Happy Birthday, Sarah Oktay

 

Happy Birthday, Sarah Oktay

 

 

Happy Birthday, Sarah Oktay

 

 

Best Online Stone Soup Features of 2023: Sarah Oktay and Len Germinara

This double feature should have happened a long time ago. Another poetry power couple I want to hang with more next year. 

 

 

Summer 2023 Highlights: Len Germinara and Sarah Oktay

So happy the few times I had my friend over for Stone Soup this summer. Moving forward, I am going to do more of this for the rest of the year.

 

New Addtions to my Bookshelf

 

Sarah Oktay's Sifting Light from the Darkness and Len Germinara's Decamerooned arrived over the weekend. The rest of you should grab copies for your summer reading. 

 

Stone Soup Croutons, 7-12-23: Impact

Stone Soup Croutons is a weekly poem I write using lines and impressions selected from Stone Soup Poetry's open mic readers and features. I figure out a title (and sometimes the rest of the poem) later. You can read the other ones I've done since 2015 here.

 

I also have a book collecting the best of my first year of poems. Click here to purchase it.

 

Sarah Oktay and Len Germinara were a delight. It was great to feature them both on the same night. I wish poetry from such a wholesome couple didn't have to get twisted by me.

Their poems about family, friends, humanity and what we--like it or not--leave behind got me to thinking about my own deaths in the family during the pandemic, other deaths with people at the casket pretending that their deaths came as no surprise. It fueled my piece below.

I thought of titling the poem "anthropocene," a word I just learned Wednesday, but I'm not as good a poet as Sarah.

It was amazing work from everyone that got my mind and emotions racing. I hope the open mics and features can be all like this week's.

Thanks for reading.

Impact 

 

Funerals fly by quick,

anxious to cover

ash with coffin. 

Fallout from our

walking blast fields,

radius unknown. 

Sarah Oktay and Len Germinara Feature at Stone Soup Poetry, 7-12-23

From this week's online gathering. A night of old friends gathering. Please support Sarah and Len by donating (Sarah's Venmo is @Sarah-Oktay) or buying their books.

 

 

Scientists Prove the Wave Works!

 

 

It was a wonderful night of reunions. Thanks to Len Germinara and Sara Oktay for a wonderful duet feature. Please support their efforts by donating (Sarah's Venmo is @Sarah-Oktay) or buying any of their books.  Stay tuned for more Stone Soup news for the summer.

Also Consider

Tonight's other special feature Sarah Oktay has two books out now. Her poetry collection Sifting Light From the Darkness was released in 2020, and last year saw a collection of her essays on Nantucket's natural history called Naturally Nantucket The Sea: Volume 1. Buy a book if you can. 

The Evening Can't Come Fast Enough

Join me for Stone Soup Poetry tonight with Len Germinara and Sarah Oktay.

Coming in Two Days

Len Germinara and Sarah Oktay at Stone Soup Poetry.

Coming This Wednesday

Welcome, Len and Sarah!

Stone Soup Croutons, 7-5-23: To The Unknown Refugee

Stone Soup Croutons is a weekly poem I write using lines and impressions selected from Stone Soup Poetry's open mic readers and features. I figure out a title (and sometimes the rest of the poem) later. You can read the other ones I've done since 2015 here.

 

I also have a book collecting the best of my first year of poems. Click here to purchase it.

Thanks for reading.

 

This past Wednesday was a little different, as C.C. Arshagra guest hosted a night with special feature Paul Skiff. I was mostly absent and handling family affairs. 

Thanks to an imperfect recording I made, I got to hear the whole feature, wich on top of Skiff's impressive performance (including a magnum opus dedicated to his home in New York's Lower East Side), it was a great showing of new poets and regulars. I'm glad everyone came out in force. I hope you can do so next week when Len Germinara and Sarah Oktay feature next week.

I also hope to supply you with C.C.'s recording along with a list of the participants if C.C. kept a paper list. For now, here's the poem. 

Hoping to write a poem with stanza breaks and zero word repetition soon. Thanks for reading.

To The Unknown Refugee 

 

Every lost soul wants their face

put on a soup can label while 

they reside in Paris, privileges

carried over from stateside,

July 12: A Poetry Power Couple Features to Stone Soup Poetry

 

I've had the honor of knowing Len Germinara and Sarah Oktay since the days of the Bridgewater Poetry Slam. From there to Poetribe to Spoken Word Nantucket and beyond, they've remained true artists and incredibly supportive patrons. Two decades, they're still writing and more prolific than ever. Their July 12 feature at Stone Soup Poetry is a homecoming I am thrilled to have put together.

Join us on July 12 from 7:00 to 9:00 PM ET by clicking this link.

The meeting ID is 883 3615 6340

Password: stonesoup

Happy Birthday, Sarah Oktay

 

Happy Birthday, Len Germinara

 

Happy Birthday, Sarah Oktay

 

Happy Birthday, Sarah Oktay

 

Sacramento Poetry Center's Socially Distant Verse, Coast to Coast

Information courtesy of Len Germinara