City of Poets: Four Poetry Titles from L.A. to San Francisco / LA Letters by Mike Sonksen

Alejandro Murguia at the SF International Poetry Festival, 2012. Photo San Francisco Public Library.

Mike Sonksen, aka Mike The Poet, has included me as part of a quartet of California poets in his latest LA Letters column for KCET online. I am tremendously honored to be included in such esteemed company. In his column he also gives a shout out and review for my new book on Punk Hostage Press, Dreams Gone Mad With Hope.

Read all about it...

Drop me an email if you'd like a signed copy.

Dreams Gone Mad With Hope by S.A. Griffin

The cover of my new book, Dreams Gone Mad With Hope

If you'd like a signed copy, send me an email and I'll be glad to oblige.

Art by the incomparable Matjames Metson,

intro by Village Voice art critic and Pop Surf Culture author Brian Chidester.

S.A. Griffin's words shoot across the page, piercing readers directly through the heart and brain. His writing is the literary version of a Jackson Pollack painting, only instead of paint, S.A.'s work is made of blood, sweat and tears. Sardonic and sharp, forlorn and joyous, he writes like an angel-eyed demon with wings made of vintage onionskin typing paper. His work- hell, his life- is informed by the Beats and their aesthetic, but he veers off into dangerous, previously uncharted territory. This book is S.A.'s own post-modern literary reality show, full of phrases that are as open to interpretation as they are an accurate assessment of the human condition. He is a genius... read him. – Pleasant Gehman, author of "Showgirl Confidential"

Twenty years ago an ex-friend who died in 2013 told me how much he loved S.A.'s latest book at the time, I reread it and it was great, I went home and reread his other books they were great. I am very pleased with S.A.'s new book and will treasure it too and reread it again and again, whether it is the Silver Surfer in Hollywood, Movie Queens at Schwab's or bug infested angels, S.A.'s world speaks to me. – Thomas R. Peters, Jr., owner of beat book shop, author of "100 missed train stations" and "certain birds"

For S.A. Griffin, poetry, art, life, love... it's all about the journey. This latest collection offers a rare glimpse into the unpaved highways of the heart, only stopping to top off the tank and wave to the angels littering the skyline of Heaven or Los Angeles. His poems are often a protest, a call and response, a love letter to a broken home long boarded up, they are points on a map in a story that is still being written, they wear their hearts on their sleeves, rolled up to expose the veins our shared history, parts of a whole, that together-- become everything. – John Dorsey, author of "Sodomy is a City in New Jersey"

S.A. Griffin's Dreams Gone Mad With Hope is beautiful, painful, joyous and absolutely riveting. This very personal collection delves into loss, memory, Los Angeles, America, world and love with a ferocity that is incredible, remarkable, honest and profound. Deeply touching and thoroughly entwined in what the word human means. The musicality and depth of his imagery are reflective of someone with keen perception and an exquisite heart. – Ellyn Maybe, Poet/Musician

s.a. griffin is the man who detonates the poetry bomb. a poet who's been laying it down true for years. he swings hard off the head making music that jumps. – mark hartenbach, author of "bring me the head of marko x"

Like, dig?

1st Annual Ongoing Dancer Award: Richard Modiano

First annual Ongoing Dancer Award. Honorarium to be gifted on February 20th annually to an individual, individuals or institution by the Estate of Scott Wannberg. "For dedication to poem and process, and for unflagging dedication to community." Art by Ken Tao.

2014 recipient Richard Modiano. Photo by S.A. Griffin.

Doc

     for William Carlos Williams

Some rural road in Jersey.

Doc's car stalled on the left shoulder.

His back seat filled with the fish his Italian patients

have given him because they

don't have the money.

He figures he better fix whatever is wrong.

Flossie is waiting up ahead. Cold strawberries on ice.

He bends down to examine the car and finds an Asphodel.

The Asphodel  is definitely a New Jersey

styled local type of flora.

The Asphodel tells him that Ezra has gone crazy in Europe.

Doc frowns. Asphodels don't talk, but this one... well,

it suddenly metabolizes into a miniature red wheelbarrow

and a tender rain begins to land

on Doc's head.

He just has to write a poem about all this.

He doesn't have any paper in the back.

Of course, the lack of paper, and the fact that his pen

is out of ink, is no obstacle.

He writes it all down on the side of his car

with his fingernails.

Eliot said if you write with your nails it isn't too poetic.

Stevens said you leave your nails at work.

This is my work, Doc counters.

The poem nailed on the paint

of his car causes the engine to kick over.

Exhaust meets the Jersey air

with some strange yet beautiful music.

Scott Wannberg

w/love to all,

Scott/S.A.