POETS PLACE
June Edition 2022
So here we are at the start of Summer. Looks like it will be a hot one. One of the ideas for this months column was to reflect on how one curates happiness. Lately, we have been in a constant state of stress with the spate of gun violence producing tragedies and lotsa death left and right. So, how do we continue to curate our happiness in the depths of despair?? Or, maybe you/we are in a state of denial. Denial can sometimes be a healthy form of getting through the day. How I curate happiness for myself is simple: 1. maintain daily relaxation practices 2. deep breathe often 3. love and accept myself 4. always dress up 5. organize and prioritize 6. don’t weigh myself 7. shop and buy art 8. attend to my friendships 9. stay involved with artistic projects 10. garden.
Life is relatively simple. It’s you that makes it hard for yourself. There’s been a whole lot of somethings to emotionally deal with lately, so that nasty feeling of helplessness creeps in and fucks with our heads. If you know what calms you and makes you happy, channel that daily. Tape those words on your fridge or your computer and make those words your mantras. Narrow your world so you have a healthy bubble to keep you safe. If friends have not shown up for you, then kiss them goodbye with a loving hug and say vaya con Dios! We can choose who we want to spend our precious time with. Life is a gift, share it with those you love and who love you.
With Love, Linda
And now, stories and poetry from you xxxooo
The Slime In All Of It
By. R. S. Rocha
(1944-May 21, 2022)
In memorandum- this poem was sent by his loving friends, Joanne Payne and Marilyn Fuss, who also shared a poem in today’s column. It was his last poem- Ronald read many of his poems over the years at my poetry shows.
Skimming stones
Flying Drones
Ancient and the new
Shocking to the gods
The now has come askew
Mad man in the castle
Public minds wrestle
No logic from the
Bald red-comb-over
An immoral mind
In full disclosure
There’s a crime
In all of this
I can’t capture
The slime in all of it
Trying to stop the Tic Toc in the towers
China wouldn’t give him
Golden showers
Campaign filled with glitches
He’s just another
One of Putin’s bitches
Rise up
Stop the rising tide
Help the nation stay alive
Punch a wooden spike through it
Put an end to the four-year violence
Put an end to it with a mallet
We can kill him with the ballot
Ronald Stephen Rocha, known to his family and close friends as Dusty, was a loving, passionate father, husband, writer, poet, and civil rights activist who passed—somewhat unexpectedly—on May 21, 2022 at age 77.
Ronald was boisterous, outspoken, loved to laugh, and never gave anything less than the entirely of his effort. His hobbies became passions and his passions became obsessions.
He was born in Los Angeles to Victor and Margherita Rocha in 1944, the youngest of their four children. His father was drafted before he was born and was killed in the war shortly thereafter. Having never met his father left an indelible mark on him, which would lead him on a quest through France and Luxembourg where he would discover secrets about his father’s final days.
As a career, Ronald worked as a peace officer. A Mexican American, he found himself passed over for promotions in favor of white candidates leading him to sue—and win—two consecutive lawsuits against the Marshals Department where he retired as a lieutenant. Along the way he became actively involved in civil rights groups where he rallied and made many lifelong friends.
Ronald’s greatest passion, however, was English, and it was always his goal to be remembered as a writer. As a masters student he devoured everything from Chaucer to Joyce to Bukowski, keen as ever to develop and hone his personal voice. Later in life he published several poems and wrote a novel based on his travels in Puebla, Mexico, which he was editing when he died.
Ronald is succeeded by Laurie, his wife of forty-five years, as well as his four children, Ingrid, Ronald Jr., Christian, and Daniel—all of whom love and miss him dearly
Looking back
By Linda Kaye
Looking back, remembering and reflecting in my old bedroom in the San Fernando Valley, circa 1960’s. Thinking, what did we know then? What could have determined the journeys taken
the doors opening
the hearts broken
the pain experienced
sour fruit ripening
stomachs churning
people always starring
family disappearing
skin peeling
At an age when the world is the size of your fist, you still dream big. Maybe it’s an unrealistic dream, or just a cloudy vision of something heroic, or just imagery of putting on some fancy lame’ pants and sparkly rhinestoned high heel shoes that allows a larger view of the world
Maybe just enjoy a puddle of creativity
a slice of love and acceptance
write a string of hits that nobody ever heard
Mental weather report
By Daniel Schack
There are lots of less true minds in this world now and lots more mindlessness.
The poet ,daniel schack can be seen on poetrysoup.com and his art on tumblr adanthemanworld.daniel schack is 57 and is a high school grad. With 3.5 years of college.peace.
INCUBUS
12-29,14
12:31 a.m.
By Mary Cheung
It paces back and forth,
Locked, in a cage of bone and skin.
The Scent of lust and desire,
Passion and fire,
Obscures my thoughts.
I cannot think....
my insides turned out,
Throbbing, hot, liquid,
starts to seep out.
Feelings of yearning,
and fragrant with desire..
An ache that lives,
just below the surface and alive
with a buzz.
My mind is blown,
my vision lost,
In a haze
of pale
blue
fire.
You burn me
and yet I still,
want,
more.
The electricity,
the energy,
crackling on my skin.
I want to drink it,
I want to roll in it,
and drown,
from within.
I drift to insanity knowing,
That a single breath from you,
will push me over the edge,
Wanting, waiting...
I'm left holding,
my breath .
It scares me ,
and it should ,
The things you inspire in
me.
I just want to be consumed by it,
and burned
by
your fire
Mary Cheung- she is an innovative Artist and Costume Designer. Her works contain a strong sense of story as well as a highly sensuous style. She mostly works in paint or photography and sometimes making art that is wearable and innovative. She states “I am usually more of a Visual style Artists and have only recently been open to sharing literally art/poems, often paired with visual art of my creation, birthing a new form of spoken word art as another form of expression”.
Our Hearts in Crisis
By Ronald G.Carrillo
Our hearts in crisis
Held hostage from maniacal devices
And Americans who’ve lost their way
Exchanging hearts for guns
Why must there be one number one superpower
That country will only have a limited time in the sun
A brief period then be replaced by another
Then another with possible wars and countless casualties
This system is outmoded and no longer serves our humanity
Why not unite our global strength for the common good
Of all the world’s people – a global village of intent
This intra-species warring is primitive
Why are we historically destroying one another
It is idiocy and counterproductive for moving us forward
It is not red, white and blue, Russian bear or Communist China
We must recognize we are but one race not warring tribes
John Lennon planted the seed for us to Imagine
That all we need is love for one another
Why not gather our best doctors, scientists, teachers
The best of the best to promote optimal human progress
No more the one percent with the lion’s share
No more wealthy elites
No more royals
No more Vatican wealth and pedophile priests
No more evil and greed hiding in the shadows of democracy
No more judgements of our cultural or racial differences
Development and maturity will rule the day
And the people are ready for the next level
The warmongers, the brutes, the bullies
Will die out and become extinct
What are we waiting for
It is time to pull together
It is time for the people to unite
And demand all world leaders to think globally
World class education, health care for all citizens
Financial support for cutting edge medicine and science
Technology for all people and updated infrastructure for all nations
Global thinking for global problems
A collective governmental form of leadership
Using our best and brightest for living standards of the highest order
Our hearts in crisis beyond the blue
Guns sounding their vengeful dues
And blood dripping from their barrels of insanity
Draining us the bystanders of our humanity
We must rid ourselves of a master servant mentality
No more slave species and supposed elite rulers dominating
Why are we held in this constant state of fear
Most of that fear owned by those unwilling to relinquish any power
The royals, the super wealthy, the blue bloods
With a self-entitled elitist complex of hoarding
There is plenty of good China dishes and silverware to go round
Conflict with neighbors and the West leading the way
Uncle Sam’s hands are not clean and the democratic republic
Cannot hold its crooked course of playing dirty world cop
Compromise and sharing this planet’s resources is possible
No more dictatorial thugs
No more democrats and republican infighting for scraps
While the masses are held in economic slavery
Slaves to our 8 to 5 jobs
Slaves to our mortgages and interest rates
Slaves to our credit cards
Slaves to student debt
Slaves to addiction
Slaves to apathy
Slaves to guns
Slaves to public murder
Slaves to republicans and democrats
Time to clean house again
The Spirit of 1776 stirring in the red, white and blue
Air of freedom releasing a second independent breeze
Our hearts in crisis beyond the blue
Murders being treated like the flu
Not subdued just another obstacle on our plates of apathy
Discontent and tears spent then lives forgotten
Round and round we spin like dead leaves in the wind
These hearts unable to heal
The heartless seats of power lacking the will
To show normal heart beats
Remembering the horror of Uvalde, Texas May 24, 2022
Ronald G. Carrillo is a native Lincoln Hts Angelino, living in Eagle Rock and a retired LAUSD educator and influencer. He writes of his passion and rebirth into the golden age of living. He has been writing since high school and was initially influenced from the songwriters, Keith Reid, Joni Mitchell, Laura Nyro, Neil Young.
Poem
By G. Billie Quijano
The burglary of children's souls
Raging gun owners, unwhole
The weight of life
Seized in seconds
Enveloped in your strife
This unbearable grief
Will not erase our dreams
Tears flow in rivers and streams
You pray on the altar of AR-15's
Your response was obscene
Sanctuary of schools
Disrupted by gunfire
Countless acts of evil will backfire
Your villainous hearts
The void of consciousness
Leaves blood on your hands
Non violence is the counter plan
Laughter and glee never to be heard
Their innocent voices
Your concern is so absurd
Today they will not dance
They will not sing
Not looking forward to wearing that ring
Stories will be memories
Kissing the waves and the seas
On this earth their imaginations will never soar
Our babies in the cosmos free to explore
Answer me!!!
How many futures will be stolen?
Your guilt will never be free
We will move from darkness to light
You cannot hide your wrongs
Us, empowered with the fight
Well, how many more?
How many more?
How many more?
G.Billie Quijano-Hija de East Los. Poeta. Artista. Bruja. Instigator of beauty. Love and peace for the children of Uvalde, Ukraine and Syria. Healing and light for the survivors. Ni Una Mas
Nutrition for the Baby in Me…
By:IE Carlo
18 June 2021
A baby, the most precious of life’s reward. Neutricain is not just food, it’s food for the entire being of a baby. A baby gives its bearers a will of continuance, it anchors the self of the bearer. It gives creativity of achievement to grow and gives the baby a model of which to grow with.
All this from a layman's point of reference. I am a man so my point of view is just that, but a point of view with awareness. I had a mother who lived to the age of 92. The last couple of years were a little difficult having to do with a fall on the hip that incapacitated her. Mother was an active woman, she’d mop the floor, clean the shutters, wash down the porch, bathe the dog, cook the meals, and watch novelas. She was funny, we’d sing songs, we’d dance, she’d tell dirty jokes.
I asked her about her childhood. She wrote me a letter telling me of this, her story: How she was a tomboy growing up. She’d like to climb trees, throw rocks, play marbles with the boys, and win all their marbles. You see, she wore no underpants, so of course they lost their minds, marbles and the will to win.
She liked a little gossip as well, maybe a lot of gossip! But in most cases it was with us at home, maybe she was protecting us from that that was happening around us?
She had but a six grade education, but she had great penmanship, read her newspaper, could add and subtract; taught me to read in Spanish, and stressed education, yet never participated; from what I can remember education was a sort of practice of ‘that’s on you’! Wrong? Who knows?
She told me of her romance with my father, how happy she was, and how much of a woman she felt when she got pregnant with me. She said she would sing all day long, rubbing her stomach, always aware of where she stepped. She was seventeen at the time. Strong woman she was, big gluteus maximus, 5’9” tall. Dark healthy brown skin. Eyes full, nose short, voluptuous lips, hair of that of a black woman. A woman of character, yet full of life and laughter. Serious? you didn’t want to know! Our home was always full of friends and family. Many of our family friends were gay, they were welcomed by all in the family.
She told me of my childhood, being the first born of the entire family. I was a star, lol. I asked her what she fed me as a baby. At the time of birth from what I know, there was a product called pablum. She said that was s--t. She’d take a green plantain, split it open, cut it into wedges and place it in the sun, then she’d place these dried wedges in the pilon (malet), pound it into powder, boil the milk of the goat, add a little sugar and feed it to me. Orange juice from the garden, papaya, viandas, mangos, bananas, all from the garden. Aside from the fact I was being fed from her breast until I was three years old.
So here I am today 79 years old. Like all of us at sometime or other we will feel our age and that of the consequences of our age. But one can’t allow oneself the luxury of giving into that of old age. Some may have all the genes of sickness in them, and that’s the way it just is! Others have a will to live on by way of routines, food intake and exercise.
I make things a little difficult for myself, which is the way I maintain a healthy attitude, and spirit. I place things up high that I may need, so I have to stretch to retrieve them. When I shower I reach down to my toes making me bend over. I walk to the supermarket, I walk to the post office. I walk to my favorite restaurant, or I walk the beach, yeah I’m one of the lucky ones, and give to beautiful dreams; and because of it I give myself the awareness of this beautiful life I lead. I’m sure that sometime in this existence things will change, I’ll deal with it as best I can when that time arrives. In the meantime I listen to, Chuck Mangione’s, “Land of Make Believe”, and the Average White Band, “If I ever Lose This Heaven'', the Four Tops, “Still Waters”, Louis Armstrong, “What a Wonderful World”, y El Gran Combo, “Las Hojas Blancas Siguen Callendo”. For now I’m taking a walk. Happy Fathers Day
Ismael (East) Carlo, poet, actor begins on the streets of East Harlem, el barrio whose monica of “East” happened due to others not being able to pronounce the name, Is-Ma-El…
East, considers himself more a storyteller than a poet, although at times he gets lucky and poetry emerges from his stories...
For more about East, visit IMDB. Paz en Vida
Prison Dad
By Jenni O
The first rule is “you never talk about family business,” which is another way of saying “snitches get stitches”.
I could not have been older than 12 years old and it was a school night and I was out with my parents and my father's friends at a restaurant. I was the only kid, as always, at these dinners. The TV and the school tell you, “don’t get in the car with a drunk driver” and to get help when situations like this arise. All his boys were telling him not to drive, but no one would take away his keys. That’s how it always went. I told my mom the enforcer, if I had to get in the car, I would call for help. She told my dad the shot caller, then the shanks from him and her came out. I still see that phone booth phone in my head and thought about what all the repercussions would be, if I challenged to commit that ultimate offense and be a rat. I looked at the waiters and other people around me that could help and guard me protect me because they could see this guy was going crazy.
I had broken the first rule and I would have to wait to get to the confines of our home to receive my punishment. I don’t remember the drive back, but I know it was frightening. As soon as the clank of the front door closed the screaming started. I was now on their turf and I would have to try to fight back because this was where I would be confined since birth. I wasn’t in a position of command and but I tried to argue back because I was a favorite child of my fathers and my brothers never had to go to these things and were at their friend's house getting in their visitations. I wasn’t allowed visitations to other homes with kids and I had always been supervised.
I don’t know what I said, but it pissed off the shot caller and I knew he was coming after me. I ran to my room fast, and tried to close my door with him fast behind me.
My dad now was the Enforcer and my mom was now a victim. She was crying and yelling on the other side of the house which she confined herself to. I didn’t get the door fully closed when my dad used his physically fit 230 6 ft body to push the door open. I used my body with my feet against a column that was between me and the door to try and push him and the door closed.
His voice changed in to a childlike voice and said “little mommy let me in” as he pushed his head and hands between the door and the door closing. I could see his face. His eyes were red and with bulging out. I screamed for help, that I knew would not come.
“I love you little mommy. Why are you doing this?” he said.
This was a different face on him and I had seen all his faces. This face was not one that was going to punish me with a fist but most likely his dick. His hands grabbing at me while talking in that childlike voice and his eyes looking at me like I was a meal. My mom had told me he had raped someone before and she got him off, but that was when he was in his 20’s. I continued to scream for help and he continued to talk to me in that childlike voice and push the door open.
“Little mommy, why are you doing this to me?’
I was strong for a little girl and was able to get his head, arms and hands out from being wedged between the door. He turned the door knob so I could lock it, but I was faster. When I heard the clink of the lock, I still kept pushing the door shut in fear. The enforcer came crying and took him back to his side of the cell.
Jennifer Guillermina Otero Aka Jenni "O" is 43 years old and a native of North-East Los Angeles, where she still resides with her mother and boyfriend. She has a degree in psychology and the culinary arts and is a certified life coach. Her hobbies include photography, videography, creative writing, dancing, and making people laugh. She is an Ex Jehovahs Witness activist and has the largest Ex Jehovahs Witness only Support Group in the world. Currently, she is making a webzine for her brand, Punk Slut as well as writing her memoirs.
For LA Art Magazine
1973—Los Angeles had the First Legal Gay Pride Parade
A true story based on the book:
MORRIS KIGHT - HUMANIST, LIBERATIONIST, FANTABULIST: A Story of Gay Rights and Gay Wrongs (Process Media/Feral House)
By Mary Ann Cherry
1970 was a time when homosexuals would be criminalized if they walked down the street holding hands. Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, three men who had nothing in common except their deviant sexual secrets decided to have a parade.
It was an inconceivable undertaking. It was also very dangerous.
An irrepressible ringmaster, Morris Kight was already 50 years old when he and his friend Bob Humphries, a few years older and an unapologetic hedonist with an insatiable appetite for boys, booze, and gambling (in no specific order) decided to have a parade. They invited Reverend Troy Perry, the handsome 30 year old ordained Baptist preacher who wore a priest’s collar and commanded respect. They agreed that the parade had to be legal. It had to be legal to advance the validity of the homosexual existence.
They began to organize a gay themed parade called Christopher Street West, all the while still doing their other works for gay liberation. Kight was a busy antiwar activist and ran an underground bail fund and a not-for-fee counseling for gay runaways and rejects. Humphries founded and ran the United States Mission and the Church of the Androgyny. Perry was already a busy activist as well as founding the Metropolitan Community Church, a gay affirming ministry that was growing quickly. Between the three of them, they certainly had the makings of a grand parade.
Kight filled out the parade permit application and Humphries paid the $50 fee. Immediately alarms went off throughout the police department. All the principals listed on the application (Kight, Perry, Humphries) were summoned to a hearing before the police commissioner. Troy Perry, in his priest’s collar and speaking his smooth southern drawl, stood before the commission, representing the gay community After some grandstanding on both sides, the commission decided to grant the permit with a few onerous restrictions including a $1,500 bond to cover the cost of additional police officers and liability insurance to cover property damage in the inevitable riot that would ensue in event of a gay parade.
The ACLU was called and a restraining order was filed against the LAPD.
Plans for the parade continued. Flyers, posters, and press notices went out - always stressing “peaceful and nonviolent.” Tulle was being cut, pounds of confetti were being purchased, and large banners were printed. People were coming from out of town and costumes and floats were being constructed. Legal or not, something would happen on Hollywood Boulevard on June 28.
Opposition to the parade wasn’t just from outside the nascent gay community. Kight received death threats. Many gay people felt safe in the closet, they were convinced that they’d be beaten or killed if they marched in a parade.
Finally, two days before the scheduled parade, the California Superior Court heard the case. The judge was appalled at the Los Angeles Police Department and cited the obvious constitutional guarantee of freedom of expression. He ordered the parade permit be issued without conditions. “These are citizens,” the judge said, “they are tax payers and they don’t have to pay extra money to have a parade. I don’t care if you have to call out the National Guard, you are to protect these people. They can have their parade.”
And what a parade it was.
When the story of twentieth-century heroes is written, let the people who marched down Hollywood Boulevard in the first Gay Pride parade be remembered. No one knew what to expect when the metaphorical closet door was blown off the hinges. It could have been a riot or worse.
The afternoon of June 28, 1970 did not disappoint. 1800 participants and 35,000 spectators peacefully followed a prescribed parade route.
From the beginning, there was nothing sedate about gay lib. Floats and marchers were wild, dramatic, humorous, unapologetic and a bit irreverent. There was a woman on a horse, a Tarzan with a five-foot boa constrictor, a raccoon and a monkey, two men walked sheepdogs and carried a sign that read, “Not all of us walk poodles.” A few duchesses, butch types, leather-clad motorcyclists, and quite a few “transvestites,” the press reported. There was a “Homosexuals for Ronald Reagan” float and another, “Heterosexuals for Homosexual Freedom.” And then there was a supersized Vaseline jar (the following year this was accompanied by an oversized “cockapillar”).
It was a historical march, starting at McCadden Place and moved east on Hollywood Boulevard and then south on Vine. It changed the course of history. The LAPD was ready for a riot. Instead they got a traffic jam.
The parade ended at Selma and spilled into an impromptu mingling in the street, a bit of disorder, pandemonium, sweet frenzy and excitement, a “mill-in,” the hippies would call it.
Even the biggest naysayers had to concede that the parade was “electrifying.”
Every year since then, with the exception of 1973 and Covid cancellations, there has been a legal parade and celebration of Gay Pride. Now Pride is celebrated in every major city in the world and many towns off-the-beaten-trail. No matter where, every Gay parade is bright, fun, and a bit wild.
And most importantly, it is always nonviolent.
Happy Pride Month!
In celebration of GAY PRIDE MONTH, get your copy of the biography of gay-rights trailblazer, Morris Kight, co-founder of Gay Pride.
There will be a reading and book signing of the biography: MORRIS KIGHT - HUMANIST, LIBERATIONIST, FANTABULIST: A Story of Gay Rights and Gay Wrongs (Process Media/Feral House)
Thursday, June 23, 2022, from 6:00-8:00pm at Small World Books in Venice 1407 Ocean Front Walk, Venice, CA 90291.
For more information call (310) 399-2360 or visit https://maryanncherrywriter.com.
Mary Ann Cherry has a wide-ranging background which includes television and film production as well as creating and maintaining the historical archives for the AIDS Healthcare Foundation. Cherry befriended Morris Kight during his last decade and with his blessing, she began researching and writing his biography. The Mary Ann Cherry Collection in ONE Archives at the USC Libraries includes all the Kight research and ancillary materials.
The first gay demonstration in Los Angeles (Jim Hansen and Morris Kight outside of Barney's).
1970, the first Christopher Street West parade down Hollywood Blvd, co-founder Bob Humphries and Morris Kight (also co-founded by Rev. Troy Perry, not pictured).
MANHUNT
--by Amy Fogerson
April 2, 2021
Helicopters circle overhead
So close they rattle the windows.
Sirens crescendo and diminuendo
As police cars circle the block.
A text from our building management
Reports a gunman in a nearby apartment
Two blocks away.
I imagine him stuck in the stairwell,
Whatever anger or fear or hunger
That caused him to take a gun
And wield it to achieve some aim
Now overwhelmed by the knowledge
That he is the subject of a manhunt.
Surely he knows he will be caught,
That this bad day can only get worse,
That his decision has started a cascading
Series of actions and events
That will change his life forever.
If a bird flew from my balcony to that building
It would cross 2 swimming pools, a tennis court,
And a lushly landscaped courtyard.
An oasis of calm in this urban center.
Not so calm now,
As the whirring blades drown out the birdsong,
The sound of one neighbor swimming laps,
And another neighbor practicing Rachmaninoff
On her grand piano.
And I imagine that man,
His heart pounding so loudly
He can barely hear the helicopters.
I imagine his thoughts racing
As he wonders how he got to this place,
Which moment of this day was the one
Where a choice he made turned his future
Into something frightening and violent.
I imagine the hopelessness he must feel
Knowing that the only choices he has now
Are bad ones.
Knowing that he is alone in that stairwell
With no one to help him.
That he has written the next chapter
Of a book he doesn’t want to read.
I wonder whether,
If he had had access to a swimming pool
Or the ability to lose himself in Rachmaninoff
Or even a moment hearing the singing of birds,
He would be in that stairwell
Holding a gun
Waiting for the helicopters
And more guns.
Amy Fogerson has made her living as a classical and session singer for more than 30 years. In addition, she works part-time for Street Symphony, an organization that brings collaborative musical events to Los Angeles’ Skid Row and incarcerated communities. She has written poetry sporadically for years; the COVID-19 pandemic quarantine provided the time and mental space to focus more deeply on the art form.
Brief Flights
By
Marilyn Fuss
April, 2016
A trinity of wrens, one at each point, fled the cross on the church next door
to make way for the Regular, a crow who delighted us at that station--
the FOREVERMORE raven,
above the hammered tin backing of the Mission Revival pediment,
beside the spire thrown in for good measure by an eager architect,
over the composition shingles where Toby the cat cried himself silly for an hour once,
before he found his way down the graduated holy roofs
to storage shed and service counter,
preventing a call to the fireman.
A former teacher and go-fer, Marilyn Fuss has spent most of her life in Los Angeles, appreciating as many of its details as she can, and working to have a safe country to live in 2021.
Thanks for joining us! We will continue to host writers and poets of all genres.
Please submit your written work to: lindakayepoetry@icloud.com and include a short bio.
Linda Kaye writes poetry, curates poetry, produces spoken word and art events and produces a poetry column POETS PLACE for the online publication LAARTNEWS throughout the Los Angeles area.
Linda’s poetry events have included several summer poetry salons, and shows at the Align Gallery, 50/50 Gallery, Gold Haus Gallery, Ave 50 Gallery and Rock Rose Gallery in Highland Park .The Manifesto Café in Hermon, Pilates and Arts studio in Echo Park, and Native Boutique and Zweet Café in Eagle Rock. And at the Neutra Institute Gallery and Museum in Silverlake. Her first short documentary film “BORDER POETS” was a socially and politically inspired event with poets and musicians filmed at the border wall near Tecate, Mexico on the Jacumba, Ca. side of the US. The film co-produced by MUD productions is available for viewing on her website and on youtube. https://youtu.be/5Te4-dlhxco
Her rap music video project in collaboration with Mary Cheung, “ERACE-ISM” can also be seen on youtube. https://youtu.be/NfrbveNUBgg
Most recently, February 19, 2022, she debuted her staged poetry production of “20 Years Left” at the historic Ebell Club in Highland Park! Two sold out shows with 2 standing ovations!! Check out the links to reviews and the video!
https://thehollywoodtimes.today/20-years-left-new-show-performance-poetry-music/
20 Years Left youtube live stream 2/19/22
Linda Kaye is a native Angeleno who grew up in the San Fernando Valley. She claims to be both a first-generation Valley Girl, and The Original Hipster. Educated at Antioch University and Cal State Long Beach in psychology and social work. Linda, now retired from medical social work, was working for the last seven years as a psychotherapist and licensed clinical supervisor for an out patient mental health clinic. She was a licensed medical social worker for 30+ years working on the front line of healthcare, a private consultant for Physicians Aid Association and for skilled nursing facilities throughout California and Arizona. She was also an adjunct assistant professor at the USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work. Oh yeah.
Twitter/Instagram: lindakayepoetry