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© Carol White

A Literary Journal of
the Environmental Crisis

Canary is a literary journal that explores one’s engagement with the natural world. It is based on the premise that the literary arts can provide an understanding that humans are part of an integrated system. Our theme is the environmental crisis and the losses of species and habitat as a result of this ongoing disaster. Our mission is to deepen awareness of the environment and enrich the well-being of the individual and in turn society as a whole.

Issue Number 18, Fall 2012

Editor, Gail Entrekin
Published by Hip Pocket Press

Managing Editor, Charles Entrekin
Art Editor, Carol White
All work reprinted by permission of authors

• Reluctance by Robert Frost
• #2 From the Hinterland ….
  Eco-Logical by Raymond Greiner
• Arguing With a Lover About Love by J. Rodney Karr
• Bison by Nicole Basta
• Cider Pressing Party by Lisa Wujnovich
• Coal Mine Canaries by Michael Shorb
• Conscious Cohabiting by Gretchen Dandrea Blynt
• Coyote’s Prediction by Scott T. Starbuck
• Ellesmere Island, Canada 1986
  – a photograph by Jim Brandenburg by Elizabeth W. Jackson
• Geese on a Northern California Pond by Judie Rae
• Nature Writing 101 by Catherine Owen
• Night Walk by Clara Quinlan
• Overhear by Linda Benninghoff
• Rescuing Tree Frogs by Maya Khosla
• Shoe Fitting X-Ray Device by Susan Terris
• The Funeral Bird by Bill Edmondson
• Trophy Sorrow by Richard Mack
• What I Wanted of Milkweed by John Smith
• Windmills at Alta Mont Pass by Susan Kelly-DeWitt

Archives: by Issue | by Author Name

© 2012 Hip Pocket Press

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  Listen

AFTER THE GOLD RUSH? The Poetry of California

Dana Gioia | Kim Addonizio | Al Young | Francisco X. Alarcón | Jack & Adelle Foley | Kevin Starr

California is the richest, most populous state in America. An economic and technical powerhouse it has also been the engine of artistic development, especially in poetry. The Beats of the 1950s spring to mind – Allen Ginsberg first read ‘Howl’ in San Francisco. Since then many radical ideas pioneered in California have become familiar – Environmentalism, Gay Liberation, the personal computer.

In ‘After the Gold Rush’ Dana Gioia traces how these are reflected in California’s poetry. One of America’s leading poets and essayists, Gioia was Chair of the National Endowment for the Arts in the George Bush years, before returning to his native California to write. He has won the American Book Award, and has just published his fourth volume of poems, ‘Pity the Beautiful’.

Gioia listens to poems by, and talks to, Kim Addonizio, who writes freely about sex, in strict sonnet form; Francisco X. Alarcon, for whom Spanish is as important as English; Al Young, the African American poet who became the state’s laureate. He hears from the great science-fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson and historian Kevin Starr, about the impact of California’s landscape on its writers.

He finds that recent developments owe much to what went before, before the Beats, right back to the Gold Rush of the 19th century. People still come to get rich but San Francisco is now one of the most competitive places in the world and no one comes to drop out. Gioia wonders what the impact of this will be on Californian poetry and meets Dan Stone, a brave or foolhardy young writer who has just launched a new magazine of literature and Rock and Roll. Music by Californian artists, from John Adams to Tom Waits, is woven through Gioia’s exploration of the poetry of California.

Produced by Julian May

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Zulima Palacio
September 21, 2012
© 2012 Voice of America

Preliminary results of a large study by the U.S. government and research by a non-profit organization show measurable amounts of arsenic in samples of rice and rice products for sale in U.S. markets. One form of the chemical, inorganic arsenic, is a known human carcinogen. While the private study cautions that people should limit their consumption of rice products, government scientists say they are making no recommendations until their study is complete, sometime next year.

Two hundred different types of rice and rice products tested by both the non-profit research group, Consumer Reports, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration [FDA], contained varying levels of different forms of arsenic. Michael Taylor is the Deputy Commissioner for Foods at the FDA.

“Arsenic is a substance that nobody wants in food, but we are confident that at the levels that we are seeing, there is no immediate safety concern. People should continue eating rice,” said Taylor.

To read Zulima Palacio’s full article, go to the Voice of America original

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Related article

  © Wired.com
Courtesy featurepics.com

Arsenic and Rice. Yes, Again | Deborah Blum | Wired.com | September 19, 2012

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Listen to Al Young read “Two Septembers” at KQED’s popular The California Report

   Courtesy images

TWO  SEPTEMBERS

1/

He’d been her lover, her tutor, her savior, her guide. Side by side, the night before, they’d hugged on the posh, new bed in a big mostly empty Village flat she’d found for them to move in together. No more trading worlds. Now web exec and master chef could walk to work if they wished. Then — sip by sip, puff by puff, and pricey pill by pill — her biggest wish grew therapies and whopping doctor bills. She wanted time to stop and wind him back. On her little brother’s tip, she acted fast. Flew west to land herself a sweet executive chef slot in foodie-rich L.A. She made new friends; they shared each other’S blues. September sticks, refueling her with tears. But never enough to snuff the smell, the smoke, the tender catch at the throat; her migraine-deep desire to die just like her lover: in a slick, sick, go-for-broke, grand-slam hoodunit still stubbornly, heartbreakingly unsolved.

2/

On wobbly tiers of black plastic trash bags, his ancient laptop leans. Chipped, funky, scarred and scratched — it’s all he needs for now. Positioned outside a stark Gilroy McDonald’s, he can pick up enough of a wi-fi wave, wake just enough with an any-size coffee, check enough email and Facebook and YouTube to still feel close enough to summer and its dawning sun to maybe reach fall half-full.

© 2012 Al Young

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Listen 

Saturday, October 6, 2012
6:30 to 10pm 
Free admission

Dima  vocals
Grant Levin  piano
Ron Belcher  bass

Singing from the heart with a voice and style reminiscent of the early 50′s, Dima was influenced at an early age by the music that surrounded her as a child: the classic sounds of jazz. She began to develop her style as a jazz singer after studying with Merrill Hoover, a jazz pianist best known for his eloquent accompaniment of vocalists like Ernestine Anderson, Anita O’Day, and Mary Stallings. This rare opportunity set the foundation for her to establish her own unique approach to singing as she fell in love with the jazz standard.

After raising her daughter Aria, she resumed her musical studies and began performing again in the Bay Area. Prior to pursuing a career as a jazz vocalist, under the direction of Joey Blake, Dima sang and performed in a Circle Song Acapella Ensemble, originally created by Bobby McFerrin. This experience put her in touch with that magical, soulful, creative process of improvisation from which all music begins. Known for her command of the lyric, beautiful soothing tone and carefully chosen repertoire, Dima keeps alive the true art of the jazz singer.

Among the highlights of her singing career, Dima worked with trumpeter Al Molina as the featured vocalist in The Chet Baker Project, which ran for one year at the 7 Mile House in Brisbane. In 2009 she performed at the Jazz Festival in Chiapas, México; the Placer Arts Gallery Summer Jazz Series (2010), and the Calistoga Jazz Festival (2008).

Dima has also performed with such musicians as Mike Greensill, Glen Pearson, Larry Vuckovich and Calvin Keys, Eddie Marshall, Ron Belcher, Chris Amberger, Charles McNeal, and Noel Jewkes. Currently she is working in collaboration with pianist Grant Levin as they prepare a new CD project: Art of the Duo.

Yoshi’s San Francisco
1330 Fillmore Street
San Francisco, CA 94115
415.655.5600

directions & map

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