Still more readings from "Slicing the Bread" - in North Hollywood and Syracuse, NY

"The Voices of Survivors" 

 Maja Trochimczyk & Ed Rosenthal 

at No-Ho Unbuckled Poetry Readings

Saturday June 6, 2015 at 3:45 p.m.

The Unbuckled Poetry readings hosted by Radomir Luza  are held at T/U Studios, at 3:45 p.m. on the First Saturday of each month. 

The T/U. Studios are located at 10943 Camarillo Street (Behind Odyssey Video) (Off Vineland) at the intersection of Vineland, Camarillo and Lankershim. I will co-feature with Ed Rosenthal, author of "The Desert Hat" published by Moonrise Press in 2014 will co-feature at Unbuckled Poetry on June 6, 2015 starting at 3:45 p.m.

Radomir Vojtech Luza wrote the following description of the event: 
"At this time of despair and disjunction, disrepair and malfunction, it is artists that keep the globe spinning and the universe purring. Without these hardy souls, escape and hibernation would be nothing less than impossible and all but implausible. The day to day concerns and worries stripped bare by craftsmen and experts who entertain, educate, illuminate and inspire. It is artists who maintain the balance in a reality gone haywire and a turquoise orb given to tragedy, turmoil and chaos. Whether writers, actors, musicians, comedians, directors, poets, composers, editors or dancers, the fraternity has no end or beginning, merely a middle. And, as such, life changers and existence alterers each one." 

"Therefore, if you wish to encounter and embrace a crew or den of such magnificent muse manipulators, look no further than the monthly UNBUCKLED: NoHo POETRY reading taking place tomorrow, 6/6/15, at T.U. Studios in North Hollywood with Featured Poets Maja Trochimczyk and Ed Rosenthal. 
At four and a half years, UNBUCKLED is the longest running literary series in North Hollywood. It offers life, love, literature and a family atmosphere that changes the world once every 30 or 31 days." 

MAJA TROCHIMCZYK

"If there is a more meticulous, dedicated and passionate poet than Trochimczyk on the Los Angeles poetry scene, this poet has not met him or her. The Polish butterfly publishes, writes, hosts and features in a dizzying schedule that makes her one of the busiest and most sought after poets in the city.

She will be reading from "Slicing the Bread," a chapbook about her parents and their experiences in WWII. If the book is anything like her past work, we have a painstakingly beautiful piece of art to look for ward to. And, really, who would expect anything less from Trochimczyk. This is Maja's first Feature at UNBUCKLED and Mary and I could not be happier to have her."

ED ROSENTHAL

The collection of poetry is THE DESERT HAT by Ed Rosenthal, and Elena Karina Byrne describes it this way: "Ed Rosenthal's THE DESERT HAT not only recounts an incredibly vivid story of survival, but maps out the dangerous journeys of the heart and the imagination in that hallucinatory place between mind and body, between nature and man, between the past and the future. Like poet James Wright, Rosenthal 'goes/Back to the broken ground' of the self and finds a stranger there trapped in the cosmology of an endless, unpitying desert. As the stark 'sun burns holes/in to the sky' the psyche's true-north compass finds salvation's shade. Rosenthal climbed out of 'the busted monster's mouth' with a beautiful,moving book."
Rosenthal, who survived alone in the Mojave Desert for six and a half days, is a gifted poet who has never read at UNBUCKLED before, but is thrilled and overjoyed to be making his debut tomorrow.
Ed is also courageous and resourceful. The poet-broker overcame tremendous odds that may have humbled others in escaping the desert. 

OPEN MIKE-Open to all poets, writers, actors, musicians and comedians.
Read your own work or that of someone else. It is alright just to watch as well.

The Palace Poetry Group Presents

Slicing the Bread / Krojenie Chleba 

 A Bilingual Poetry Reading 

by Dr. Maja Trochimczyk

TUESDAY, JUNE 9, 2015, 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm.

DeWitt Community Library, DeWitt near Syracuse, NY

3649 Erie Blvd. East, DeWitt, NY 13214 
Tel.: (315) 446-3578 www.dewlib.org

Dr. Maja Trochimczyk at Tia Chucha's Centro Cultural, Sylmar, February 2015.

Photo by Jessica Wilson

Slicing the Bread. A Children’s Survival Manual in 25 Poems

 Paperback. Georgetown, KY: Finishing Line Press, 2014, $14 + $2.99 S & H

https://finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=2149

Slicing the Bread is a unique poetry collection revisits the dark days of World War II and the post-war occupation of Poland by the Soviet Union that “liberated” the country from one foreign oppression to replace it with another.  The point of view is that of children, raised by survivors, scarred by war, wary of politics. The poems, each inspired by a single object giving rise to memories like Proust’s madeleine (a spoon, a coat, the smell of incense), are divided into three sections, starting with snapshots of World War II in the Polish Borderlands (Kresy) and in central Poland.

Reflections on the Germans’ brutal killings of Jews and Poles are followed by insights into the way the long shadow of THE war darkened a childhood spent behind the Iron Curtain. For poet Georgia Jones Davis, this book, “brings the experience of war into shocking, immediate focus” through Trochimczyk’s use of “her weapon: Language at its most precise and lyrical, understated and piercingly visual.” According to Pulitzer-Prize nominated poet John Guzlowski, Maja’s “poems about what the Poles suffered both during World War II and The Cold War afterwards are written with the clarity of truth and the fullness of poetry… Here are the stories of how the people she loved experienced hunger and suffering and terror so strong that it defined them and taught her, and teach us, the meaning of family.

        Los Angeles Poet Laureate - Luis J. Rodriguez

Luis J. Rodriguez gave a reading at the Tujunga Branch of Los Angeles Public Library and the Village Poets welcomed him on May 23, 2015: Dorothy Skiles, Marlene Hitt, Joe DeCenzo, and Maja Trochimczyk. Elsa Frausto who organized the reading could not attend but was present through her poems. 

Holocaust Memorials and Reviews of "Slicing the Bread" Poetry Chapbook

The "Slicing the Bread" poetry book is starting to make waves. I did some readings, and sent some review copies, and the results are starting to appear in print and online.

The poems also have a life on their own, in their proper context.  One of my poems dedicated to the victims of Holocaust, heard not seen ("Bees and the Breeze") was just reprinted in the 17th Annual Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) issue of the Poetry Super Highway, managed by poet Rick Lupert. It is my second time in this commemorative issue, another poem was published two years ago. There are just a few poems about the Holocaust and its witnesses in the "Slicing the Bread" book. I'm honored to be among the distinguished group of 40 poets, each with a different story to tell, a bitter family history, or a reflection on the unimaginable. It is now children of survivors, children and grandchildren of victims who take upon themselves the task to remember.

http://poetrysuperhighway.com/psh/2015/04/annual-yom-ha-shoah-issue-2015/

Rick picked a photo from the death camp of Majdanek, where many people from Lublin and Warsaw died; these areas are my ancestral lands, so it is good to share this, lest we forget who died, how and why...

_________________________________

The best response to so much suffering is silence, prayer and a resolve to not allow anything like that to happen again.

Like that - wars for financial gain, wars for territorial expansion, genocide for financial gain, genocide for "Lebensraum." We do have such wars today... And what are we doing about them?

             An Intermission

              She stopped waving the flag at the passing troops
              to sigh and say: "It is not my fault. I did not kill the children."
              "I did not want this to happen. I did not know..."
           
              He stopped singing the anthem with a hand on his chest
              to sigh and say: "It is not my fault. I did not carry the gun.
              I did not vote for the war. I did not vote at all."

              Why are they saying these things then, if they are not guilty?
              These innocent bystanders, the witnesses that did nothing,
              The silent, self-righteous ones... Their silence devours their souls.
           
              Their silence screams in the town squares. Their silence
              stifles the breath in their lungs.  This silence spreads quickly 
              like the plague of indifference. It is the death of all of us. 

                                                                                 Maja Trochimczyk, April 2015.
           

_____________________________

I have been so pleased that the two reviews published so far of the book have been so positive. I enjoyed the endorsements of my poet friends:

According to Pulitzer-Prize nominated poet John Guzlowski, These “poems about what the Poles suffered both during World War II and The Cold War afterwards are written with the clarity of truth and the fullness of poetry… Here are the stories of how the people she loved experienced hunger and suffering and terror so strong that it defined them and taught her, and teach us, the meaning of family.”

The Tieferet Prize winner and Poets-Café host Lois P. Jones points out that “Maja brings the Warsaw of her youth and that of her ancestors into vivid and heartbreaking detail. These are words that will move you to appreciate the simple privileges and necessities of life. Slicing the Bread is a feast in our universal and ever present famine.” As Jones wisely observes “It is the duty of the poet to convey story, but it is the art of the poet who can transform our often cruel and brutal history and affect forever, the way we look and listen to the world.”

According to Zofia Reklewska-Braun’s review of this volume (Goniec, March 2015), “One wants to read these poems. They attract the attention of the reader, from the first to the last… They are poignant, engaging. The readers’ own memories may become superimposed on these poems, if the reader is a Pole or a Polish Jew. The poems force one to reflect about the painful events from the modern history of Poland.”

Quite fittingly, Zofia Reklewska-Braun's review was printed in a Polish American periodical "Goniec."  This book, though about the War and its aftermath in Poland, is written for Polish Americans and for Americans, for those who do not know. All the families that I knew and was a part of had their stories similar to mine, some with more heroism, others with more suffering. None - not affected.

 http://www.goniec.net/goniec/inne-dzialy/goniec-poleca/poetycki-podr%C4%99cznik-przetrwania-maja-trochimczyk-%E2%80%93-slicing-the-bread.html

__________________________________

The second review, this time in English, appeared in the venerable Sarmatian Review published by the Polish Institute in Houston, Texas (April 2015).  The review by Sally Boss, one of the founders of the Sarmatian Review, praises the insightful yet hopeful poems that "describe the pain, hunger and humiliation" of the victims of the two huge millstones, Germany and Soviet Union, that "constantly grind against each other and repeatedly threaten the existence of the people in between" (a metaphor borrowed from historian Andrzej Nowak). 

"Then death, death, and more death - but not the anonymous death of millions, rather the loss of fathers, mothers, uncles, and aunts - sometimes in twenty-four hours, as when the incoming Soviets shot the narrator's uncle int he street and shipped his wife and two sons to Siberia, all in twenty-four hours."  The ray of hope found in this book is credited to the "delicacy and gentleness" in approaching the suffering, without condemnation of unnamed murderers, just as a  tribute to those they killed. 

Harvesting Pomegranates and Poetry in October

fall hues turn red

pomegranate juice on my fingers - 

I taste the seeds

October is the month of the harvest. Octoberfest in Bavaria. Thanksgiving in Canada. Pomegranates in my one-tree orchard. What does my crop of poetry publications and readings look like?  Exciting and refreshing like the pomegranates off my tree.

LA POETRY HOSTS AT NOHO LIT CRAWL - OCTOBER 22

I must say I love being invited to do things with friends. I also love being invited to do things with new friends. Jessica Wilson included my name in a small group of Los Angeles Poetry Hosts who will be featured together this Wednesday during the NoHo Lit Crawl event at 9 p.m. Live music -drums and flute by Juan Cardenas, and round robin poetry by the guests of Jessica, a dynamo of energy and poetic talent.

Since I could not quite figure out where I'm supposed to be and how to find my way Jessica made us a map with red arrows that make the location  really, really obvious. Come if you have a taste for some poetry on Wednesday night, come if you don't. You never know what you'll find.

WOMAN IN METAPHOR  AT BEYOND BAROQUE - OCTOBER 25 

I'm really honored to have been selected to join an elite group of poets, inspired by the mysterious, mystifying and mystic art of Stephen Linsteadt. My poem came from a fascination with his portrait of a ballet dancer, reflected in a series of mirrors. I melded the Myth of Orpheus losing his Euridice with a Balinese myth of a fish that was a dancing tree... in an altogether surreal set of images... Dance, Euridice, dance. Pas de poisson!

The event's description: "Twenty-seven poets from around the world share their vision of the feminine spirit, inspired by the paintings of Stephen Linsteadt. Editor, Maria Elena B. Mahler, collected twenty-seven poems from twenty-seven accomplished, published, and award winning poets from different parts of the world. She invited them to write a poem based on one of Stephen Linsteadt's paintings; paintings he created over the last thirty-five years. Live music by Adey Bell."

At Beyond Baroque: Saturday, October 25, 2014 at 8 p.m. Regular Admission. 
681 Venice Blvd, Venice, California 90291

GUTTERS & ALLEYWAYS ANTHOLOGY READINGS IN OCT & NOV

I'm very happy to have a poem included in an amazing anthology, Gutters and Alleyways: Perspectives on Poverty and Struggle, published by Lucid Moose Lit Press this fall. There are many readings scheduled in Southern California, as discussed below.  Due to other deadlines I missed the big launch described below, but I hope to make it to at least one reading later - most likely to the November 11 reading in Echo Park. 

The Gutters & Alleyways Anthology and Lucid Moose Lit Press launch was a wonderful success. Thank you to all of you who come out in support of this project release. We’d love to meet even more of you at upcoming readings and events. A few ways to keep up with the latest Lucid Moose news is through the website, LucidMooseLit.com, and through the Facebook page,facebook.com/lucidmooselit. There you will find photos from the big launch event, the latest information about readings, and new submission calls such as our very next anthology, Like a Girl: Perspectives on Feminine Identity and Development. We hope you will consider sending us a new batch of work for this and future projects.

 

For contributors outside of the southern California area, we will be mailing out contributor copies over the next week. For those able to come to an upcoming event, we will give you your copy in person. Here is a list of upcoming readings where you may also sign up to read in an open reading list (email us if you can 100% commit to reading at one of these events and we can possibly add your name to the “mini feature” list):

October 24th 6:30-9 pm at Half Off Books in Whittier (joint Cadence Collective reading)

October 29th 8-10 pm at the Ugly Mug in Orange

November 11th 6:30 pm at Stories in Echo Park

December 8th 7 pm at Gatsby Books in Long Beach

 

Other opportunities to pick up your copy (Please email or message if you can stop by one of these locations on these dates):

November 10th at 7 pm  Gatsby Books in Long Beach

November 18th at Rebel Bite in Long Beach

 

If you’d like to buy additional copies online, the most direct way is through www.createspace.com/4971670. Copies will also be available at local independent bookstores: Gatsby Books in Long Beach, Read On Till Morning in San Pedro, and Half Off Books in Whittier. If you are interested in bulk copies, please email us about price discounts.

 

QUILL AND PARCHMENT - VOL. 160, OCTOBER 2014

The October issue of the Quill and Parchment monthly poetry magazine, edited by Sharmagne Leland St. John is a virtual cornucopia of inspiration.  There is a notice about my book, Slicing the Bread, with the title poem and various statements by other poets.

TITLE PAGE: http://www.quillandparchment.com/archives/Oct2014/vol160.html

MY BOOK PAGE: http://www.quillandparchment.com/archives/Oct2014/new.html

SLICING THE BREAD PUBLICATION - DELAYED TO NOVEMBER 

https://finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=2149

All those who had pre-ordered copies of my "Slicing the Bread" chapbook from Finishing Line Press that is supposed to be published on October 25, 2014 will have to wait a little bit longer. I did not get my page proofs yet, so please be patient.  In the meantime, several poems made it to various venues, so they can be found and enjoyed in these locations. You also can read about the book on the various blogs and websites.

The book is starting to get noticed on blogs and in papers, and thanks to Andrena Zawinski, four poems can be read in the Poetry Magazine this fall:

Andrena Zawinski's Featured Poets in Poetry Magazine, Vol. 13 no. 3. www.poetrymagazine.com

John Guzlowski posted about it on his Writing the Polish Diaspora blog:
http://writingpolishdiaspora.blogspot.com/2014/07/slicing-bread-by-maja-trochimczyk.html

Rae wrote about it on her blog: Books for Mom: 
http://booksformom.blogspot.com/2014/10/monday-morning-poetry-slicing-bread.html

Forum Polonia Houston reprinted the notice with links to order copies: Slicing the Bread in Houston

The New Book Journal noticed and reprinted the press release: Slicing the Bread on New Book Journal

Then its editor, Ray K. Alan posted it on Pinterest:  Slicing the Bread Pinned to Interests

Don Kingfisher Campbell put one poem, "The Way to School" in his San Gabriel Valley Poetry Quarterly, Fall 2014. I did not attend the reading, so my poem is not posted on the blog.

And, if you have not seen the previous post about the book on this blog, with all the advanced praise by wonderful poets,  here's the link from Poetry Laurels from July 2014:
 http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2014/07/finishing-line-press-to-publish-slicing.html

And, for all those who read all the way to the end, here's the poetic reward, one poem from the Poetry Magazine set:

THE SPOON

It was made of rough metal, thick and light.

Its grey, unpolished surface looked like
no other spoon she ever saw.

Grandma said: Ah, yes, that spoon 
was made of a plane shot down 
near the Mieleszki forest.
People gathered metal scraps to melt 
into spoons. We used to carve ours
from birch-wood.  Aluminum was better.

What about the pilot? What happened to him? 
Children never stop asking questions. 

Grandma shrugs.  We found his parachute,
cut the silk into squares to filter milk,
make cheese. But the pilot?

I heard the Germans took him, 
came back for the plane. 

We did not get much,
 just some cheesecloth
and this one spoon.

(C) 2014 by Maja Trochimczyk

Immigration Poetry on KPFK Website and More on Slicing the Bread

KPFK, Pacifica Radio, included my "Ode of the Lost" in their Immigration Poetry Series. Conceived by Marlene Bond, with editorial assistance by Lois P. Jones, the series has featured a diverse range of poets.

MAJA TROCHIMCZYK: An Ode of the Lost
MARIA ELENA BOEKEMEYER: My Heart in Handcuffs
TERESA MEI CHUC: Immigration
SARAH THURSDAY: Murietta

Lois P. Jones thus introduced my poem - which is posted as a recording and text on KPFK website:

The poet, Maja Trochimczyk asks: "Are not all journeys one way?"

In this reflection on Polish exile "how far is too far for the lost country to become but a dream of ancient kings..."

http://poetscafe.podomatic.com/entry/2014-07-19T11_34_20-07_00

We hope you are enjoying this series. Please share freely and come join us at 

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Poets-Cafe-Fan-Page-KPFK-Radio-Los-Angeles-907-fm/148382908556552?ref=hl&focus_composer=true&ref_type=bookmark

"SLICING THE BREAD" STARTED ITS TREK TOWARDS THE FINISHING LINE 

If all goes well, the Finishing Line Press will publish my chapbook, "Slicing the Bread" on October 25, 2014.  This book can be ordered now and will be printed and shipped in October. The limited edition’s pre-publication sales will determine the press run, so please reserve your copy now. So far 23 poets and friends have purchased their copy. I need to find 32 more poets to do the same...

The books cost $14 each plus $2.99 for shipping for the first book in a package and $1.99 for each additional book. You can order your copy of Slicing the Bread on Finishing Line Press website at www.finishinglinepress.com (look for new releases). Read more about this book, highly praised by poets Lois P. Jones, Georgia Jones Davis, John Z. Guzlowski, Sharon Chmielarz, and Linda Nemec Foster,  on the previous issue of this blog:

http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2014/07/finishing-line-press-to-publish-slicing.html