Name as Fundamental Pattern

Ian Boyden Reads from A Forest of Names

Join Ian Boyden for a reading of poems from A Forest of Names: 108 Meditations, a collection of poems translating the names of schoolchildren killed in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. 5,196 schoolchildren were killed when their schools collapsed on them. Boyden spent a year translating their names and contemplating what these names reveal about who we are and what it is we value. This reading will be structured around the word , pronounced wén​—an incredibly important word for which we have no exact translation. The word comes up again and again in the names of these children. How did it come to be so important? What is revealed about culture and hopes for the future based on the names the children are asked to carry? Not only is “wen” central to many of these children’s names, but it is also central to the place and geography where they lived, even the name of the earthquake itself. The reading, hosted by the Seattle Poetics Lab, will last about 45 minutes and be followed by a Q&A.

Friday, January 22, 7pm PST
Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/2064225002

About Splabman

Poet & interviewer Paul E Nelson founded SPLAB (Seattle Poetics LAB) & the Cascadia Poetry Festival. Since 1993, SPLAB has produced hundreds of poetry events & 600 hours of interview programming with legendary poets & whole systems activists including Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Joanne Kyger, Robin Blaser, Diane di Prima, Daphne Marlatt, Nate Mackey, George Bowering, Barry McKinnon, José Kozer, Brenda Hillman & many others. Paul’s books include American Prophets (interviews 1994-2012) (2018) American Sentences (2015) A Time Before Slaughter (2009) and Organic in Cascadia: A Sequence of Energies (2013). Co-Editor of Make It True: Poetry From Cascadia (2015), 56 Days of August: Poetry Postcards (2017) and Samthology: A Tribute to Sam Hamill (2019) Make it True meets Medusario (2019), he’s presented poetry/poetics in London, Brussels, Nanaimo, Qinghai & Beijing, China, has had work translated into Spanish, Chinese & Portuguese & writes an American Sentence every day. Awarded a residency at The Lake, from the Morris Graves Foundation in Loleta, CA, he’s published work in Golden Handcuffs Review, Zen Monster, Hambone, and elsewhere. Winner of the 2014 Robin Blaser Award from The Capilano Review, he is engaged in a 20 year bioregional cultural investigation of Cascadia and lives in Rainier Beach, in the Cascadia bioregion’s Cedar River watershed.
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