Cupertino Public Library
In the winter of 2019, Kaecey McCormick, the Cupertino Poet Laureate at the time, was hosting an open mic for reading poetry in all languages, at the Cupertino Public Library. For a few years before that, I had been hosting monthly poetry readings in my living room. I decided to go for my first open mic reading at this event. There were about 30-35 poetry lovers and half as many readers. I came away impressed with the attentive listening and appreciation from the audience especially from Kaecey. She demonstrated her engagement with each reader by introducing us and thanking the previous reader by quoting some of the lines they had just read or commenting on the ideas expressed.
I’ve been a life-long poetry lover growing up in India, the land of oral traditions with the largest poetry movement that lasted centuries, the Bhakti Movement. As an early immigrant to Silicon Valley, before the internet became the World Wide Web, it was rare to find Hindi speakers here, so I started to translate Hindi poems to English if I wanted to share my ideas with friends here.
An anthology by local poets
It was at this open mic that I learned of Kaecey’s other project, to produce a multilingual anthology of poetry by local poets. I published my first poems in this book, along with seventy other local poets. The book, Celebrate Creativity, was launched in February 2020, as Kacey completed her two-year term and Jing Jing Yang became the new Cupertino Poet Laureate.
Ann Muto and other former poet laureates attended the grand event with over 150 poetry lovers at the Cupertino Community Center. Jing Jing’s tenure was during COVID-19, and our poetry readings also migrated online. She attended one of the events of my poetry group, now called the Poetry of Diaspora in Silicon Valley, and heard Rabindra Nath’s poetry. She talked about how his contemporary, the great Chinese poet Xu Zimo had hosted Tagore in China and the close friendship that developed between the two literary giants.
Jing Jing invited us to read the Tagore poem at the Chinese New Year celebration, also online. Amongst the 150+ in attendance, were the grand and great-grandkids of Xu Zimo, who now live in Los Angeles. By 2022, for the April poetry month, Jing Jing hosted the socially distanced open mic at the Cupertino public library, where Tshaka Campbell, the Santa Clara County poet Laureate was the featured reader.
Open Mic on April 14th
On April 14th, Sunday, at 2 pm, the current poet laureate of Cupertino, Keiko O’Leary, will be hosting an open mic again at the Cupertino public library. Along with several poets from my group, and many other local poets, I will be reading there.
Last year, there were immigrants from Russia, Ukraine, India, and other places as well as native-born Americans. We heard ancient poems as well as freshly written ones. The youngest poet was a fifth grader. This space for multilingual poetry in the community, allows ideas to be shared across generations and cultures, with bridge-building of shared understanding and humanity. Even if I did not understand the poems read in languages I do not know, from the tone, musicality, and rhythm of the words, it was not difficult to understand the reader’s emotions and why the poem was meaningful to them.
Casting a spell
Poetry casts a spell with the magic of words especially when it is read out loud by someone who is moved by it and wants to share it with others. So much is conveyed in the silences between the words or what remains tacit in-between the lines that it does not matter what language it is read in. Come to read or discover what you might find. It’s a good way to spend a Sunday afternoon in a family-friendly manner with zero cost.
My experience at the initial open mic led me to read at more events and festivals locally, where I had a chance to meet Monica Korde, the current poet laureate of Belmont and Lisa Rosenberg, the emeritus poet laureate of San Mateo county. I modeled the first anthology I created, the Memory Book of Poetry of Diaspora in Silicon Valley, based on seeing Kaecey create the anthology. I’d say it again, try poetry for poetry month.
Sunday, April 14
2:00-3:30 pm
Cupertino Library, room 201 (upstairs)
Free and open to the public