Jim on Dementia Arts

Jim describes participating in the Memory Arts Cafe performance at IONA Senior Services on Thursday, Sept. 20th in Washington DC. The event was part of the Dementia Arts Festival and featured musician Judith-Kate Friedman, Songwriting Works, dancer Maria Genne, Kairos Alive! and poet Gary Glazner More info at dementiaarts.com

Jelly Fish

A special session of the Memory Arts Café took place on Saturday, October 13th, as part of
Parachute: the Coney Island Performance Festival at the New York Aquarium.

Two New Poems

Screaming Under Water                   

I don’t like silence,

I like this.

Have the children been out today?

I love silence.

The orchid is lavender,

like the shirt of the aide.

Beautiful sounds –

I have a stack of cd’s and books,

I have nothing else.

Love makes a house a home.

I have loved

every person I have ever known.

It never goes away –

I never lose any of it.

The woman who screams under water

is in a lot of pain,

but not above the water.

If you wanted to join the Red Cross

you had to swim many laps

to prove your endurance.

I am a person who needs

a lot of time – I am a Buddhist

and I got this out of it.

The love is impressed through every letter.

One thing that could not be taken away:

imagination.

Could you close the window? –

I’m cold.

I want to be out of here.

Silence in the Storm

Silence can say more than speaking.

It can be more intense

and safer.

My godfather was an evangelist.

He used to say: that’s another star in your crown.

My mother once told me

to go to her bedroom,

but don’t touch the brush,

lay down on your stomach

and don’t move.

What crimes do three-year olds make?

None.

In a sports game I expect

to be bounced around like a ball.

Shoes used to be filled with straw for warmth.

A black orchid keeps Brenda Star alive.

Sometime’s silence is not enough.

Either the poet was battered,

or he did the battering.

I used to dream so often,

I don’t so much anymore –

I am kind of thankful for that.

Screaming Under Water and  Silence in the Storm were created in sessions in Santa Fe, New Mexico led by APP artist Joanne Dwyer working with the poets of Kingston and Rosemont  respectively.  The model poems Dwyer used included: “Silence” Billy Collins; “A Poem for S.” Jessica Greenbaum; “Don’t Tell Anyone” Tony Hoagland and “Home” Edgar Albert Guest. 

Dwyer writes of one of the sessions, " The atmosphere at can be quite chaotic as was this visit. It made it hard at times to talk above the volume. I was nervous, unsure of how this session would go and was relieved and greatly surprised (and pleased) that once I began reading the first poem the whole place hushed and a sense of quiet and peace ensued."

     

Memory Arts Café

New York Memory Center & Alzheimer’s Poetry Project Present

Memory Arts Café

Brooklyn, NY – September 12, 2012 – Memory Arts Café is a new series of free art events for people living with Alzheimer’s disease, their caregivers and the general public and is co-produced by New York Memory Center and the Alzheimer’s Poetry Project. 

The series, which takes place on the 2nd Wednesday of each month, includes light refreshments and the opportunity to chat with the guest artists.

This Memory Arts Café event features Jesse Neuman, musician and Founder and Director of MusicWorks NYC. Poet Gary Glazner will host the event. 

Wednesday, October 10th, at 6 pm

New York Memory Center

199 14th Street at 4th Avenue 
Brooklyn, NY 11215

(Take the R to Prospect Ave.)

For info: call (718) 499-7701

Dementia Arts Festival

National Center for Creative Aging & Alzheimer’s Poetry Project Present Dementia Arts Festival

We are thrilled to announce a series of performances focused on bringing attention to the expanding opportunities the arts bring to people with Alzheimer’s. The events take place at Washington DC assisted living and adult day care centers in support of the National Alzheimer’s Plan Act. For a full festival schedule please see dementiaarts.com.

Memory Arts Café Performance Thursday, September 20th, 6 to 8pm Iona Senior Services, 4125 Albemarle Street, Washington, DC 20016.

You are invited to a performance for people living with Alzheimer’s disease, their caregivers and the general public. New Mexico poet Stuart Hall reads work documenting his experience in living with dementia. Maria Genne, Kairos Dance and Judith-Kate Friedman, Songwriting Works and Gary Glazner, Alzheimer’s Poetry Project will lead the audience in the creation of a new performance. The event includes light refreshments and the opportunity to chat with the guest artists. We are excited to show an excerpt from Anne Bastings’ film “Penelope Project,” which documents the performance of using the Penelope story from Homer’s Odyssey to engage an entire long-term care community in the creative process and Songwriting Works’ new music video, “WWII Homecoming Song.”

Sponsored by the Alzheimer’s Association Washington DC Chapter, Center for Aging Heath and Humanities, Generations United, Iona Senior Services, and the Society Arts and Healthcare with support from the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America, the Helen Bader Foundation, the MetLife Foundation and the Pabst Charitable Foundation for the Arts.

Memory Arts Cafe, August 8th, 6pm

New York Memory Center
and Alzheimer’s Poetry Project
Present Memory Arts Cafe

This Memory Arts Cafe event will highlight the artists of New York Memory Center in performance. They will lead the audience in the creation of new work featuring music, dance, poetry and collage. Poet Gary Glazner will host the event. PLUS a SUMMER BBQ!

The performers and artists include: Ismail Butera, Musician in Residence; David Azarch, Percussionist in Residence; Ruth Azarch, Artist; Pamela Lawton, Artist; Jennie Smith-Peers, Improv and the Rhythm Breaks Dance Group.

Wednesday, August 8th, at 6 pm
New York Memory Center
199 14th Street at 4th Avenue • Brooklyn, NY 11215
(Take the R to Prospect Ave.)
For info: call (718) 499-7701 or visit alzpoetry.com

Daughter Love

Daughter Love

She wakes at eight in her bed with the rail,
She smiles in delight, with nary a wail.
I relish her babytalk, hug her and kiss her,
Changing her diaper, I wash her and dress her.
We kiss and we sing, she gurgles with laughter,
Miss Jolly, spoon-fed, gazes sweetly thereafter.
She teethes CD cases, whate’er’s at arm’s length,
Her joy is contagious -- from where comes her strength?
I drop her at Day Care, and muse to another,
“But I am not childless, I’ve an Alzheimer’s mother.”



The poem "Daughter Love" is written by Lucine Kasbarian for her mother Alice Hamparian Kasbarian. The photograph is of her mother and father Charles Kasbarian.

Writer, book publicist and political cartoonist Lucine Kasbarian is a descendant of survivors of the 1915 Turkish genocide of the Armenians, Assyrians and Greeks, which drove her grandparents from their native lands in Western Armenia (now within the borders of Turkey). She is the author of Armenia: A Rugged Land, an Enduring People (Simon & Schuster) and The Greedy Sparrow: An Armenian Tale (Marshall Cavendish). Her syndicated articles appear in media outlets around the world. Lucine and her husband, writer David Boyajian, live in Massachusetts and New Jersey.
More info on Kasbarian's work here.