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Kiddie Pool in Albany is celebrating their first anniversary with a masquerade party on Friday night. Come by! It will be fun and informative! Historian Peter Gabak will give a lecture at 7:30pm and Nina Isabel will perform around 9pm. @nadalex is making a playlist for the dance party after Nina's performance.

Transit of Venus Anniversary Masquerade 💫 Friday, December 6 - 7-12pm

At Kiddie Pool on Grand Street in Albany.

It's really a masquerade. Come with a mask, or pay $7 for a Venus-theme mask. You can probably get in wearing just your N95 face mask.

WHY ARE WE CELEBRATING

It's our anniversary too! St. Rocco's organized two readings at Kiddie Pool in their first season, including the very first Kiddie Pool salon - "My Life in Art" with Michael Oatman and Rebecca Schiff. We followed up with "Generative Texts" with Kite, Christopher Funkhauser, and Brian McCorkle in November 2023. See all of Kiddie Pool's past events here. Listen to highlights from Generative Texts here.

We won't be organizing future events there, but @nadalex is currently plotting Kiddie Pool's music and literary programs for 2025 with Karley.

Also, Kite is performing at EMPAC in Troy on December 6th at 7pm. Go see Kite and then come to Kiddie Pool for after-party.

More details from Kiddie Pool:

We’re having a party and you’re invited! Join us as we celebrate 1 year of Kiddie Pool and the 150th anniversary of the gilded era house that holds us. There will be happenings, projections, protections and good company to enjoy. Small artworks, zines & spells from Kiddie Pool participants, plus Venus approved masques ($7) will be for sale to support our programming for 2025

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We invite your collaboration

2024 is a moment of transformation for St. Rocco's and we invite your input and participation in the future of our organization. If you would like to get involved, or just want to share your thoughts about our future directions, please fill in this form, or send us a message here.

We welcome new members or occasional collaborators who would like to

Organize Readings

Host Readings

Photo/Video at Readings

Participate in Workshops

Interview Visiting Poets

Write Blog Posts

Design Flyers

Produce Radio Shows

Arrange Audio Archives

Be sure to tell us where you live and if you have visited St. Rocco's readings.

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Asking for Help

RADIO UPDATE: Our radio show hasn't been on since before Christmas. We need help to keep the radio show going. The new year radio producer meeting is Feb 7. We will cancel our show at that meeting. Get in touch if you would like to split our time slot or help produce shows.

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New episode is up on Pacifica Audioport.

Rebroadcasting our 2020 Indigenous People's Day episode plus 13 minutes of Kite and up to date "Upcoming Show Announcements" for Albany / Troy.

Would you like to be on our radio show? Visit our Submissions page to send us a reading. Past readers can send us full hour-long "With Friends" episodes. St. Rocco's Broadcast airs on WCAA 107.3FM in Albany, and is available online for Pacifica-affiliates around the country and around the world on Audioport.

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Erasure is also generative!

Justin Torres new novel is full of erasures.

"So the book is reacting to this medical study called Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns from the 1930s. It was this early sexology study, and it was very pathologizing. They took all these queer people and studied them. They measured them. They measured their genitals. They asked them everything about their sexual histories, and they recorded it, took it all down, and then talked about them in dehumanizing ways, as if homosexuality is a disease, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But the study was started by this woman, Jan Gay, who was herself a lesbian and a lesbian activist. She was a fascinating figure. Her hopes for the study were totally the opposite of what it turned out to be, and she was devastated. Some of the photographs are from the study itself—hand drawn images of vulvas, naked men and women with their faces blurred—but I wanted to include other historical photographs in Blackouts as well, both to mirror this sexology study, and to provide a visual counternarrative. And I wanted to be doing something different, which is why there’s all these blackout poems. These erasures. I took the original text of this study that was very pathological, and I tried to get it to say and do something else. So, that’s part of it."

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Save the date - November 30 - for our "Generative Texts" salon. From the depths of your computer to the apex of Giza Plateau. At Kiddie Pool on Grand Street in Albany.

With Kite, Brian McCorkle, Alexis Bhagat and more. Chatbots and Python outputs, and also cut-ups and surrealist games. We are presenting a variety of approaches to generative texts, grounding the current hype for AI/LLM/chatbots in deeper literary histories. The critique of AI has a long tradition; conversely, literary experiments with more than human writing have long traditions, too.

We are finalizing a few reader invitiations and will post the official announcement on Saturday. DM us here on on Instagram if you would be interested in reading or in sharing a text based game (paper, tabletop, or online) in the game room.

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Ride the elevators where they work, 

See how the bus boy is treated,

Go into the basement of the post office and live 

That world for a time, visit their rooms, you see.

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from “I WAS A TWENTY-FOUR-YEAR-OLD SEPARATIST” by Kimberly Alidio

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Poetry in Albany

It's the middle of a roller coaster week that started in an oddly sweet nadir. We hosted the meeting of two Seattle writers - Bill Carty and Paul Hlava Ceballos with Zoe Tuck from Northampton. There were four people in the audience--two members of St. Roccos, our friend Dan, and the owner of the bookshop where our reading took place. At 5pm, we decided to wait an extra 5 minutes in case anyone sauntered in late. Bill gave us a scene report from Seattle. "The pandemic has given people permission to stay home, and they are taking it." And so the show went on for our small audience... and what a beautiful reading! The readers brought their books to life, reading for the birds and the bricks. I was grateful for these visitors, embarrassed for Albany, and promised that we would make sure not to hold another reading with only visiting out of town poets without any local readers to bring in their friends.

Yesterday, my faith in Albany was redeemed, to see the packed hall that came out to see Pierre Joris read at U-Albany campus! He spoke about cormorants and about his "infinite debt" to Paul Celan. He read from "The Book of U" as well as some translations of Celan. The room was crowded with undergraduate students, who asked earnest questions about the writing life.

Pierre read from The Book of U at St. Rocco's back in 2019. We have never played it on the radio because of room noise... I will clean up the recording and put it on the broadcast in the coming weeks. If you would like to hear Pierre read, @pennsoundradio-blog has a whole page of recordings! https://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Joris.php

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New Show up on Audioport. St. Rocco's Broadcast for September 13, 2023. Continuing to just explore the Segue Series at Zinc Collection at Penn Sound... last week we played Michael Basinski from September 2012... this week, Natalie Zina Walshots from October 2012.

Listen to all of the recordings from the Segue Series at Zinc Bar at Penn Sound.

Our Upcoming Readings announcement this week reminds you to register for Tracie Morris and Tongo Eisen-Martin in conversation at Flow Chart Foundation on September 22. It is a free event but space is limited so register on Eventbrite to secure your spot.

This week's episode goes out with some sound poetry from Tracie Morris, also from the Segue Series at Zinc archive, from October 2014.

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September Literary Events in/around Albany

September 9: River Poems at Herman Melville House in Troy

September 12: 2nd Tuesday Open Mic in Bennington

September 15: Open Mic Slam at Cafe Euphoria in Troy

September 16: Verbatim Text Sound Festival (Book Fair with readings and performances all day!) at Open 40 in Saugerties

September 16: Zoe Tuck, Bill Carty, and Paul Hlava Ceballos at Urban Aftermath in Albany

September 19: Pierre Joris at NYS Writers Institute in Albany

September 21: 3rd Thursday Poetry Open Mic at Social Justice Center in Albany

September 22: Tracie Morris and Tongo Eisen-Martin at Flow Chart Foundation in Hudson

September 23: Martin Espada at Caffe Lena in Saratoga

September 28: Stephanie Burt at NYS Writers Institute in Albany

Further Afield:

September 26: Ross Gay at Smith College

Literary Adjacent:

September 4 thru October 14: Text - an exhibition at joyce goldstein gallery, chatham ny

September 28: My Life in Art Salon at Kiddie Pool in Albany

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Ok. Summer is over. Fall is here! Coming up: September 16 at Urban Aftermath with Bunny Presse book launch, September 28 at new space - Kiddie Pool. And November 4th will be Kimberly Alidio “Teeter” book launch at College of Saint Rose

2023 at a glance

We took a break in August of 2022–too much juggling to keep this thing going without a fixed home-base. We will be back in 2023, with four readings at the College of St. Rose, two readings at Urban Aftermath, and some specials.

Here is our 2023 schedule at a glance. Just dates, no names yet. Get in touch if you might like to join us to read.

Jan 7: Midwinter Day Marathon at Lenox Library (Lenox, MA)

Jan 22: Ursula Le Guin Poetry Brunch at a secret location in Albany

Feb 11: February Reading at College of St. Rose

April 1: Poetry Book Sale at Albany Public Library - Delaware Branch

April 15: April Reading at College of St. Rose

June 17: Reading at People’s Park

July 15, August 19: Summer Readings at Urban Aftermath

July or August TBD: STREAM salon at location TBD

September and November (Date TBD): Fall Readings at College of St. Rose

Specials to be added. Readings in March or May or October or December, if you want them.

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I am looking for poems about Cluster Bombs to play on this week’s radio show. Do you have any suggestions? Or if you have written one, use our “submissions” button and send a recording.

This week, the United States has decided to send Cluster Munitions to Ukraine. Over 100 nations have banned cluster munitions due to the inevitable harm to civilians, now and in posterity.

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Salvage Kitties this weekend

Summer is here. People are planning summer or just reading on the lawn or beach.  Here are two readings in the Hudson Valley you don’t want to miss this weekend.

Friday, June 23 at 5:30: Cat’s Meow Reading Series in Hudson, NY Todd Colby & Bianca Stone

Saturday, June 24 at 7pm: Salon Salvage in Troy, NY With Alexis Bhagat, Thea Brown, + Michael Flatt

We announce Capital Region and Hudson Valley readings regularly on our radio broadcast. Message us with your readings, or list them on the Hudson Valley Writers Guild calendar.

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Upcoming Radio Shows

April 23: Earth Day Show - John Trudell’s “Take Back the Earth” on air April 30: Poetry CDs from Douglas's House May 7: Beat Saints May 13: Sound Poetry Spotlight May 20: Douglas Rothschild special May 27: Memorial Day - Bernadette Mayer special

St. Rocco’s Broadcast airs at 11am on Sundays on WCAA, 107.3 FM Albany and is available for Pacifica affiliates around the world via Audioport.

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St. Rocco’s is pleased to invite you to join us at the College of Saint Rose, indoors again for our Readings for the Dispossessed!

Local poets Amie Zimmerman and Danni Beltran will share new work with us. And Alexis Bhagat will read from, and invite others to read from, older work by Douglas Rothschild.

Feb 11. 4pm to 6pm At Albertus Hall, 432 Western Ave, Albany, NY

Gather at 4pm Reading begins at 4:30pm. Enter Albertus Hall on Western Ave. There will be signage to direct you to room 105.

Co-sponsored by Pine Hills Review and Barzakh Magazine.

– – – –

Amie Zimmerman organizes unions, cuts hair, and writes poems. Find her chaptbooks from Essay Press, Reality Beach, and Ursus Americanus.

Danni Beltran writes poems, spells, and non-fiction. They are the managing editor of Barzakh, and previously were the managing editor at Pine Hills Review.

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Support Douglas’s Recovery! Online: Douglas Fundraiser organized by Linda, Charmaine, and Joanna. https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-for-douglas-rothschilds-medical-recovery In-Person: Gathering this weekend in Albany - Feb 4, 2023 - at Excelsior Pub from 12pm to 3pm.

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Looking for versions of The Waste Land to play on our radio show. Does the musical background on this one make it perfect for radio or is it too leading?

“The Waste Land” by T.S. Eliot (Poetry Film) 2017 ❧ Directed by Alejandro Mos Riera de Alejandro Mos Riera en Vimeo.