See & Hear

photo-seeandhearLucy has read her work at many colleges, cafés, galleries, bookstores, conferences, and other venues and events in the U.S. and Canada, such as Association for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE) Biennial Conference, University of Victoria, British Columbia; Cody’s Books, Berkeley, CA; California State University East Bay, Hayward, CA; Cornelia Street Café, New York, NY; Diesel: A Bookstore, Oakland, CA: Food for Thought Books, Amherst, MA; Kensington Row Bookshop, Kensington, MD; Mechanics’ Institute Library, San Francisco, CA; Midnight Special Bookstore, Santa Monica, CA; Pierre Menard Gallery, Cambridge, MA; Sacramento Poetry Center, California, CA; San Francisco State University, CA; the University of Maine, Fort Kent, ME; Watershed Environmental Poetry Festival, Berkeley, CA; and Wine & Words, Livermore, CA.  In 2004 she read in the Poetry at Noon Series at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

Links:

Reading at Diesel: A Bookstore, Oakland, California, August 2, 2009

Poetry Video by Richard Schiff, Lucille Lang Day reads her poem “When Palm Shadows Dance on the Pavement, Which One Keeps the Beat?”

“The Change,” Berkeley Poets Workshop and Press

Reading of “Reject Jell-O” by Garrison Keillor, The Writer’s Almanac, July 25, 2005

Upcoming Events:

Lucille Lang Day, Alice Rogoff, and Open Mic
Tuesday, September 28, 2010, 7:00 p.m.
3300 Club
3300 Mission Street
San Francisco, CA 94110-5009
(415) 826-6886
Coordinator: Nancy Keane, nancyat33@sbcglobal.net

Color of the Universe

The universe is really beige. Get used to it.

John Noble Wilford
The New York Times

For Richard

I can’t believe the universe is tan,
Not red or green or lavender or blue.
I feel carnelian when you take my hand—

Not beige like lima beans from a can,
But a splendid, electrifying hue.
I can’t believe the universe is tan.

Rose and gold are what I understand
When I think of waking up each day with you.
I feel carnelian when I take your hand,

And like the universe my love expands,
Surrounding us with turquoise and chartreuse.
Can you believe the universe is tan,

A color desolate as lunar sand
And homely as a peanut or cashew?
I feel carnelian when we’re hand in hand,

Listening to Perahia play Chopin.
The stars all turn cerulean on cue.
I don’t care if the universe is tan:
I feel carnelian as you take my hand.

— Lucille Lang Day



From The Curvature of Blue,
first published in Blue Unicorn