Basking in Boise

http://radiowritersblock.wordpress.com/2011/04/25/the-writers-block-for-april-28th-joan-logghe/




That's the place you can hear an interview I did that hits the highlights on my visit to Boise.
I did four readings, five workshops, one interview, one meeting about PL with their arts administrators and community.  I am landing at home again, the snow has melted and I think I am melting a bit as well.


I cannot begin to write about all my Boise adventures, so I will give you some highlights.


My friend, Diane Ronayne, a consummate activist and community organizer, outdid herself.  In fact she almost outdid me or did me in, but no, I had a grateful blast and it all went smoothly.  We weren't even late one time.  I got to teach poetry to elders, teachers, high school students, therapists, and my old friends.
I got to read at a bookstore, coffee-shop with my second cousin playing a mean guitar,  a school library, and a literary center. I was on the radio, took a few good walks, and introduced WS Merwin, the US poet Laureate.


A lanky girl, i later found is named Sophia, came up to me on the street, "Are you the poet?"  She had to make up a test and so missed my reading.  I gave her my poem typed on a tiny piece of pink cloth, "Dressing Down for Love."  I told her to promise me if she had a poetry emergency she would call me.
Her teacher wrote me this morning that she came into school with the poem, much treasured.  Maybe that was my favorite thing.


Honestly, it was all my favorite thing.  I have said it before, Boise is my Holy Land.  Or is travel just the chance to get out of our patterned ways and become more whole?  I don't travel much, so not so sure.


I fell in love with another poet, loved having Michael meet my friends, and got so tired I had to lie down on a rug.  Now I am home, the world is changed with Bin Laden's death.  Teaching poetry makes me happy, and divisions between us make me sad.  I am not waving any flags, though feel solidarity with those who have fought, lost dear ones, and yet saddened by circumstances that cause us to hate one another.


If I can figure out how to send you any films we took I will.  If you want to hang out with me a while, check out the site above, a great young interviewer indeed.  Love to all in Boise, and to my arranged love, Santa Fe, I'm back.   XXX JL