Marilyn Hacker

Marilyn Hacker and Deema K. Shehabi

2 OCTOBER 2014 — thursday

Poetry Flash presents a reading by Palestinian-American poet Deema K. Shehabi and Jewish-American poet Marilyn Hacker from their new co-authored collection, Diaspo/Renga, request ASL interpreters one week in advance from editor@poetryflash.org, wheelchair accessible, Moe's Books, 2476 Telegraph Avenue, Berkeley, 7:30 (510/849-2087, www.moesbooks.com)

MORE ABOUT THE READERS
The Israeli siege of Gaza in 2009—sadly, two sieges ago—moved Palestinian-American poet Deema K. Shehabi and Jewish-American poet Marilyn Hacker to begin a correspondence in poems, a dialogue that continued until 2012. The result is their collaborative book Diaspo/Renga. Annie Finch says of it, “Peace grows from the interweaving of voices, and it’s hard to imagine two more aware and unmistakable poetic voices on the subject of peace in the Middle East than these: Hacker and Shehabi, two brilliant witnesses, one infused with memory and dream, the other unswerving and crystalline.”
Marilyn Hacker has published twelve books of poetry, including Names, Essays on Departure, and Desesperanto; and an essay collection, Unauthorized Voices. A prolific translator from the French, she received the 2009 American PEN Award for Poetry in Translation for her rendering of Marie Etienne’s King of a Hundred Horsemen. Her honors for her own poetry include the Lenore Marshall Award, the Poet’s Prize for her Selected Poems, and the National Book Award for Presentation Piece. A Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, she lives now in Paris and is an editor of the Journal Siecle 21.
Deema K. Shehabi is a poet, writer, and editor. The child of Palestinian parents, she grew up in the Middle East and moved to the United States in 1988. Her book of poems Thirteen Departures From the Moon was published in 2011. She is co-editor of Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here, which received the Northern California Book Reviewers NCBR Recognition Award. She also served as Vice-President of the Radius of Arab-American Writers (RAWI) between 2007 and 2010.