Here’s the video of a poem that Angel Nafis and I wrote this summer. This performance was at Adam Falkner and My live show at the Bowery Poetry Club in January. If you have the opportunity to look up any more of the remarkable work Angel has online (both in print and video), that will be time extremely well spent.

As perhaps the final documented chapter of the poem I wrote for my brother Ben’s wedding in October: Rattapallax films and Ram Devineni made the video for “Epithalamion: For Ben & Wendell”. A tremendous holler to love, family, New York State, 2011, and the small moments becoming the most undying.

Feel more than free to pass it along to good people:

ALSO WORD RIOT PUBLISHED THIS VERSION IF YOU’D LIKE TO READ ALONG

Hitting the road this month for some really exciting shows and workshops.

I’ll be travelling with my book, “The New Clean” from Write Bloody Publishing, as well as the live album “Jon Sands & Adam Falkner LIVE at the Bowery Poetry Club”. And enough high-fives for everybody.

CHECK BACK AS MORE DETAILS ARE FILLED IN!

2/4: The Standard, 8300 Sunset Boulevard, 7 PM – West Hollywood, CA
(For the epic release of “The Rattling Wall” through PEN Center USA):

2/6: Amino Pat Brown Charter High School (closed), 9 AM, – Los Angeles, CA

2/6: PEN Office (closed), 7 PM – Beverly Hills, CA
(Author Q&A with 2012 PEN Emerging Voices Fellows)

2/7: Da Poetry Lounge, 544 N. Fairfax Ave, 9 PM – Los Angeles, CA

2/17 & 2/18: ACUI “Hand and Heart” Poetry Invitational at Kalamazoo College – Kalamazoo, MI
(I’ll be reading sets and faciliating workshops throughout the weekend)

2/19: Writing workshop at the Neutral Zone, 2-4 PM – Ann Arbor, MI

2/20: Chill Pill @ the Soho Theater (w/ Ken Arkind), 20:00 – London, UK

2/21: The Cobblestone – (77 N. King Street, Smithfield Dublin 7), 20:30 – Dublin, Ireland

2/22: Open Writing Workshop (w/Ken Arkind) – The Cobblestone, 77 N. King Street, Smithfield, Dublin 7), 17:00-19:00 – Dublin, Ireland

2/23: Public Writing Workshop (w/ Ken Arkind) @ The Victoria, 16:00-18:00 – Birmingham, UK

2/23: The Victoria (w/ Ken Arkind), 48 John Bright Street, 19:30 PM – Birmingham, UK

2/24: OPEN Writing Workshop – Nottingham Writers Studio, 14:00-16:00 – Nottinham, UK

2/24: Show + Workshop (w/ Ken Arkind) – Mouthy @ The Nottingham Playhouse, 17:00 – 20:00 – Nottingham, UK

2/25: Moholo, (extended set w/ Ken Arkind), 20:00 – London, UK
CLICK FOR DETAILS

2/26: Moholo PUBLIC WORKSHOP (w/ Ken Arkind), 13:00-15:00 – London, UK
CLICK FOR DETAILS

2/26: Keats House Museum (w/ Ken Arkind), (time TBA) – London, UK

2/27: The Rio Cafe (w/ Ken Arkind), 27 Hyndland Street, Glasgow G11, 20:30 – Glasgow, UK

2/28: Open Writing Workshop (w/ Ken Arkind) @ The Hide, 15-17 Argyle St, 17:00-19:00 – Edinburgh, UK

2/28: The Third Door (w/ Ken Arkind), 8 PM – Edinburgh, UK

3/1: LTAB at the Chicago Cultural Center (w/ many amazing poets), 6 PM – Chicago, IL

3/2: Elastic Arts, 9:30 PM – Chicago, IL
(PART OF WRITE BLOODY PUBLISHING’S OFF-SITE AWP READING)

3/3: AWP Panel (w/ Ram Devineni, Susan Brennan, Bob Holman & Lamont Steptoe):
Poetry as Web-Series, 4:30 PM – Chicago, IL

This is the second video in the series from Adam Falkner and my live show at the Bowery Poetry Club on January 14th. Midway through the set we asked everyone to direct their attention to the back of the room, where Roger was crouched atop the bar. The room went silent, and he told us this:

Tara Hardy is one of true gems of, not just this art form, but humanity. She’s among the best this life has to offer. Tara has gifted the world not just her amazing work, but her sweat, empathy, investment, and infinite honest encouragement. Please give what you can:

CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE AND LEARN MORE!

On January 14th, Adam Falkner and I had the third installment of our live show at the Bowery Poetry Club (with help from Humuni, Angel Nafis, and Roger Bonair-Agard). For the next month, I’ll be releasing some of the videos from that night on this blog, starting with this one. Adam is playing the piano, and Duv (one of the finest voices in all five boroughs) is singing it beautiful:

Got a little love in Tonya Ingram’s Huffington Post Blog. The UW poets absolutely did their thing for the “Bring to Light” Festival. We made a LOT of magic, in a little time:

READ IT HERE<-------

If you’ve been aching to clap, relax, wild out, and listen simultaneously, this is hands-down the reading I’m most excited about. Pull up those extra fancy argyles, and come to our third “Jon Sands & Adam Falkner LIVE at the Bowery Poetry Club“. Adam is a brother to me in this life, and I hold tight these nights we get to kick back and really share a stage. We’ll be doing new work, a few middle-age jams, and more than anything — celebrating this beautiful evening we’ve been looking forward to all year.

In the tradition of remarkable collaborators we’ve had: Our host will be the inimitable, Angel Nafis! Our special guests will be the dynamic hip-hopexplosion, Humuni! Our DJ will be the headmaster at Hogwarts, Eliel Lucero

(FLY)er by Rico Fdk

The last one looked like THIS:

If you consider yourself a member of any community, this show is definitely the jam for you. I just wrapped listening to the episode about the Bronx. It’s spellbinding, and makes you grateful that we have, not only the individuals working to accentuate, celebrate, and improve their own communities, but that we also have people committed to these stories and the way they blossom into the world. Incredible ups to host: Al Letson, producer: Tina Antolini, and the entire crew at State of the Re:Union.

LISTEN to “State of the Re:Union”

This week (in New York City) during morning rush hour (8-10) on both the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bound L-trains (vroooom) you can connect to the first ever mobile pirate intranet to exist on the New York City Subway. It runs as a sort of arts and literature magazine (among a few other interactive features). This is a project from the company WeMakeCoolSh.It.

I was asked to curate poetry content for the issue, and I’ve got to say that if you make it on those trains you are in for a real doozy. You can look forward to reading amazing work from the following poets:

Jon Sands!
Jeanann Verlee!
Mahogany L. Browne!
Roger Bonair-Agard!
Shira Erlichman!
Michael Cirelli!
Samantha Thornhill!
Adam Falkner!
Erica Miriam Fabri!
Mindy Nettifee!
Ken Arkind!
Elana Bell!

THIS IS THE LINK TO THE FULL PRESS RELEASE