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Bamboo Ridge Issue 126: Events Recap
It’s hard to believe that launch events for Bamboo Ridge Issue 126 are all pau! To celebrate all the ways this book has brought community together, here’s a recap of some of the many wonderful moments from the events series for this collection.
Reading & Launch at Mānoa Public Library
After a few sneak peak readings at the Hawaiʻi Book and Music Festival, the BR 126 launch events kicked off on a December evening at Mānoa Public Library. With introductions from guest editor Victoria Nalani Kneubuhl herself, some of the collection’s wonderful writers shared their pieces with us. First-time BR contributor Cheryl Ann Farrell read her fascinating speculative short story, “Yesterday’s Tomorrow.” Set in a future Hawaiʻi in which man-made environmental destruction forces agricultural practices indoors, a mysterious and kind figure brings some much-needed guidance.
Long-time BR contributor Joseph Stanton treated us not only to the poems he wrote for Issue #126, but a bonus reading of “The Last Kauaʻi ʻŌʻō.” This poem remembers and holds close the song of the last Kauaʻi ʻŌʻō as he called out to his mate one last time, only to receive silence. That one hit me right in the chest.
As if I wasn’t emotional enough, I got to say hi to Victoria Nalani Kneubuhl, too. Luckily, she was very patient and kind as I rattled on about my first encounter with her writing (it was her thought-provoking speculative short story “Hoʻoulu Lāhui”).
Virtual Reading & Launch
Good thing we didn’t have to wait too long after that first reading for the next one just a couple days later. In this virtual launch event, we heard from even more Issue #126 writers, including Sue Cowing. In her poem “A Swell Weekend,” people are drawn from their man-made worlds, attention captured by a historic South Shore swell. From GoPro-clad amateur surfers to the watermen who keep watch over them, everyone’s mesmerized. For many today, this reminder of the power and pull of the ocean is jolting–it breaks through the routines we fabricate for ourselves and reminds us how small we really are. For Rocky the Hawaiian monk seal, who makes her appearance in the poem, too, it’s just part of her everyday life. “A Swell Weekend” observes this kind of human relationship to the natural world, somehow with both humor and gravity.
Click the image above to watch the event recording
Poems Downtown: Reading at Native Books
After taking a break over the holidays, we regrouped at Native Books in Chinatown on the 125th anniversary of the fires that decimated 38 acres of the historic Honolulu community. As the aunties and uncles of Chinatown ambled by outside, we looked to the past. Wing Tek Lum read from The Oldtimers, a thoughtful and well-researched collection of poems inspired by the lives of the earliest Chinese immigrants to Hawaiʻi. A section of the book is dedicated to poems about the 1900 Chinatown fire–just one example of the unequal consequences that Chinese and Native Hawaiians faced during the bubonic plague outbreak of 1899.
Bamboo Ridge Issue 126 writers took us back in time, too. Reading his poem “Passing a Friend Before Daybreak,” John E. Simonds took readers running in one of the many Honolulu Marathons he’s completed, past the old building where he worked as a newspaper editor for years. You’d think journalism and marathoning are totally different things, but he shows us how they aren’t–with both, you’re chasing time. “Chasing today for tomorrow,” as he puts it. The piece is full of bittersweet nostalgia as he reflects on the building that housed his career and helped keep Hawaiʻi informed, and the heavy feeling of carrying on with the running of time. I love it. Plus, it really is a totally different experience hearing it in John E. Simond’s amazing old-school radio voice.
We were lucky to hear Darlene M. Javar read, too–she’s usually on Hawaiʻi Island! Her poem “Scavengers” is sharp and cutting, yet vulnerable. It tells of the kind of ownership over memory that people sometimes feel entitled to when someone they know passes away. It’s a nuanced look at a part of grief and loss that I hadn’t known how to pin down until I watched Darlene do it in this poem. Not only is Darlene an incredible writer of poems–she is also an incredible writer of grant applications that help fund BR projects!
Last thing I’ll mention about this day at Native Books was getting to hear BR editor Cathy Song swear during her powerful reading of “Somewhere a Frontier,” which is a damning poem about the never-ending greed and domination of colonialism.
Duskfall Virtual Reading
For the next event, we jumped back into the digital realm for a duskfall reading featuring pieces from Kathleen M. Foster, Terra Oliveira, and more. Kathleen shared from her short story “Lucky Numbahs,” which is an incredibly bittersweet look at aging, friendship, and loss. In it, Auntie Min finds good luck, and along with it, the guidance and essence of a dear but departed friend. Terra Oliveira blew me away with her reading of “The Big Island,” which expertly weaves together complex emotions with the difficult realities that engender them: guilt, avoidance, anger, fading family history, colonialism, resistance. You might think that’s a crazy list I just rattled off, but she really does it, and I’m still in awe.
Click the image above to watch the event recording
Reading at da Shop
We wrapped up the Bamboo Ridge Issue 126 events with a reading at da Shop in Kaimukī. Leah Emi ʻAuliʻi Loudermilk gave us a sneak peak of her short story “Anu,” which is packed with layer after layer of backstory and emotion, carefully peeled away to explore themes of siblinghood, depression, the ways we hurt and forgive each other, and growing up to face your first big goodbye. We also got a chance to hear from Marion Lyman-Mersereau, who shared some of her personal experiences on the crew of the Hōkūleʻa, to complement her reading of “Eddie Wen Go II” (you can read more about her time on the Hōkūleʻa here). It’s a poem that utilizes pidgin and rhyme to pay heartfelt homage to the legendary and selfless Eddie Aikau.
We lucky listeners got a bonus reading from THE Boy and Uncle of “Boy and Uncle: State of Entropy,” a.k.a. Misty-Lynn Sanico and Darrell H.Y. Lum. Let me tell you, the audience was losing it. And finally, we were blessed by an appearance from the mystical, magical, all-knowing, all-telling Crystal-Marie Cristobal, da Podagee fortune teller, who did, for the record, predict that Kent Sakoda would bring cone sushi for the reading. Seriously, though, Misty is a genius.
It has been a joy to see everyone come together to celebrate such brilliant writing. I really had a hard time picking which pieces to highlight in this recap, because they truly all bring something special to this collection. Thank you, thank you, thank you to all those who made BR 126 a reality. If you haven’t already: go check um go!
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