
steered past, thankfully trapped behind their steel
The first poem, titled “The Mississippi River’s Proclamations,” is written in the first-person exclamation: “I am the Father of Rivers…. I am the heart of remembrance…. I am a road with infinite shores…. I sing bottomless blues for porous shadows.” The personified river switches its role in another poem, “The River’s Music,” which “plays in its dark depths… / still and sad, shriveled waves, / a procession of mourners” for the sorrow of the people living in the Mississippi Delta, yet it also “turns into a flowing symphony / dressed for a storied night of revelries.”
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Can sins be washed away by the silent river? Can sinners feel peace from their confessions? The answer can be found in the following stanza:
Here Kolin imagines the Mississippi as a coroner stacking the bodies from the suffering, the killing, and the missing, suggesting that the river can be “the darkest place on earth” in the sinners’ hearts as well as “the longest tear duct in America / filled with unshared sorrows / and lost dreams…” The concluding one-line stanza emphasizes that the river never asks the reason for these sorrows, but it does associate the river with a killing scene where dark things are done by humans.
Two poems restage the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927. After months of heavy rain, the flood-swollen river breached its levee at Mound Landing in the Mississippi Delta. The destructive waters affected especially the life of African Americans. Many of them were drowned when they were ordered to stay on the levee fighting the flood. Kolin describes a vivid scene in the first-person narration in “The Great Flood of 1927.” The narrator tells in a black voice that his father “swilled cotton dust / all his sharecropper life” but
In brief, Kolin’s Delta Tears is a place that stores memories, reminding us of the history and life in the Mississippi Delta. Many poems are muddy tears “lengthening the suits of sorrow” with “generations of misery;” they are also pearls coated in silt.” Therefore, reading this book is a process to heighten the perception of history.
You can find the book here: https://mainstreetragbookstore.com/product/delta-tears-philip-c-kolin/
John (Jianqing) Zheng published A Way of Looking and Conversations with Dana Gioia in 2021. His poetry has appeared in Hanging Loose, Mississippi Review, Poetry South, Tar River among others. He is the editor of Journal of Ethnic American Literature.
Thanks to all the poets and those in attendance for our celebration – North of Oxford Presents – National Poetry Month at Chase’s Hop Shop. Thanks to Frank and the staff for all their assistance. Photos from the event appear below of Diane Sahms-Guarnieri, Charles Rammelkamp, , Ezra Solway, Jane Rebecca Cannarella, Paul Ilechko, Cleveland Wall, Carl Kaucher, and Michael Griffith.
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North of Oxford Presents
Live
National Poetry Month @ Chase’s Hop Shop
7235 Rising Sun Ave
Philadelphia, PA 19111
April 30th – 2pm to 5pm
Poets Reading
Diane Sahms-Guarnieri, a native Philadelphia poet living in Lawndale since 1986, is author of four full-length poetry collections and most recently a chapbook, COVID-19 2020 A Poetic Journal (Moonstone Press, 2021). Published in North American Review, Sequestrum Journal of Literature & Arts and Brushfire Literature & Arts Journal, among others, she is poetry editor at North of Oxford’s online literary journal and teleworks full-time for the government. www.dianesahmsguarnieri.com .
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Charles Rammelkamp is Prose Editor for Brick House Books in Baltimore and Reviews Editor for The Adirondack Review. His most recent releases are Sparring Partners from Mooonstone Press, Ugler Lee from Kelsay Books and Catastroika from Apprentice House.
Sawyer Lovett is a writer, bookseller, and professor. He is a pretty good person, but he is always trying to be better.
Ezra Solway is a jack of some trades. A poet, fiction writer, reporter living in Philadelphia, where he earned an MFA in Creative Writing from Temple University. He has taught English in Akko, Israel; sold electricity door-to-door; and waited tables at a Japanese karaoke lounge, among other eclectic posts. Currently, he is the Assistant Editor of the Jewish Community Voice, a local newspaper covering Southern New Jersey. https://www.ezrasolway.com/
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Jane-Rebecca Cannarella (she/her) is a writer and editor living in Philadelphia. She is the editor of HOOT Review and Meow Meow Pow Pow Lit, and a former genre editor at Lunch Ticket. She’s the author of Better Bones and Marrow, both published by Thirty West Publishing House, The Guessing Game published by BA Press, and Thirst and Frost forthcoming from Vegetarian Alcoholic Press. https://www.instagram.com/anotherintro/?hl=en
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Paul Ilechko is the author of three chapbooks, most recently “Pain Sections” (Alien Buddha Press). His work has appeared in a variety of journals, including Rogue Agent, January Review, North Dakota Quarterly, Book of Matches and Pithead Chapel. He lives with his partner in Lambertville, NJ.
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Cleveland Wall is a poet, teaching artist, and maker of things out of other things. She performs with interactive poetry troupe No River Twice and with musical combo The Starry Eyes. Her first full-length poetry collection, Let X=X , was published by Kelsay Books in the fall of 2019. She is also the sole librarian at Books on the Hill, a mighty twig of the Bethlehem Area Public Library. https://www.clevelandwall.com/
Carl Kaucher is a poet, photographer, and urban explorer who lives in Temple, Pa. He is the author of two chap books, “Sideways Blues ( Irish mountain and beyond )”, “Postpoemed” and most recently “Peripheral Debris.” His work has appeared in numerous publications and on line. The writing explores his experiences wandering urban spaces near his home and throughout Pennsylvania. Using his photography and writing, Carl has been exploring the overlooked places and documenting the chance occurrences that happen to him and by doing so gives us the opportunity to reflect upon those similar events happening in our lives also. More info can be found at https://www.facebook.com/CarlKaucher/ and on instagram @Carlkaucher.
Dave Worrell is the author of We Who Were Bound and Close to Home featuring paintings by Catherine Kuzma. Dave’s poems have appeared in Slant, Canary, Heroin Chic, Shot Glass Journal, Referential Magazine, Wild River Review, and elsewhere. He has performed his music-backed poems at Chris’ Jazz Café in Philadelphia and The Cornelia Street Café in New York. He began writing poetry toward the end of his 30-plus year law career, has taught writing at area community colleges and business law to undergraduates at Drexel University’s LeBow College of Business.
Michael Griffith is a story-teller at heart, a teacher, problem-solver, and helper at heart. He has been freelance writing and editing on-and-off on the professional level for over 25 years. Michael has taught courses in communication, public speaking, mass media, film studies, logic, developmental English, and creative writing. He currently teaches for-credit classes at Raritan Valley Community College in Branchburg, NJ and Mercer County Community College in West Windsor, NJ. https://michaelgriffithwordpress.wordpress.com/
Host – g emil reutter
https://northofoxford.wordpress.com/
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Chase’s Hop Shop
https://www.facebook.com/Chases-Hop-Shop-319982001828515/
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Diane Sahms-Guarnieri, g emil reutter, Steven Walker
Followed by an Open Mic
April 23rd @ 1pm
Daddy O’s Studio –116 N. Main Street, Sellersville, Pa.
On Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/events/384018440251171/?ref=newsfeed
Diane Sahms-Guarnieri, a native Philadelphia poet living in Lawndale since 1986, is author of four full-length poetry collections and most recently a chapbook, COVID-19 2020 A Poetic Journal (Moonstone Press, 2021). Published in North American Review, Sequestrum Journal of Literature & Arts and Brushfire Literature & Arts Journal, among others, she is poetry editor at North of Oxford’s online literary journal and teleworks full-time for the government. www.dianesahmsguarnieri.com .
g emil reutter is a writer of poems and stories. Sixteen collections of his poetry and fiction have been published. He can be found at: https://gereutter.wordpress.com/about/
Steven Walker is an award-winning writer, poet, playwright and journalist with approximately 1500 published credits including two horror novels, “Desmodus” and “Hell and Back” and two true crime books, “Blood Trail” and “Predator”. He helped to establish The Writer’s Room of Bucks County, The Writer’s Web, an internet-based school and marketing tool and was the founding president of the Lehigh Valley Writers Academy. Walker, a musician and songwriter, currently owns and operates Daddy O’s Studio in Sellersville, PA where he provides guitar lessons and sells musical instruments, books, smoking accessories, tapestries, posters, wiccan items, gemstones and other unique gifts. Also as a talented artist and photographer, Daddy O’s Studio is a showcase to exhibit and sell his paintings and photos as well as the work of other local artists, photographers and crafters. https://www.daddyos.shop/about
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