Episode Twenty-four

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june gehringer

This month I got to talk to June Gehringer about her latest book! June Gehringer is the author of I Love You It Looks Like Rain (Be About It, 2017), and I Don't Write About Race (Civil Coping Mechanisms, 2018), the latter of which was the winner of Civil Coping Mechanisms's 2017 Mainline contest. She lives in Philadelphia and has more crushes than she can count. She tweets about it @june_gehringer, and if you're a press interested in her next book you can reach her at gehringercat@gmail.com .

She's also an editor over at tenderness lit. 

I Don't Write About Race can be purchased here. 

 

Writers, presses, musicians mentioned in the show:

Editor and Social Media Manager: Mitchel Davidovitz

The Sound of Waves Breaking

Episode Twenty-three

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In this episode I got to speak to Chase Berggrun about their new book R E D (Birds, LLC, 2018). Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in POETRY, Pinwheel, PEN Poetry Series, Sixth Finch, Diagram, The Offing, Prelude, Beloit Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. They received their MFA from New York University. They are Poetry Editor at Big Lucks.

Chase's website

Chase's Twitter

Go Buy R E D

List of things and people mentioned in this episode:

Editor and Social Media Manager: Mitchel Davidovitz

Sound of Waves Breaking

Episode Twenty-two

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This month I got to talk with Luis Lopez-Maldonado. Prepare yourself, this episode gets a little more sexy than usual. Luis is a Xicanx poeta, playwright, dancer, choreographer, and educator. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of California Riverside in Creative Writing and Dance. His poetry has been seen in The American Poetry Review, Foglifter, The Packinghouse Review, Public Pool, and Spillway, among many others. He also earned a Master of Arts degree in Dance from Florida State University, and a Master of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing from the University of Notre Dame. He is currently a co-founder and editor at The Brillantina Project. 

Follow Waves Breaking on Twitter at @WavesBreakPod, or email at wavesbreakingshow@gmail.com

Editor and Social Media Manager: Mitchel Davidovitz

The Sound of Waves Breaking: LA/Orange County Metro

Episode Twenty-one

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This month I got to chat with Kayleb Rae Candrilli. Kayleb is author of What Runs Over, winner of the 2016 Pamet River Prize, with YesYes Books. What Runs Over is a 2017 Lambda Literary finalist for Transgender Poetry. Candrilli is published or forthcoming in Puerto del Sol, Booth, RHINO, Cream City Review, Hayden's Ferry Review, Adroit, Bettering American Poetry, Boaat Press, Vinyl, CutBank, Muzzle, New Orleans Review, and many others.

They have served as the nonfiction editor of the Black Warrior Review and as a feature editor for NANO Fiction. They are now an Assistant Poetry Editor for Boaat Press. In 2015, Candrilli was a Lambda Literary Emerging Fellow in Nonfiction, and again in 2017 as a fellow in poetry. Kayleb is a Best of the Net winner and has been nominated for Pushcart Prizes (in prose and poetry) and for Best New Poets. They were also a 2017 recipient of a Leeway Art and Change Grant.

Kayleb's website

Purchase What Runs Over here.

Artists and musicians mentioned in this episode:

The Sound of Waves Breaking is here.

This episode is edited by Mitchel Davidovitz. 
Mitchel Davidovitz is also the Social Media Manager.

You can contact Avren on twitter @WavesBreakPod, and on Facebook at Waves Breaking Podcast, and through email wavesbreakingshow@gmail.com

Episode Twenty

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This month(ish) I got to interview Nat Raha! Nat Raha is a poet and trans / queer activist, living in Edinburgh, Scotland. Her poetry includes two collections countersonnets (Contraband Books, 2013) and Octet (Veer Books, 2010); and numerous pamphlets including ‘de/compositions’ (Enjoy Your Homes Press, 2017), '£/€xtinctions' (sociopathetic distro, 2017), '[of sirens / body & faultlines]' (Veer Books, 2015), 'radio / threat' (sociopathetic distro, 2014) and 'mute exterior intimate' (Oystercatcher Press, 2013). She's performed and published her work internationally. Nat co-edited the Radical Transfeminism zine, and is currently finishing PhD in on queer Marxism and contemporary poetry at the University of Sussex.

http://sociodistro.tumblr.com (if you go here, there's pdfs of £/€xtinctions, the first edition '[of sirens...], and 'radio/threat')
http://sociopatheticsemaphores.blogspot.com

Ideas and writers discussed in this episode:

This episode was edited and social media managed by Mitchel Davidovitz

The Sound of Waves Breaking is from CadereSounds, freesound.org

Episode Nineteen

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This month I got to speak with Chely Lima and Margaret Randall, the translator for his new collection of poetry What the Werewolf Told Them/ Lo que los dijo el licantropo.

Chely Lima is a queer Cuban-American writer who has published numerous books (poetry, novel, short story, theater, literature for children) in his country of origin, and also in Spain, United States, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador. Some of these books are the novels Lucrecia quiere decir perfidia (2015), Triángulos mágicos (2014) and Confesiones nocturnas (1994), as well as the poetry books Zona de silencio (2004), Discurso de la amante (2013), and Lo que les dijo el licántropo / What the Werewolf told them (2017). His texts have been translated into English, French, Portuguese, German, Italian, Russian, Czech and Esperanto, and numerous selections and anthologies of literature from various parts of the world collect samples of his work. 

** Listeners can use the code WAVES for a 20% on ANY *Operating System* book directly through their online store, here: https://squareup.com/store/the-operating-system/ ** Thanks, Lynne DeSilva-Johnson

Books, authors, and ideas mentioned in this episode:

Editing and Social Media Management mangaed by none other than Mitchel Davidovitz

Sound of Waves Breaking: Wolves in Finland

Episode Eighteen

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This month I had the opportunity to interview H. Melt about the anthology they've just edited: Subject to Change: Trans Poetry & Conversation. 

H. Melt is a poet, activist, and educator whose work proudly celebrates Chicago’s queer and trans communities. Their writing has appeared many places including In These Times, The Offing, and Them, the first trans literary journal in the United States. They are the author of The Plural, The Blurring and editor of Subject to Change: Trans Poetry & Conversation. Lambda Literary awarded them the Judith A. Markowitz Award for Emerging LGBTQ Writers and they've been named to Newcity's Lit 50 list, as well as Windy City Times' 30 under 30. H. Melt co-leads Queeriosity at Young Chicago Authors and works at Women & Children First, Chicago’s feminist bookstore.

Writers, books and artists mentioned in this episode:

Subject_to_Change_Front_Cover_JPEG.jpg

Sound of Waves Breaking: butter melting in a pan

Editing and Marketing by: Mitchel Davidovitz

WE HAVE SOCIAL MEDIA:

check out our new facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/WavesBreakPod/

and our new Twitter account at @WavesBreakPod

You can, of course, always reach me at wavesbreakingshow@gmail.com 

Episode Seventeen

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This month, I had the pleasure of meeting Venus Selenite in person while she started her first leg of her #RehabYearTour. Venus is a Bettering American Poetry 2016 nominee, a 2017 Pink Door Fellow, and one of the most notable trans women of color interdisciplinary artists in the United States. She is the author of two books: trigger and the fire been here. She lives in Washington, D.C. and the internet.

Artists, writers, and literature mentioned in this episode:

The Sound of Waves Breaking is by Chris Lynn, a recording of voices in Washington, D.C. near the Jefferson Memorial.

The editor is Mitchel Davidovitz, and the show is produced by me. 

Episode Sixteen

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This month I speak with Raquel Salas Rivera from their residence in Puerto Rico.

Raquel Salas Rivera es una poeta, traductora, ensayista y educadora puertorriqueña que vive y trabaja en Filadelfia. Ha publicado poemas, traducciones y ensayos en numerosas revistas y antologías; también ha publicado cuatro libros de poesía: Caneca de anhelos turbios (2011), oropel/tinsel (2016), huequitos/holies (2016) y tierra intermitente (2017). En el 2018, publicará el libro lo terciario/the tertiary con Timeless, Infinite Light. Actualmente, es editora contribuyente y traductora para The Wanderer. Si para Roque Dalton no existe revolución sin poesía, para Raquel no existe poesía sin Puerto Rico. Puedes aprender más sobre su trabajo si visitas raquelsalasrivera.com.

Raquel Salas Rivera is a Puerto Rican poet, translator, essayist, and educator living and working in Philadelphia. They have published poetry, translations, and essays in numerous anthologies and journals, and as well as four poetry books: Caneca de anhelos turbios (2011), oropel/tinsel (2016), huequitos/holies (2016), and tierra intermitente (2017). In 2018, Timeless, Infinite Light will publish their fifth book, lo terciario/the tertiary. Currently, they are a Contributing Editor at The Wanderer. If for Roque Dalton there is no revolution without poetry, for Raquel there is no poetry without Puerto Rico. You can find out more about their work at raquelsalasrivera.com.

Artists, teachers, and other things mentioned in this month's episode:

This episode was edited by Mitchel Davidovitz and produced by me.

The Sound of Waves Breaking is of the coquí hanging out at night, found on freesound.org

Episode Fifteen

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I got to talk on the phone with poet Kenyatta JP Garcia and their most recent collection Slow Living. 

Kenyatta JP Garcia is the author of They Say, Slow Living and ROBOT. JP was raised in Brooklyn but currently resides in Albany, N.Y. where they received degrees in English and linguistics. They are an editor at both Rigorous and Five 2 One Literary Magazine. In a past life, they were a cook for about a dozen years. In this modern incarnation, they get paid to put boxes on shelves by night and by day they read comics, pine, worry, and attempt to craft something worth reading. 

Artists, Music, and Writers Mentioned in This Month's Episode:

The Sound of Waves Breaking is this sound effect of Time Travel.

This episode was edited by Mitchel Davidovitz. 

Lucky Episode Thirteen

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This month I had the pleasure of interviewing Ching-In about their recent publication, recombinant. We got to talk about archive, language, history, and gender. 

Ching-In Chen is the author of The Heart's Traffic (Arktoi Books) and recombinant (Kelsey Street Press) and co-editor of The Revolution Starts at Home: Confronting Intimate Violence Within Activist Communities (South End Press; AK Press) and Here is a Pen: an Anthology of West Coast Kundiman Poets (Achiote Press). A Kundiman, Lambda, Watering Hole and Callaloo Fellow, they are part of the Macondo and Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation writing communities. Their work has appeared in The Best American Experimental Writing, The &NOW Awards 3: The Best Innovative Writing, and Troubling the Line: Trans and Genderqueer Poetry and Poetics. They are a senior editor of The Conversant and poetry editor of the Texas Review. They serve on the Executive Board of Thinking Its Presence: Race, Advocacy, Solidarity in the Arts as the Director of Membership and Social Media. www.chinginchen.com

Have a listen, spread the word!

Artists and works mentioned in this episode:

The Sound of Waves Breaking this week is from Jon Jang and the Pan-Asian Arkestra's "Night in Tunisia," just in case you're curious. 

This episode was edited by Mitchel Davidovitz, whose sound project you can find here on bandcamp

Episode Twelve

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While I was on the East Coast to attend/table AWP, Tyler Vile and I got the chance to meet up with each other in D.C.'s Green Lantern bar to talk poetry and punk. The photo for this month's episode was taken just after our interview.  

Tyler Vile is a writer, performer, and activist from Baltimore, MD whose novel-in-verse, Never Coming Home, is available on Topside Press. She is a member of the Baltimore Transgender Alliance leadership team and the vocalist in a punk band called Anti-Androgen. Her interactive poetry zine, Hassidic Witch Murderer is available on her website. She aspires to one day become the world’s greatest transsexual yenta.

Artists/Bands Mentioned in the show:

Episode Eleven

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It was such a gift to speak with emerging-talent Aristilde Kirby for this month's episode! Aristilde Kirby is a twenty-five year old lesbian trans-woman poet and songsmith originally from Bronx, NY, but now resides from Carrollton, GA. She is a UGA Master Gardener. She is working on a chapbook entitled [bitácora total bust] and an EP entitled [LA POESÍA DEL CANTE JONDO], which will be out sometime in future recent history, hopefully. 

Click through the poems below to read Aris's poems "Strawberry Resirper / Achene Returner" and the four poems in her cycle "Intermediate Starved Aster Egretta SAE."

Authors, artists, and books mentioned in this episode:

The Sound of Waves Breaking is Aris's poetic soundscape "Opaline Y Hyalite" which you can find here at her bandcamp. 

Editing was done by Mitchel Davidovitz. 

Episode Ten

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This month’s interview is with none other than Jayy Dodd! In this episode we talk about their newest chapbook [sugar in the tank], their work in other genres of art and critique, their views on compensation for artistic labor, and more.

Authors and Works mentioned in this episode:

This episode was edited by Mitchel Davidovitz, whose experimental audio work "Window of Normalization" you can check out at his bandcamp.

 

    The Sound of Waves Breaking is Lucille Clifton reading her work “blessing the boats,” a poem I return to often in this post-election climate.

    Episode Nine!

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    I am so honored to get to speak with Vita E. Cleveland about her recent chapbook Dedications. The conversation, of course, wanders elsewhere: toward her percussion expertise, musings on art's intersection with activism, slut shaming in activist circles, and more.

    Poets Mentioned in this episode:

    This episode was edited by Mitchel Davidovitz, whose experimental audio work "Window of Normalization" you can check out at his bandcamp. 

    "The Sound of Waves Breaking" was Vita E's drum solo "Clave." You can listen to the entirety of "Clave" at her SoundCloud page. 

    Transcripts forthcoming, I promise!

    Episode Eight

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    In this month's episode, Jay Besemer and I talk about his recent book, Chelate, along with other topics, including: living with chronic illness, our relationship with nature, sci-fi, poetry comics, and that old chestnut TRANS TEMPORALITY.

    Books and things mentioned in this episode:

    Theme Music is by Bahati Kiro

    Music throughout is by Chris Zorn

    Transcripts forthcoming from Amir Rabiyah

    The Sound of Waves Breaking is the ambient noise of Terok Nor from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

    Lucky Episode Seven

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    In this episode I talk with Cameron Awkward-Rich about his approaches to poetry and theory, and the poetry in his new book Sympathetic Little Monster.

    Cameron has published poems in The Journal, cream city review, Muzzle Magazine, Hobart, The Seattle Review, The Offing and elsewhere. He is a Cave Canem Fellow, a poetry editor at Muzzle Magazine, and currently a doctoral candidate in Modern Thought & Literature at Stanford University. Cam is the author of the chapbook Transit (Button Poetry, 2015) and his debut collection, Sympathetic Little Monster, was published by Ricochet Editions in 2016.

    Go check out Sympathetic Little Monster, its a wonderful collection. 

    Writers who were mentioned in the shout outs: 

    The Sound of Waves Breaking this week is the sound of opening an attic, as found on freesound.org

    Transcripts are by Amir Rabiyah: https://www.scribd.com/document/378843639/Interview-with-Cameron-Awkward-Rich

    Theme Music by Bahati Kiro and the transition music is by Chris Zorn. 

    The podcast is produced by banging my head into a desk until something cohesive comes together. 

    Episode Six

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    photo by Scott Shaw

    photo by Scott Shaw

    Jai Arun Ravine talks to me about their newest book, The Romance of Siam, just released from Timeless, Infinite Light. We talk about their use of humor in critiquing orientalism, the tourist industry in Thailand, and their process as an interdisciplinary artist. 

    I have no idea what Jim Thompson's "jungle box" looked like, but maybe it was something like this

    I have no idea what Jim Thompson's "jungle box" looked like, but maybe it was something like this

    The sound of waves breaking is a section of the (incredibly long) "Once in a Lifetime" theme song for Thailand's tourism campaign. 

    Transcripts by Amir Rabiyah: https://www.scribd.com/document/378843274/Interview-with-Jai-Arun-Ravine

    External materials mentioned in this episode:

    Episode Two!

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    Today's show features a conversation between Loma and me about the government's influence on poetry, the boundaries of a poem between other objects and being, poetry & activism, struggling with how to write poetry about domestic abuse, fearlessness, and more.

    Transcripts for this episode can be found here. 

    As always, comment, rate and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes! I'll love you forever.

    Poets mentioned in this episode:

    Episode One is Here!

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    Here it is, the first episode of Waves Breaking. In this episode I interview Amir Rabiyah about the anthology they just co-edited, Writing the Walls Down. 

    Here's the show on iTunes. Please rate, subscribe, and share widely. :) 

    Transcripts for this episode, as transcribed by Amir Rabiyah, are here. 

    If you would like to support Amir Rabiyah's writing residency, go to gofundme.com/amirgoestohambidge to donate.

    And if you would like to support Aurora Levins Morales' goal to get safe housing, go to littlevehicleforchange.org to donate.