Literary Events (Page 131)

One Voice, Many Voices

By Maia Williams

Poetry Café Bellas Artes will launch their second season on Thursday, January 19th by featuring three poets with strong ties to San Miguel de Allende: Lynn Learned, Ken Morrow, and Nan Williamson.

Early on in her career and shortly after the Watts riot, Lynn Learned created programs for Cross Cultural Communication through the Office of Economic Opportunity in Los Angeles. Later, she was invited to go to the Western Equatorial Pacific with John Kenneth Galbraith to assist in a series of economic meetings with important Palauan dignitaries that resulted in the Palauan’s working toward independent status with a Nuclear Free Constitution. Subsequently, she produced an award winning PBS television documentary, “Strategic Trust, The Making of Nuclear Free Palau” and was selected for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Documentary Series and won the Benton Film Peace Prize.

Trained as an artist with a Masters in Fine Art, Lynn’s vocation has centered on photography and film, but she has always written poems on the back of envelopes or scraps of paper. Poetry has been and is always with her.

Ken Morrow has worked hard as architect, sculptor, painter, furniture-maker, candle-maker, carpenter, bartender but never as hard as his current effort to define the verb “to write.” One entry in that definition is the preparation of a manuscript of recent poems with the working title, Uncertainty Principle. Another entry is his current exploration of poetry for multiple voices as spoken, dramatic narrative. For the January Poetry Café Ken will collaborate with his partnered readers, Lynn Learned and Nan Williamson, to present a group of poems written for multiple voices.

Nan Williamson is an artist, teacher, and author from Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. She began her poetry journey in San Miguel in 2011 in classes led by Judyth Hill, who is still a mentor. Nan is a member of The Ontario Poetry Society and The League of Canadian Poets. Her poems have been published in numerous magazines in Canada and the U.K. In 2013, she graduated from the prestigious Humber School for Creative Writing, Toronto. Her chapbook, leave the door open for the moon, was published by Jackson Creek Press in 2015, featuring hand-printed block illustrations throughout 40 hand-bound pages, a limited edition of 125 copies, signed and numbered. Recently, a copy was purchased for the Canadiana Collection, Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto.

Founded in January of 2016, Poetry Café Bellas Artes meets monthly, September through April. The all-volunteer community organization features local and visiting poets (established and emerging) sharing original work in a casual setting.

Please arrive a few minutes early. Seating is first come, first seated. Depending on the temperature, a cold or hot beverage will be served.