How is everybody?
Good.
Good?
Can you hear me in the back OK?
Yes.
Good enough?
If you can't, do a big wave and I'll be louder.
Really happy to have this crowd here-- thank you so much
everyone for choosing to do this on a Friday night.
It's an awesome choice, and you will not be sorry, so grateful
that all of you are here.
My name is Tyler Meier.
I work as the executive director at the University
of Arizona Poetry Center.
I just want to say some quick thank you's and tell you
about some things that are coming up
this spring here in the collaboration with the art
museum.
And first off, I just want to thank our lead sponsor
for these series, these programs.
The Virginia Piper Center at Arizona State University--
gratitude to you for your support and belief
in these readings that we've been
doing where we do for poetry readings a year in Phoenix.
So thank you very much to the Piper Center for your support.
[APPLAUSE]
There are others.
I also want to thank Superstition Review,
Performance in the Borderlands, and the Creative Writing
Program at ASU as well as the Literary and Prologue Society
and, of course, the Phoenix Art Museum.
We're grateful for your support to help make this happen.
So thank you so much
[APPLAUSE]
There's a very special group of people here tonight,
and I'm so excited to be sharing this space with them, to be
sharing this state with them.
And that's the Poetry Coalition, which
is a national group of leadership
from poetry organizations who have flown to Arizona.
We've had some meetings today in Tucson.
We drove up I-10 on a bus to do this.
We're very happy to be here.
We have some meetings tomorrow.
So I just want to acknowledge there
are many, many groups that are here
that are doing work on behalf of poetry and the country,
and they're all in Arizona this weekend
to take part and be a part of this great reading.
So if you're part of the Poetry Coalition,
will you just raise your hands so people can see who you are.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
It's amazing, amazing, amazing to be working with them.
We also have leadership tonight from the National Endowment
for the Arts and from the Library of Congress.
And we're just so excited to have all of these great people
here with us tonight, so thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
Some last things-- so the spring events in this series
are coming up, and there's an event
in February, an event in April.
In February, the poet Khaled Mattawa
will be visiting and reading.
And then in April, the poet Ada Limón will be here reading
as well.
And so this is a "hot off the press"
postcard that has those details.
We'll have these.
You can pick up in the back at the book sale
after the reading.
They still smell fresh from the printer.
[LAUGHING]
They're delightful.
It made the bus ride so much better--
[LAUGHING]
--to have all of these there with me, so many of them.
Jennifer mentioned Hannah, who's been a great collaborator
for me for years at the Poetry Center,
and I'm grateful for that.
And if you've enjoyed any of these poetry events
at the art museum, then you've seen Hannah's handiwork
in putting a lot of this together.
This is her last event at the Phoenix Art Museum
and with the Poetry Center.
We're losing her to Michigan, which is very sad but also
very exciting for Hannah.
And so I just want to acknowledge and ask
for a round of applause.
[APPLAUSE]
She works really, really hard.
And so there will be a Hannah-sized hole
in my life for a little while, and we'll
be looking to fill it.
But most of all, I want to thank two creative forces that have
helped make tonight possible.
And the Poetry Center really has been a small part of this,
just sort of minding some details.
The vision for this has come from our friends
Natalie Diaz and Eloisa Amezcua.
And we're so grateful to have had a chance
to work with you guys, your creativity, your vision,
your interest in seeing this through.
Eloisa has been an incredible person helping figure out
who's where and when and, who's picking them up?
And how would they get where they need to go?
And I'm grateful for all of that.
And Natalie, I'm grateful for so many things,
but especially for writing an email that said, what if?
What if we did this?
Could we do this?
And lo and behold, look what's happened and look who's here.
We're just so, so grateful for that and for Natalie's vision.
So before I welcome Natalie--
there's round of applause.
[APPLAUSE]
Arizona is very lucky to have her.
So before I welcome Natalie up to help with what comes next,
just one quick detail a piece of housekeeping.
So after the reading, you'll be tempted
to come up and visit with these poets.
And you have to suppress that temptation
because otherwise we'll have a total disaster of a book sale.
So it's very important after the reading for you
to stay seated and let the poet's exit first please,
so they can go back to the book sale table.
They're very happy to do book sales and to sign books
and to meet with you.
So you may be tempted, and they're delightful.
And I understand, but please stay seated.
And I will come up at the end of the reading
to remind you of this promise you all just made
with your eyes and me.
So thank you for that, and thanks
for letting us get out first.
So without further ado, please help me welcome Natalie Diaz.
[APPLAUSE]