March 19 is an international day of commemoration of the 5th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq by the United States.
At 7 pm in Cafe Roma, a one-hour film about the American poet and pacifist William Stafford will be shown. Some would say that this is a political event. This even is free and open to the public.
Look: no one ever promised for sure
that we would sing. We have decided
to moan. In a strange dance that
we don’t understand till we do it, we
have to carry on.Just as in sleep you have to dream
the exact dream to round out your life,
so we have to live that dream into stories
and hold them close at you, close at the
edge we share, to be right.We find it an awful thing to meet people,
serious or not, who have turned into vacant
effective people, so far lost that they
won’t believe their own feelings
enough to follow them out.The authentic is a line from one thing
along to the next; it interests us.
Strangely, it relates to what works,
but is not quite the same. It never
swerves for revenge,Or profit, or fame: it holds
together something more than the world,
this line. And we are your wavery
efforts at following it. Are you coming?
Good: now it is time.
—William Stafford
A group of us are going early to have a bite before we begin the showing. A discussion will follow. If you have something short (three minutes) you would like to read after the video, you are welcome to do so after the video. Please pass this on to anyone you feel might be interested. Cafe Roma is upstairs overlooking the Rio Cuale in the block between Vallarta St. Bridge and the Wiggly Constitution Bridge on the north side of the river.
“Poetry is an act of peace. Peace goes into the making of a poet as flour goes into the making of bread.” – Pablo Neruda
“I asked William Stafford ‘how can you write a poem every morning?’ and Bill said, ‘Just lower your standards.’” – Robert Bly