■4fl. JUStlQUt APRIL
people
The 29th Street Writers have been writing, learning, supporting and critiquing each other's work for 20 years.
This Is the Welcome
"Writing is isolating
by nature. We spark
each other and keep
each other going
around our writing."
29th Street Writers release spoken word CD
by Pat Young
really didn’t have that until 1 started working with
he 29th Street Writers recently released a
the group," she says, “and saw around the table
spoken word CD titled This Is the
women who were exploring themselves as creative
Welcome. It’s more than just a collection
people, and that really meant so much to me. It
of then- original poetry and prose. It’s an
opportunity to “spotlight and highlight gave me a way into taking myself seriously as a
writer,
some of the good writers we have here in Portland,
” and over the years it has evolved into help
ing me hone my craft.”
says Renee LaChance, who helped the producer,
Ila Suzanne also appreciates the support that
Shirley Kishiyama, in a consulting and advisory
the group gives her. “Writing is isolating by
role. “I’m hoping the CD will get some national
nature," she says. The group provides her with a
attention and that the works of these women will
place to share her work. “We spark each other and
he appreciated.”
The 29th Street Writers have Been meeting in
keep each other going around our writing.”
various configurations for 20 years. While the
Suzanne’s poems have appeared in anthologies,
membership has changed a bit through the years,
yet working on the CD was a new experience. It
was the first time she had ever been recorded.
one thing remains constant: a commitment to
writing. It’s not a drop-in group. These women are. While she considers herself to be a pretty good
reader, she says she read one of her poems six or
committed to writing, learning, supporting and cri
tiquing each other’s work. They have public read seven times before getting it just right for the CD.
And she had no problems doing that, thanks to
ings once a year, and this CD grew out of their
Barbara Bernstein’s expertise in sound engineering.
2004 reading.
“I sort of turned myself over to Barbara and Shirley.
Amy Schutzer lays claim to being the longest-
running member of the group. Not the oldest, she
They were listening with professional ears, so that
adds with a laugh, just the one who has been
was an interesting experience,” she says. “I’m proud
around for the longest. The group gave her the self to be part of a project that I think is of quality.”
confidence to take herself seriously as a writer. "I
Naomi Morena has a strong background and
T
—Ila Suzanne
long history in women’s music, so she had seen the
inside of a recording studio many times before. But
this time it was different, for she had her son with
her. Her partner gave birth to him shortly before
the CD was produced. Trying to fit the recording
session into her schedule—being a new mom as
well as her regular work for Multnomah County—
was quite the challenge. But she did it, reading a
selection from her biography.
Morena has been writing ever since she was a
kid. “1 find that 1 have drawers and drawers of
things that 1 start to write and never finish, and
being invited to be part of the writers group gave
me focus. It gave me something to hold on to so I
could discipline myself to start finishing some of
these pieces and not just let them lay around,” she
says.
The group has also been an inspiration to her.
Whenever she hears the other members of the
Portland's Only Smooth Jazz Station
group read, “it puts me in this other place of my
^eing where my spirit goes that is just a lot lighter
and not so contained or defined by what I am sup
posed to do in my workday life,” says Morena,
a parole and probation officer. “It is a role that
doesn’t have as many boundaries and there is a lot
more freedom to think outside the box, so it has
meant a lot to me especially because 1 stopped
doing music professionally.”
One thing Morena learned from the group is
that she missed the performance aspect of being a
musician. “Writers don’t generally get to perform,"
she notes.
There is a difference between writing and then
reading what you have written. For example, some
poets don’t read well, even though they write great
poetry. Some poetry is better not read and belongs
on the page.
While being a writer and not a recording artist
is an important distinction for Ellen Goldberg, she
notes that poetry for her is something that has
always had an oral tradition. She started reading
political poetry during the early 1970s. “The
women’s movement, the political left, the anti-war
movement all had a group of people who were
cultural workers as well as political workers,” she
says. “We blended our art with our politics, and so
it was something usually shared out loud.”
With this new CD, she says: “It’s neat for peo
ple to get at chance to hear the writers’ voices, to
hear how they are hearing in their own heads,
because that is sometimes different than it looks on
the page. 1 think that all good writing is something
that we hear in our head, or we even say it out loud
as we write it and so the music of it—the sound of
it, the meter of it, all of that—is something that
you don’t necessarily get unless it is read out loud.”
Schutzer puts in a lot of work before a reading.
“The challenge for me for this reading was 1 want
ed to recite one of the poems and not have my
safety net of having the poem in front of me. And
that was the first time 1 have done that in public,"
she says. “It was such a challenge just to have that
confidence. It really pushed me, and it went off
fine." ©
T his I s
the
W elcome is available at Powell’s
Books, In Other Words, Broadway Books, Annie
Bloom’s Books, Dxiking Class Bookstore, Music
Millennium and CDBaby.com.
Portland free-lance writer P at Y oung is a gay and
lesbian historian.
kijz.com