Join us on Saturday, October 20, 2018 at 2:00pm at the Tranquilbuzz Coffee House (112 W Yankie St.) for Just Words! Eve West Bessier and Raven Drake will read from their work.
Eve West Bessier is a jazz vocalist, voice coach, and published author. She is a Poet Laureate Emerita of the City of Davis, California. She currently lives in Silver City, New Mexico. She was born in Holland and immigrated to San Francisco with her mom at age seven. Eve holds a Bachelor of Arts in English/Creative Writing from San Francisco State University, and a Master of Education from The University of California, Davis. She worked in educational research at UC Davis for eighteen years. She served as an Area Coordinator and teacher with California Poets in the Schools for over a decade, and still teaches writing workshops on occasion. Eve performs her unique mix of vocal jazz and original poetry at conferences, house concerts, art galleries, and other venues. https://www.jazzpoeteve.com/
A sample of Eve West Bessier’s poetry:
How to Resurrect a Luma
(Dedicated to the town of Petaluma)
Go ahead and pet a Luma
with imagination. You’ll exhume
a creature whose perfume
requires moonlight, and whose hooves
tap out a tune to conjure June
and all her grandeur.
If you do not pet a Luma soon,
the Luma will elude you.
Then your moon will be tuneless,
and Juneless your perfume.
Raven Drake is originally from Boston and started conjuring poetry when he was eleven. Sixteen years ago he moved to Grant County, New Mexico. Within recent years his explorations of mythology and etymology have helped to fuel his writing ambitions. Mr. Drake’s work has been featured in the 2004 Ink Spot Anthology of Poets, Las Cruces Poets and Writers Magazine, Tales of the Talisman, Illumen Magazine, the e-zine Aoife’s Kiss, the webzine La Lune Bleue Planete, Decanto Magazine, and Apollo’s Lyre. Raven has held readings throughout Grant County and was also a presenter at the 2013 Southwest Festival Of The Written Word.
His work reflects an ongoing exploration of and fascination with assorted mythic realms, and multi-dimensions of the imagination. For years, he’s been interested in poetry as an act of conjuration or spell-craft, taking as a given that archetypal space/time is fully inhabited with various aspects of the soul/self. He is currently working on a more articulate vision of the myriad paradoxes and enigmas that exist within that barely visible continuum, giving shape to various psychic forces and attempting to manifest the often unseen, calling forth the unknown and perhaps unknowable into the realm of the known.
You can visit Raven http://ravendrake.webs.com/
A sample of Raven Drake’s poetry:
Foretold
Sibyl, my governess
Diverted and adrift
What prophecy bound by your circle
Sputters from my lips?
Talk to me
As I think aloud
Scribbling frantic script
In open court
Without reserve
In the face of this eclipse
Open mic will follow promptly after the featured artist!
