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MIDDLETOWN, Calif. — California Humanities has announced the recent round of Humanities For All Quick Grant awards.
The Middletown Art Center, or MAC, a project of EcoArts of Lake County, has been awarded $5,000 for its project, “Sounds of Liberation: Race and Music in Lake County.”
The Humanities For All Quick Grant is a competitive grant program of California Humanities that supports locally-initiated public humanities projects that respond to the needs and interests of Californians, encourage greater public participation in humanities programming, particularly by new and/or underserved audiences, and promotes understanding and empathy among all our state’s peoples in order to cultivate a thriving democracy.
Sounds of Liberation is a series of intimate conversations and performances with Black musicians living in rural Northern California about their responses to sweeping social events throughout their careers.
Sounds of Liberation uplifts a hopeful vision of racial harmony and social change. Host and co-organizer Clovice Lewis, an African-American composer living in Upper Lake, said, “We invite all our neighbors to join us on a journey to raise awareness and understanding.”
Lewis connected with MAC’s director, Lisa Kaplan, at a gathering of the “Community Call to Action: A loving response to systemic racism in America,” a self-organized local action group formed by the Unitarian Universalist Community of Lake County, and Sounds of Liberation was conceived a few weeks later. It is now set to launch in mid-June.
“These projects will bring the complexity and diversity of California to light in new ways that will engage Californians from every part of our state, and will help us all understand each other better,” said Julie Fry, president and CEO of California Humanities. “We congratulate the grantees whose projects will promote understanding and provide insight into a wide range of topics, issues, and experiences.”
Learn about Sounds of Liberation at www.middletownartcenter.org/sounds-of-liberation.html.
For a complete list of all Humanities For All Quick Grants, check out the www.calhum.org.
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The insane birds in “Almost Forty”, by the always eloquent and emotionally generous poet, Ada Limón, seem to be warning of the coming of winter, but it is time, really, and its passing, that they anthem.
Yet, Limón finds strained but necessary comfort in the defiance that comes from desiring a long life and good health.
Almost Forty An Old Story
By Ada Limón
The birds were being so bizarre today,
we stood static and listened to them insane
in their winter shock of sweet gum and ash.
We swallow what we won’t say: Maybe
it’s a warning. Maybe they’re screaming
for us to take cover. Inside, your father
seems angry, and the soup’s grown cold
on the stove. I’ve never been someone
to wish for too much, but now I say,
I want to live a long time. You look up
from your work and nod. Yes, but
in good health. We turn up the stove
again and eat what we’ve made together,
each bite an ordinary weapon we wield
against the shrinking of mouths.
American Life in Poetry does not accept unsolicited manuscripts. It is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2018 by Ada Limón, "Almost Forty" from The Carrying, (Milkweed Editions, 2018). Poem reprinted by permission of Permissions Company, LLC and the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2021 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Kwame Dawes, is George W. Holmes Professor of English and Glenna Luschei Editor of Prairie Schooner at the University of Nebraska.
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- Written by: Kwame Dawes
