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Dancing Poetry Festival, 2009

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   Dancing Poetry Contest, 2010

Artists Embassy International is a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting intercultural understanding and peace through the universal language of the arts.  Founded by Althya Youngman in 1951, AEI has continuously promoted individual and group artists working in many media, offered venues, publication opportunities, poetry  contest, prizes, festivals, conferences, classes, exhibitions and many other opportunities for the promotion of artists and their work throughout the United States and the world.   Membership dues, $30 per year, include quarterly newsletters, advertisements of events, opportunities and contacts for international events and reports on your personal artistic work.  Subscription only to the quarterly Newsletter, $10 per year.  Send dues, subscription, newsletter articles and information to AEI for inclusion in the next publication.      For more information about AEI, please visit www.dancingpoetry.com

2009, The Most Varied Program in the History of the Dancing Poetry Festival

Saturday, September 26, 2009, Noon to 4:00 p.m., you never knew what to expect when the curtain opened and a new act, with a new performance troupe, began. Whoever would dream than an ode to an onion harvest would be so lively as the performance by Gypsy Krackers?  For the Grand Prizes, who but Natica could imagine a poem about Silver Sandals in the form of flappers dancing the Charleston?  And where, on the same afternoon, can you witness the creation of the universe with Eve Dreaming, then delve into the deepest roots of our soul with Salome’s Dance of the Seven Veils?   The 2009 Dancing Poetry Festival was truly a grand success!

Presented on a most glorious stage

in a famous art museum

brought into motion

by local and international troupes

and innovative solos

of exciting

16^th Annual Dancing Poetry Festival

     “Congratulation!” one of my friends, attending the Dancing Poetry Festival for the first time, told me during intermission. “I never thought there would be so much variety! This theater is beautiful!” 

     “I can’t believe it, but this was the best ever! You do it every year!” another admirer commented after the show.

     And so it is, an unbelievably beautiful event of “big stage” proportions and grandeur, featuring current poetry from around the world, and dance acts from around the globe innovatively performed to poetry from many countries, written throughout the ages by old masters, obscure authors, and current poets in a variety of performance acts that are unique.

Dance of the Seven Veils

Jeanne Wagner, Kensington, CA

2009 Grand Prize Winner

Behind the torch lights, upturned faces tilt

And leer like sallow lilies in the dark.

The body and the mind are separate skills.

I’ve learned my motions well, I play my part.

Their faces leer like sallow lilies in the dark.

I wear one veil for each two years I’ve lived.

I’ve learned my motions well, I move by heart.

I give only what I’m asked to give.

I shed one veil for each two years I’ve lived.

You show one thing, another is concealed.

I give only what I’m asked to give.

Teach me what I’m not supposed to feel.

You show one thing, another is concealed.

A veil covers up my mouth but not my eyes.

Tell me what I’m not supposed to feel.

I drape myself in veils, my veils all lies.

One veil hides my mouth but not my eyes.

I watch the platters where the fish heads stare,

Indifferent to my veils, my veils all lies.

The dead have nothing more to bear.

I watch the platters where the fish heads stare

From the flattened silver circles of their eyes.

The dead are severed from their cares,

They’re deaf to the rhythm of the knives.

Fish heads stare from the circles of their eyes.

Someone strips the scales, casts them to the side.

Along the spines and ribs, the sound of knives.

The heads left whole, the bodies open wide.

I shed my final veil and toss it to the side.

The body and the mind are separate skills.

Even after death the eyes are opened wide.

Eve Dreaming

 by Nancy Rakoczy, Flushing, NY

2009 Grand Prize Winner

I see Eve dreaming on a moonless night

caressed and held by a tree that tangles dreams and green

thoughts.  A leafy smile, a rustle, a frown

and cascades of elephants and antelopes

leopards, lions, and lemurs pour from her head.

Dwarf zebras, a million anteaters pour from her sleeping head.

and Eve, who lies there dreaming

turns in her sleep and frowns, and cloven hoofed antelopes,

anteaters, sloth, octopi, and possums tangle the night

and dance in her hair. She frowns

and they trot away, slipping into a garden of green.

She sighs, turns on her side, and this woman who dreams in green,

and breathes up cascades of creation from her head,

gives up porpoises, starfish and whales with small effort and a frown.

Watch. A curved green stalk grows from her heart, as she lies dreaming.

This tall solemn stalk grows triumphant in the night;

this green life grows tall making shade for elephants and antelopes.

Look. Not just elephants and antelopes,

everything that is green,

everything that this moonless night

can show us,

Eve dreams. She lies there asleep, her head

crowned by a tree that cascades with life and still Eve is dreaming.

She sighs and frowns,

turns in her sleep, and with each frown

the bounty of her sleep is tossed from her crown: monkeys and antelopes

jump and canter away while she is sleeping and dreaming;

the green stalk grows from her heart, this green

life of silken leaves grows higher than her head

on this matchless moonless night.

Asleep on this particular night,

A hand pauses, and pulls and parts her flesh and Eve frowns,

While a wild animal torrent jumps from her head,

Amidst a swirl of elephants and jackals and antelopes

A hand searches and probes in the deep jungle green,

While Eve lies moaning and sleeping and dreaming.

Life pours from Eve’s head, but from her side is taken this night,

not her dreaming, but a rib, and a bone and a frown

while antelopes leap high and leap green.

Get Ready for the

2010 Dancing Poetry Contest and Festival

The Contest opens January 1

Deadline May 15, 2010

Over $1,000 in prize money to be awarded

All DPF prize winners will receive a prize certificate suitable for framing, a ticket to the Dancing Poetry Festival ’10, and be invited to read their prize winning poem at the 2010 Dancing Poetry Festival, September 18, 2010, Noon to 4:00 p.m. in the Florence Gould Theater in the California Palace of the Legion of Honor Art Museum in San Francisco. 

Three Grand Prizes will receive $100 each plus the poems will be danced, and videotaped for the winner.

Each Grand Prize Winner will be invited onstage for photo ops with the dancers and a bow in the lime light.

Five First Prizes will receive $50 each
Ten Second Prizes will receive $25 each

Thirty Third Prizes will receive $10 each

2010’s winners will be performed on September 18, 2009

CONTEST RULES
Line Limit: 40 lines maximum each poem. No limit on number of entries
Send TWO typed, clear copies of each entry
Poems must be in English or include English translation
Show name, address, telephone number, e-mail and how you heard about us on ONE copy only
(The anonymous copy goes to the judges. Judges’ decisions are final.)
Entry Fee: One poem for $5 or 3 poems for $10

Make checks out to Artists Embassy International
Poets outside the USA, please send an international postal money order in US dollars or US currency
No poems will be returned.
Send all entries and fees postmarked by May 15, 2010, to
AEI Contest Chair, Judy Cheung
704 Brigham Ave.
Santa Rosa, CA 95404
Accepting a grand prize includes your permission for AEI to publish and perform your poem

in print, on-line, and on stage around the world, with your credits

All other rights remain with the author.
Judges are members of AEI and represent poets, dancers, artists, and musicians with international credits.

Winners will be announced by July 31, 2010

Early submissions are appreciated by the staff. Thank you. We look forward to seeing your work.

Check out our website at dancingpoetry.com for last year’s winners, photos and additional general information

2010 Dancing Poetry Festival

September 18, Noon to 4:00 p.m.

Florence Gould Theater in the

California Palace of the Legion of Honor

Lincoln Park, San Francisco, CA

Our meeting was called to order at 3:00, December 20, 2009 in the home of Nancy Merritt. 12 people were present. The minutes from 2008 were reviewed and approved. The treasurer gave a report. We showed a small increase in 2009.

     Arthur Levinson gave a report on archival historical documentation with his two videos, one on Dancing Poetry Festival 2009 and on on the World Congress of Poets held in Nicaragua in which AEI had a prominent role.

     The Dancing Poetry Festival was discussed in many reports. Cindy Levinson continues to contact contest winners and to be sure they get their awards. Judy Cheung creates the Newsletters and website for advertisement. Due to many concerns, we many have a printed newsletter 2 times per year instead of 4. The executive board will further deliberate and decide. Various techniques of advertising were discussed including using postcards instead of more expensive flyers, newsletters and handouts. We sorely missed the services and presence of VP Alicia Rodrigues who can no longer contact the newspapers and poetry organizations for the contest advertisements.