Good evening and welcome. My names emily and im the adult programs librarian. Tonights event is the last of the author talks. For anyone who is not been in our library since our renovation, welcome back. Before we begin have a few housekeeping things to mention. I would ask everyone to silence her cell phones. If youre looking for the rest of their three upstairs and down the hall. Across lobby. Although we do not allow food and drink, if you like to continue your conversation after the event the cafe is often a 10 discount on food and nonalcoholic beverages. Without further do ill give the podium. [applause] thank you for being here for this essential, sadly sensual event. Limited be very brief, theres a lot to come tonight. I want to begin personal if thats okay tied it with the subject. Like all of you, we all are poor violence. I know violence fairly intimately. I had a violent youth, a lot of violence. I was a victim of a lot of it and i victimized victimizers and it was all ugly. Violence always is. It showed to me in shape, look at the world, i have a friend from massachusetts i come from north of boston and im get a read the beginning of a poem like matt w miller, this moment came in his life just recently im just gonna read a tenth of this poem. The greasy popup of the semi automatic rex fear before i can get off the couch. Before my wife yanks our baby dollars from the new followed front flesh a pomegranate and runs inside before their car is pastor fences true. Fits winter this town the ten to 15 seconds left to body with the heart instantly destroyed. With left of his or fence, 5 feet from the street. The front wall 4 inches of california bungalow and then her crib. I know there people in this room have lost loved ones take islands violence. I have not lost a loved one from gun violence, ive taken a lost friends to suicide by gun and im convinced if they didnt have easy access to it they would be a lie. We all have our story sadly. Whatever these moments of madness happen they happened far too often in our land, 30,000 plus every year die of gun violence. Nevermind the madness of the Mass Shootings were seen. I have the emotions and im sure you have two. It begins with grief and fear, terror and outrage and then range in this horrible, numbing kind of despair. I begin to feel helpless and powerless i cannot tell you how many young people, especially those i teach to work in malls and stores and they have the active Shooter Drill as part of their lives yet, despair will change nothing. Despair is an awful motion to live through. Going to reach a passage from one of my favorite american writers. The very act of writing assumes to begin with that someone cares to hear what you have to say. It assumes that people share in that people can be reached, that people can be touched and even in some cases, change. Many of the things our worldliness to despair, it seems to me the final symptom of despair silence and it story telling and poetry are some of the sustaining arts, they are the affirming arts, a writer may have a certain pessimism in their outlook but the very act of being writer seems to be an optimistic act. This book has been an antidote to my own despair. It got me to get up and start thinking more about not just wallowing in fear and outrage and rage and grief, audrey lord has a wonderful thing to say about the power poetry. Poetry, there are the songs on the street and the ones i can go back on the street and it read again and again. The quality of life by which we scrutinize our lives have direct bearing upon where we live. It is within this light that we form the ideas by which we pursue our magic and make it realize. This is poetry is illumination. It is through poetry that we give name to those that are nameless and formless. Poetry is not a luxury, its a vital necessity of our existence. It forms the light which we predicate our hopes and dreams first made into language than into idea than into more tangible action. One of my favorite quotes is this. Artist transferring feeling from one heart to another. Mild view is the only thing that can transfer feeling from many heart is truth. Once truth makes the journey inside the changes lines it opens hearts and changes our lives. Its not her to be here. Thank you. Peace honor. [applause] good evening, brian one of the editors and andre thank you for being here tonight and for getting us started in a wonderful way. I want to thank my coeditors is an honor to work with you on this project and to all of the poets who are here tonight, thank you for your past and ongoing work. And thank you to beacon for publishing the book. Youre the reason we can do this. Thank you so much this book is part of a threepart project. This comprises supplemental material including interviews and essays on a website that is hosted. You can find it by googling the book. I hope youll take a look for more information including opportunities for action. The third part of the project is a National Series of events like this one across the country. Alexander has hosted one in idaho. Will be doing one event in every state in d. C. Over the next six months. Let your friends and family around the country know about the events. Will be going in three blocks tonight. You be doing a block of introductions and readings and then will have the opportunity for questions its my pleasure to introduce martinas father is the author of numerous poetry collections including those who have failed, imagine the angels of bread in the republic of poetry. Understand he will read this time. The response is from david and francine will for the parents have been was killed in the sandy hook shootings. They cannot be here this evening megan cannot be here from new jersey. Shes the author of a new language from falling out of love. Her poem will be read by my coeditor was a fellow and author of two books of poems she teaches at the university of idaho. The response from the poems from my wife abby who is a second grade teacher at sandy hook the day of the shooting. She now teaches at another school in newtown. Ill read my poem from the anthology in the response was written by kim murray, the executive director of Newtown National alliance. They cannot be here and another member was supposed to be here to read the response but i dont think she is shown up yet. Please welcome martina. [applause] thank you. I have very honored to be here part of this anthology. I want to especially thank the editors. This is hard work. And very important work. Granted the title poem to the anthology. This is a poem based on the visions newtown i was written for the location of a National Childrens day events entitled, within our reach at the Newtown Congregational Church on junjun, 2013. The first stanza refers to two different cities, first albania which is the site of the bell of peace. The other city in the first stanza is preventive, italy and the subsequent stanza refers to newtown itself. The title of the poem is heal the cracks in the bell of the world. For the community of newtown, connecticut were 20 students and six educators lost their lives to a gunman at Sandy Hook Elementary School on december 14, 2012. Now the bells speak with their tongues. Now, the bells open their mouths of bronze to say, listen to the bells a world away. This into the bell in the rooms of the city were children gathered copper shows like beach class and the copper boiled in the foundry and the billboard and the founder says, i was bored of bullets but now i sing of a world where bullets melt into bells. Listen to the bell when the city were cannons in the army of the great war sink into molten metal and the many mouth set one spoke the ton of smoke formed the one mouth of a bill that says i was born of canada but now i sing of a world where canon melts into bells. Listen to the bells the town the flagpole on main street. A rooster weathervane keeping watch atop the meetinghouse. The congregation gathering to sing in times of great silence. Here, the bells rock the heads of bronze as if to say melt the bullets into bells, melt the bolus into bells. Here, they raise their heavy heads is as if to say melt the cannons into bells, melt the cannons into bells. Here weapons crumbled deep into the earth and nobody remembers where they were very. Now the bells passed the world that in my the ancient language of bronze from bell to bell like ship smuggling use of liberation from island to island a song rippling through the clouds. Now, the bells chime like the muscle feeding in every chest. Killed the cracks in the face of every person listening to the bells. The chimes feel the cracks in the bell of the moon. The chimes seal the cracks in the bell of the world. [applause] a response from david and francine wheeler. In the time following the murder of our son, this poem was read at several gatherings. At one, i david spoke the words myself. If you the irony of the location of our loss, connecticut. The birthplace of the american firearm industry, newtown, the home of the industrys trade group. Nearby water very former breast capital were for mrs. Melted brass to make bells. Shifting their efforts to shell casings after the war. Eli whitney, to move through this landscaped after day carrying the weight of our murder boy in the whole of our hearts and the unwanted permanent texture of our lives. It is however the support assistance a love of our community tucked inside the same hills. Where we work to support, teach, help others the organization bends lighthouse created to help in on her bed. Helping his ceiling. So we stay and we listen for the bells. [applause] when a child hears gunshots by megan. When a child hears gunshots, she will say mom, is beating the pots and pans. She will say it sounds like home. Lets keep it this way. Our children misinterpreting the sound of dying this accrued progression. When they kneel at their beds in ascot where he was when there best friend stopping a life you say, was at the drive through, i so hungry he thought the gunshots were my stomach begging for food. It will say, i know nothing until strangers told me about it first. I could have Bullet Wounds in my hands and i would know nothing about what hurts and what doesnt hurt. What a god, making the world out of variations of madness, refusing to hold his face in its hands and say you, you are mine. It is not ours, the young blood, the unfinished drawings, the less blurry thoughts before world goes black. When god is busy wiping grease from his mouth we can stand in the line with the dead in our backpack next are pencils in our snacks, he wont notice when we give the whole damn world back. [applause] 154 shots, they heard them all. I thought they were folding chairs falling, we huddled into the coats and backpacks some of them cried some of them left, how could they know and if they knew, hope they believe we shared a waldo bottle, blue one passing it around little arms poking out to take it. We waited we had to believe the police were who they said they were. I open the door and they scattered. A few in my outstretched arms. We ran, we were lucky. Surviving is a gift and burden, what you do with that . For me as soon as i could i started to fight. I fight to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people ive fight to keep guns away from depressed teens and toddlers, the fight against Arming Teachers and i fight to keep guns out of College Dorms and classrooms, lack downs, active Shooter Drills and backpacks that morph into shields are not an answer. Parents should not have to worry about whether or not their kids will make it home from school. The year two after the tragedy one mom told me that every day after school she left a gift for her daughter setting on her bed, celebration for making it home. [applause] 22, the guy my girlfriend ran off with at 23. A 22 pistol runs to the bank to drop off nightly deposits. Swear i worked and saw rocky for about 20 times more than i wanted to he lived in a rat shack. A few streets over from the house for in 2004 a local tv reporter was murdered in her bed. Her face be beyond recognition. In 1988, an assistant manager at a restaurant down a fight broke out between the pimp in a private investigator who may also have been a pimp. A group of frat boys decided to jump in and knock it all over on the floor just on the other side of the bar from me, the pimp came up pointing a semi automatic directly at the closest object which happened to be my four head. He didnt shoot. He just waved his gun around until everyone cowered and then calmly walked out the front door and down the street. My best friend in sixth or seventh grade with arkansas from new mexico, ron was rough he raised hamsters and hermit crabs. We went out to his fathers farm a shot cans and bottles with his 22. Back in new mexico he had Health Problems and his mother had shot herself in the head. If you years ago a dead body was found buried under fathers property, ron son ended up shooting himself in the head as well. He was 22. On december 14, 2012 gunman entered the Sandy Hook School to push those, bushmaster 223, hundreds around with ammunition in the shotgun in the car. Rather than turn right towards my sons classroom where she pulled two kids he turns to the left of murder 20 children and six adults including the principal and school psychologist, both of went into the hallway to stop. After that a lot of other things happen but it doesnt matter what. [applause] [inaudible] i will read the response to my poem. It did not matter to the National Rifle association the republican congress, donald trump or others that my mother killed his mother in her bed and then gun down 20 children or that a hundred thousand americans are killed or injured by guns in our towns and cities across the nation every year, or theres nearly 300 Mass Shootings nationally. Theres more than that. The matter to us, where a group of newtown connecticut neighbors and friends perform an action alliance. The group advocating for gun violence in our nation. In matter to families of victims and survivors directly impacted by gun violence. Still matters to us we will work to hold all representatives accountable for standing with the nra instead of taking action to keep all of us stay. Despite the nra rhetoric, we know firsthand that guns kill and guns dont make us safe. [applause] my name is dean, one of the editors of the book, thank you all for coming. I want to go brian think he may coeditors ryan and alexander and all the contributors and activists, this has been an important and sobering project to work on. All i want to say before introduce the videos youll see in jill set theres a history in america of art, doing the cultural work that oped in journalism and essays do not two. Arts can create an emotional currency that works on a different level. Everything from Thomas Paines common sense to Uncle Toms Cabin to photographs, it can educate our emotions and sustain our intellect and get us to respond in ways. I dont know that this book will do all those things but my hope is the voices of the poet and the voices of the respondents can create a larger conversation that perhaps can move those outside a policy to address the serious issue. For my part i will introduce children who will read her amazing poem afraid, that will have a video response from Kim Parker Russell im going to read a poem with a response by clay summers gun violence survivor and activists. Then i will read my poem and the anthology with a video response. Jill is a threetime pushcart prize winner. And nra she teaches in a program her books include habeas corpus, where you live in here all night. The response to the poem is from a gun violence survivor and activist who works with the womens march. Kim couldnt be with us but she sent a video i will play after jills reading. Caution cannot be with us we know that he would like to be here you will get the emotional impact of his poem read by clay summers, storytelling and activists who believes each story must be held with honor and respect. Shes a caretaker farmer overly that allows for respite for gun violence. My poem will have response from joe clint cannot make it this evening from brooklyn. Photographer, activist and curator. [applause] this is hard. Im grateful for it. And im just gonna cry all the way through. Get a reach a poem called afraid. I work with some incarcerated children in a juvenile detention facility and when i first publish this poem i brought it into them and you write poems about things you going to employee explained that he wasnt afraid of anything i said thats fantastic. He brought along poem of very specific things he is not afraid of and i do not believe him. Afraid. Im not afraid of mergers apparently your walking alone at night. What im supposed to fear, 40 american white, employ, ive already won. But a quick shadow in the street gunshots breaking air open doubting with under my feet rachel says, youre afraid of everything and i flinch, because she is right. Im not afraid of getting shot, the noise just makes me want to cry. Heights, not a roofer bridge a plane, but ice, iceskating, ladders, and he jolted precarious perch. I remember the shipshape track i nickname lucky the summary painted houses, gripped aluminum ladders the cheerful song i sang under my breath dipping in reaching and keeping everybody save and hes are lucky rock, his name is lucky. Then i would sing it over again. Thank you. [applause] my name is kim russell and on the survival of gun violence. I want to thank everybody who helped put this book together my responses called the afraid. I sorta remember my life before a became afraid, i was curious, impulsive and still a little innocent. I realize they had been gone now for 20 years. Afraid, its not hard for me to conjure at all. My hairstyle, my person frank i remember the wine i drank the conversation i had at dinner. The just columbine happened just a few days prior. It was a wonderful evening i remember diving under an old truck for copper. I remember my body feeling like it no longer belong to me. I remember trying to pull dead i remember feeling the cold have a gun pressed him ahead i remember the shock when i figured out that i was a live but my friend was not. I wish i could remember my life before that night the specific details. This poem is called always and forever from oceans collection that cannot lester called night sky with exit wound always and forever openness when you naming most she said as he slid the shoebox wrapped in duct tape beneath my head. His thumb still damp from the shutter between mothers by cap circling the mall above my brow. The devils eyes these between his teeth or was he lighting a joint, tonight i wait, i have the shoebox with seven winters in here sunken fol