Earth Day 2015: "Everglades Litany"

and blessed be the morning star in the arms of gumbo limbo

blessed be the sun on the cruciform wings of anhingas

blessed be the wind where ospreys and black vultures ride

blessed be zebra butterflies on crowns of tamarind

blessed be lightning on the spires of royal palms.

blessed be wildfires that temper berries of the green hawthorn

blessed be hurricanes that tear at the bark of tallowwood and bay-cedars

blessed be bracken and wild olives huddled by salt marshes

blessed be august heat that rasps the throat of morning glories

blessed be panthers and deer hiding behind a screen of leatherwood

blessed be brown pelicans grunting in mangroves after thunderstorms

blessed be the evening star over aisles of magnolias

blessed be barred owls cooing by swamps and hardwood hammocks

blessed be june beetles dusting pollen off their backs in the damp air

blessed be woodstorks and spoonbills wading through resurrection ferns

blessed be chanterelles, their yellow plumes rising from oak and pine

blessed be the moon ripening with pond apples on the banks of canals

blessed be dew and mist, fog and hail, falling on blades of  sugar cane

blessed be  loggerhead turtles lumbering past the thorns of anemones

blessed be, blessed be all that move, live, and breathe on the edge of these lakes

blessed be, blessed be... everything

Geoffrey Philp

Excerpt from xango music: http://www.amazon.com/Xango-Music-Geoffrey-Philp/dp/1900715465

 

 

Image: http://www.campingroadtrip.com/tips-and-articles/best-things-to-do-at-everglades-national-park

 

 

On My Bookshelf: Spring Evenings in Sterling Street: Poems by Eliot Bliss [Kindle Edition]

Eliot (Eileen) Bliss was a Creole writer born in 1903 in Kingston, Jamaica, a British colony at the time. She died, forgotten and neglected, in Bishop’s Stortford, Hertfordshire, in December 1990. At her side was her lifelong companion, Patricia Allen-Burns, who had supported and taken care of her for 60 years.

The poems collected here were written from 1922 to 1931, and were found in 2004 in the apartment she had shared with Ms Allen-Burns.These poems reflect different stages and periods in Eliot Bliss’s life: There are poems that bring to mind the Caribbean, where she was born and whose memory she would always carry with her; others are dedicated to spiritual life; some to important literary figures, women who had an influence on her life.

About the Editor

Michela A. Calderaro, an Associate Editor of Calabash: A Journal of Caribbean Arts and Letters, teaches English and Postcolonial Literature at the University of Trieste (Italy). Dr. Calderaro, whose critical works include a book on Ford Madox Ford and numerous articles on British, American and Anglophone Caribbean writers, is currently working on Creole writer Eliot (Eileen) Bliss’s biography.

Available @ Amazon: http://goo.gl/QnjkaC

Malachi Smith @ Miami Dade College, North Campus

During National Poetry Month, Malachi Smith, the internationally renowned dub poet, will be reading from Scream, his latest CD, at Miami Dade College, North Campus, on Tuesday, April 14, 2015.

The son of a preacher, Malachi was born in Westmoreland, Jamaica. At the tender age of eight, Malachi began writing poetry and recorded his first poem “Kimbo to Kimbo” in 1979. Following on this early success, Malachi became a founding member of Poets in Unity at the Jamaica School of Drama and went on to produce many other CDs such as Blacker the Berry - The Sweeter the Cherry, Throw Two Punch, Middle Passage, and Luv Dub Fever.

In 2009, Malachi won the Outstanding Writer award for the Jamaica Development Commission's Creative Writing Competition. A retired member of the Jamaica Constabulary Force  and a graduate of Miami Dade College, Malachi is based in Miami.

Malachi Smith

10:00 am to 11:00 a.m.

Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Rooms 3249--Halls A&C

Miami Dade College, North Campus

11380 NW 27 Avenue,

Miami, FL 33167

This performance is free and open to the public.