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Barbara Ras

Barbara Hamby and Barbara Ras

28 MARCH 2021 — sunday

Poetry Flash presents a virtual poetry reading by Barbara Hamby, Holoholo, and Barbara Ras, The Blues of Heaven, online via Zoom, free, 3:00 pm PDT (Register to attend: please click here; you will receive an email with a link to join the reading)

MORE ABOUT THE READERS
Please join us for a Poetry Flash virtual reading on Sunday, March 28 at 3:00 pm PDT! We are excited to bring you Barbara Ras and Barbara Hamby via Zoom. To register for this reading, please click on the link in the calendar listing above. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. Thank you for continuing to support Poetry Flash and our reading series during these unprecedented times.

This reading is co-sponsored by Moe's Books in Berkeley; the featured books are available at bookshop.org/lists/poetry-flash-readings.

Barbara Ras's new book of poems is The Blues of Heaven, both personal, dealing with grief over the death of a brother and memories of growing up in a working-class neighborhood of Polish immigrants, and national, reflecting on gun violence, the climate crisis, and the fecklessness of an ignorant, corrupt government. Naomi Shihab Nye said, "The Blues of Heaven radiates with immense tenderness—here are poems of vivid painterly wonderment, perfect pacing and weight, elegantly woven counterpoints of shimmering imagery." Ras's previous collections include Bite Every Sorrow, winner of the Walt Whitman Award and a Kate Tufts Discovery Award, One Hidden Stuff, and The Lost Skin. Her poetry has been published in The New Yorker, Tin House, Granta, Orion, and elsewhere, and she's been awarded fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, among others. She lives in San Antonio, Texas, and is the founding director emerita of the Trinity University Press.

Barbara Hamby's new book of poems is Holoholo, the Hawaiian word for strolling without a fixed destination. A collage of one woman's consciousness, spoken in an American lingo, including Yiddish and street talk, its three sections motor across wars, racial tension, street violence, and other assorted national chaos. Billy Collins said, ""Barbara Hamby's poems are wild, outspoken, seriously funny, motor-mouth rambles that take us through hoops of association to places both unexpected and unimpeachable. This collection offers a generous helping of poems so crackling with references and busy with verbal energy you might feel them buzzing in your hands." She's the author of seven previous collections, most recently Bird Odyssey and On the Street of Divine Love: New and Selected Poems. Her book of linked stories, Lester Higata's 20th Century, was the winner of the 2010 University of Iowa John Simmons Award. A 2010 Guggenheim fellow, she is also co-editor, with her husband David Kirby, of Seriously Funny, an anthology of poetry.

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19 APRIL 2026 — sunday

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20 APRIL 2026 — monday

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21 APRIL 2026 — tuesday

Join local poets reading their contributions to the poetry anthology Catching Fire: The Los Angeles Wildfires, featuring Susan Auerbach, Mary Anne Berry, Teresa Mei Chuc, Spencer Griffin, Richard Modiano, Riot Renwick, Maryrose Smyth, Loma Alta Park Gymnasium, Multipurpose Room, 3330 Sunset Ridge Road, Altadena, free, 6:00 pm (Registration required at altadenalibrary.libnet.info/event/16123059)
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22 APRIL 2026 — wednesday

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23 APRIL 2026 — thursday

The Altadena Library hosts their first ever Adult Literacy Book Club, a limited supply of books will be available on a first-come, first serve basis, Bob Lucas Memorial Library and Literacy Center, 2659 Lincoln Avenue, Altadena, adults nineteen or older, free, 10:30 am (altadenalibrary.libnet.info/event/15871102)
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City Lights and University of California Press present Scott Kurashige to celebrate the publication of American Peril: The Violent History of Anti-Asian Racism, in conversation with journalist Jeff Yang, in-store and on Zoom, City Lights Books, 261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, free, registration required for the Zoom, 7:00 pm PDT (www.eventbrite.com/e/scott-kurashige-american-peril-tickets-1979945436098?aff=oddtdtcreator, and )
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San Francisco Poet Laureate emerita Kim Shuck and special guests celebrate the publication of poet Jeffrey Bryant's The Catacombs of Vanished Lovers at SFPL's monthly poetry reading, San Francisco Public Library, Koret Auditorium, 100 Larkin Street, San Francisco, free, 6:00 pm (sfpl.org/events/2026/04/23/performance-kim-shucks-poem-jam-celebrates-catacombs-vanished-lovers)
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24 APRIL 2026 — friday

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25 APRIL 2026 — saturday

Small Press Traffic presents Terrence Arjoon, Sophia Dahlin, and Ronaldo V. Wilson with introductions by Ebti, Jacob Kahn, and Kristen Nelson, event takes place at Et al., 2831 a Mission Street, San Francisco, free, doors open at 6:30 pm, reading starts at 7:00 pm (Registration required: www.smallpresstraffic.org/event/terrence-arjoon-sophia-dahlin-ronaldo-wilson)
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In celebration of twenty years of the Altadena Libraries' Altadena Poets Laureate Program, and as the Closing Event for the After the Fire Series, the Altadena Library presents "Poetry & Cookies," a reading with an open mic, featuring writer Viet Thanh Nguyen, poets published in Altadena Poetry Review 2026, indie publishers and their poets, with art activities by the Altadena Library and Armory Center for the Arts, and the announcement of the Altadena Poets Laureate 2026–2028, hosted by Sehba Sarwar and Lester Graves Lennon, Bob Lucas Memorial Library and Literacy Center, Bob Lucas Parking Lot, Bob Lucas Reading Court, 2659 Lincoln Avenue, Altadena, adults nineteen or older, free, 3:00 pm (altadenalibrary.libnet.info/event/16132810)
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26 APRIL 2026 — sunday

Poetry Flash presents a poetry reading by Rebecca Foust, You Are Leaving the American Sector: Love Poems, and Diane Frank, Prayer to the Invisible, Art House Gallery & Cultural Center, 2905 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley, two blocks north of Ashby BART, refreshments, free, 3:00 pm (poetryflash.org).
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San Francisco's 9th Poet Laureate Genny Lim hosts a special program featuring San Francisco's first Youth Poet Laureates: SF Youth Poet Laureate Karan Gupta, Vice SF Youth Poet Laureate Aisha McCulloch and Tika Zahiri, SF Youth Poet Laureate Cohort Member, with butterfly harp music performed by Harriet Lim, San Francisco Public Library, Latino/Hispanic Room, 100 Larkin Street, San Francisco, free, 1:00 pm (sfpl.org/events/2026/04/26/performance-sf-poet-laureate-genny-lim-and-sf-youth-poet-laureates)
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27 APRIL 2026 — monday

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28 APRIL 2026 — tuesday

Bird & Beckett hosts Jeanne Carsten to discuss her new book, A Greek Tragedy: One Day, a Deadly Shipwreck, and the Human Cost of the Refugee Crisis, Bird & Beckett Books and Records, 653 Chenery Street, San Francisco, free, 7:30 pm (birdbeckett.com/events)
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Book Society presents "Motherhood, Adoption, Inheritance: A Conversation," with Kate Shatz, Where the Girls Were, and Tracy Clark-Flory, My Mother's Daughter, exploring the stories we inherit from our mothers, Book Society, 2945 College Avenue, Berkeley, $45, members $30, 6:00 pm (Purchase tickets online: www.booksociety.social/event-details/motherhood-adoption-inheritance-a-conversation-with-kate-schatz-tracy-clark-flory)
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City Lights and HarperCollins present Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff celebrating the publication of their new book, Muskism: A Guide for the Perplexed, both in-store and on Zoom, City Lights Books, 261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, free, registration required for Zoom, 7:00 pm PDT (www.eventbrite.com/e/quinn-slobodian-and-ben-tarnoff-tickets-1979948819217?aff=oddtdtcreator, and citylights.com/events/quinn-slobodian-and-ben-tarnoff)
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29 APRIL 2026 — wednesday

The Hugh C. Hyde Living Writers' Series at SDSU presents Blas Falconer in a poetry reading from his newest book Rara Avis, in-person at San Diego State University Library, 5500 Campanile Drive, San Diego, in the Leon Williams Room, LL430, Love Library, Fourth Floor, free, 7:00 pm (library.sdsu.edu/events#event-details/49327f40-616e-4f1a-8ba1-a188dc054cb1)
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30 APRIL 2026 — thursday

The Altadena Library hosts their first ever Adult Literacy Book Club, a limited supply of books will be available on a first-come, first serve basis, Bob Lucas Memorial Library and Literacy Center, 2659 Lincoln Avenue, Altadena, adults nineteen or older, free, 10:30 am (altadenalibrary.libnet.info/event/15871103)
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Molly Crabapple, Here Where We Live Is Our Country: The Story of the Jewish Bund, in conversation with queer, jewish, poet and writer Sam Sax, both in-store and on Zoom, City Lights Books, 261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, free, registration required for Zoom, 7:00 pm PDT (www.eventbrite.com/e/molly-crabapple-in-conversation-with-sam-sax-tickets-1982664999385?aff=oddtdtcreator, and citylights.com/events/molly-crabapple-here-where-we-live-is-our-country-the-story-of-the-jewish-bund)
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Poet and writer Eileen Myles in conversation with poet James Schuyler's biographer, Nathan Kernan, A Day Like Any Other: The Life of James Schuyler, with additional discussion and reading of Schuyler's work by Tom Carey, Jason Morris, and Hannah Zeavin, Bird & Beckett Books and Records, 653 Chenery Street, San Francisco, free, 7:30 pm (birdbeckett.com/events/)
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