
dark veins.
In the Lagoon, a gray whale exhales, sputters,
and disappears.
And it happens like this, while a swamp cooler
hums, that a red whale rises from the deep,
breaks the surface, and quietly swallows.
In the stillness flies land, deposit their young
on his face.
Mice scurry over potato chip crumbs.
And it cannot be undone.
Not the foam oozing from his mouth.
Not the sirens wailing in the background.
Not his mother's fist pounding on his chest.
Because, finally, Raúl is warm, floating in balmy waters,
full of whales giving birth."
Heroin was a horrible thing.
And I understand that it's making this comeback.
Horrible stuff.
"Para Juan".
"Pequeñito.
En calzoncitos blancos y capa voladora,
sobre mosaico helado tus piecitos
descalzos corren por la casa.
Tu cuerpecito de Sívori, panzita saltadita.
Morenita tu piel finita, sedosa, como el champuro que hacía tu
madre.
Tus manitas, juntitas bajo el pescuecito,
aferradas de una toalla blanca de algodón.
Hoy.
Hoy te encontramos.
Pantalones arrugados, camisa planchada,
pies llenos de callos, cansados de correr.
Hoy sacaste tu capa por última vez,
en una toalla de algodón papá lo dio,
se convirtió en un par de alas para ti, súper niño.
Para ti, precioso y adorado.
Para ti, querido Juan."
OK.
All right.
Enough drug things.
I grew up among that stuff.
It's horrible.
Ay.
I was one of a handful of people in my elementary,
you know, my little elementary graduating class.
A handful, one of a handful of kids who got out of there,
and didn't go to jail or die of drug overdoses.
The next couple of poems, and I--
I think I will end with these, are
a couple of poems to my family.
This one I dedicate to my son.
"Saint George".
"Victorious horse spirit.
Brave, strong.
Diacletion forces harness Spanish stallion
into lowely milk horse.
Full gallops and elegant high steps,
into tired clip-clops in the dark.
Victor's spirit, I wish for you.
For you, no blinders.
No hypnotic trot.
No walk through dawn, asleep.
For you, I wish long, wild mane floating in the wind.
For your, wings on thick and calloused hooves.
For you, heart of Richard, courageous and bold.
For you, showers of grace and dragons at your feet.
For you, miracle worker.
For you, Saint George.
For you, my son.
For you."
[APPLAUSE]
That is such a mama's poem, isn't it?
And this last piece that I'm going to read,
it's for my mom, who's in the audience.
"Tortillera".
"With her right hand cocked, she scoops a handful
of masa, wet, gritty, white Masa, speckled black and brown,
no matter how white the corn.
Prietitos swirl in Spanish blood like cobalt-blue ribbons
round yellow Moroccan sunflowers.
Her hands, the color of wet Earth,
dig out fist-sized balls, the size of her heart.
And with both hands, and drums in her head,
she rolls and cups, and rolls and cups,
and rolls, and rolls, until palmaditas flatten.
Flatten wider and wider disks, from the inside out,
this India's Malinche heart, until her copper fingertips,
her copper fingertips hold her tortillas, and her lifeline,
hanging in the wind."
Thank you very much.
[APPLAUSE]