Sydney Solis Hosts Poetry and Jazz in Kyoto June 24

Ying yang lotus, Museum of Oriental ceramics, Osaka, Japan
photo by Sydney Solis

I'm delighted to host the upcoming Poetry Reading and Jazz Improv with Writers in Kyoto on June 24 at the Gnome in Kyoto.

It will feature some of the top poets, jazz and shakuhachi in Kyoto. I need not say more, just get to the website for more info and come on out!  

Now back to work writing!

poems should come from bare ground night falling on night falling on a black landscape - Ikkyū
From Crow With No Mouth by Stephen Berg.

Two Poems by Sydney Solis in The Caribbean Writer Vol 31

Hot off the press! Second time I have poems published in The Caribbean Writer. This Vol. 31 features two more poems from my Novella in Poems, "Broken Venus."

It features, "Trickle Down Economics" and "Sorrow." Three other poems about St. Croix, U.S.V.I. are featured in Vol. 29.

I have steadily been getting poems from this novella published in various publications and live poetry performances. I have been submitting the manuscript around to different publishers.

There are two versions: one also a chapbook that includes photographs called Little Piece of Paradise. Going to get better at submitting regularly!

Be sure to check out my photography and artwork of St. Croix, U.S.V.I.  and more at Estudio Sol at Society6!

I do miss the lovely Caribbean! I visited a friend in Melbourne, Florida, recently, and just loved that S. Florida climate that reminds me of St. Croix! So love those sea grapes, coconut palms.....

Leaving Orlando soon. It's back to Japan for me shortly. I am a member of Writers in Kyoto and will be producing a poetry and improvisational jazz night in KYOTO. STAY TUNED! 

Photo Collages and Poetry - Latest Published and to be Published!

I'm happy to say that four of my silver gelatin print photo collages were published in Depth Psychology Alliance's Depth Insight Journal.
Get a copy!

Also I received word that three of my poems will be published in The Caribbean Writer Anthology Vol. 31.

It's a very special edition, as it is in tribute to TCW editorial member and Nobel Laureate Derek A. Walcott who passed earlier this year. Sending love to my former home for nearly three years, the island of St. Croix, USVI, still recovering after the hurricanes.

Mythic Yoga Journey: Three Poems by Sydney Solis Published In Moko

I have been writing a novel in verse with various poems strung together based on my time living on the island of St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The sights, sounds and people as well as intense beauty of nature was extremely healing for me on my Mythic Yoga Journey abroad I took beginning in 2010 when I left my hometown of Boulder, Colorado with my two young children.

My Buddhist name is Guyo - Brave Sun for a reason! Looking back I think, who would do such a thing? Well I'm glad I took a risk and followed my bliss!

Various fictionalized accounts have been getting published. These latest three in  the November 2016 issue of Moko, The Magazine of Caribbean Arts and Letters. 

The manuscript is finished, and I have a little Daruma doll I picked up in Japan to keep me focused on sending more poems out as well as the manuscript for publication!

Enjoy my latest three poems: Three Roosters, Frederiksted Pier and The End of the World. Definitely subscribe to Moko! A fabulous publication! 

The Mythic Yoga Journey Continues!

Visit my new website at SydneySolis.com!  Subscribe to my new blog! 

OM SHANTI

Sydney Solis has Two Poems Published in Shambhala Times

Very honored to have the poems "The Passion" and "Being, Then Nothingness" published in the Shambhala Times Fall 2016 Poetry Space. 

I've been practicing meditation since I was 12 years old, and spent many hours on the cushion at the Boulder Shambhala Center. I'm a member of the Volusia Buddhist Fellowship now and took refuge and my vows in January 2015.

Spirituality has been a part of my life and writing since I was a kid. Poetry and the arts enlivens our lives and sustains us too.

OM SHANTI 

Mythic Yoga: Telling the Myth Poem of the Body

Mythic Yoga: Telling the Myth Poem of the Body

with

Sydney Solis

Saturday, January 14, 2017

9-3

Lighthouse Writer’s Workshop

Denver, Colorado

“I am the poet of the body. And I am the poet of the soul.” - Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

Delve into the oral tradition by hearing Hindu and other myths and connect it with the body for fresh perspectives in creating poetry, memoir and spoken-word narrative. In this day-long course, Storyteller, Performance Poet and Yoga Teacher Sydney Solis guides you in a self-reflective mythic journey to write from the body and listen to its silent voice by using meditation, yoga and dance, dreamwork and the chakras to discover your personal mythology and tell the myth poem of the body.
It's yoga beyond asana and delves into the psycho-spiritual aspects of yoga wisdom and the expressive arts.

More details coming soon!

Sydney Solis Performs Poetry from Mythic Yoga: Personal Mythology April 24 for National Poetry Month Festival in Ormond Beach

Sydney Solis performs poetry from her upcoming book, Little Piece of Paradise, about her time in St. Croix, U.S.V.I. for the National Poetry Month Festival The Gallery at The Casements in Ormond Beach, FL on April 23.

The book is a culmination of her Mythic Yoga practice of personal mythology after a 5-year Mythic Journey abroad with her two children. Experience the beauty, wisdom and power of poetry and yoga for healing and self-growth. 

Mythic Yoga: Sydney Solis Performs The Man Who Forgot He Was God from the Yoga Vasistha

Sydney Solis performs Mythic Yoga: The Man Who Forgot He Was God from the Yoga Vasistha at The MACDeLand Slam DeLand, Florida August 15, 2015

Sydney Solis publishes two poems in The Caribbean Writer

Sydney Solis has two poems that are "fictional memoirs" of her time living in St. Croix, U.S.V.I. published in volume 29 of acclaimed literary anthology The Caribbean Writer.

"Fisherman, St. Croix" and "Little Piece of Paradise," are featured.

She will be performing these poems among others at the Dan Pels Poetry Show in Daytona Beach Sept 2 at Wine Me. 

More #SixWordStories

Fetus in bishop's coffin deliberately concealed #sixwordstory #sixwords http://gu.com/p/4a2y8/stw 

Sydney Solis Performs Poetry at the Dan Pels Poetry Show in Daytona Beach, Sept. 2 at Wine Me

Join me and hear live the Tichacek voice for some Performance Poetry at the Dan Pels Poetry Show September 2 at Wine Me in Historic Downtown Daytona Beach, Florida.

I will be sharing stories from my upcoming Chapbooks Story Poetica and Little Piece of Paradise.

#Micropoetry Neu-Veaux

Like a surprise, happy ending to a long, sad movie, life delights me now. 

In my dream

he wore a short-sleeved shirt
to be Sergio for me;
he wore a long-sleeved shirt
to be Saul for his wife.


I caught a glimpse

of myself, Sergio said.

How I treated you. I was the rusty old plane on the tarmac.   

Instead of boarding the flight to Havana,

I went home to my parents instead.

That’s how you keep me, my dear

I mistake pity for love

Pirates of old 

aren't the only ones who hoard gold.
Now financial advisors store off-shore
Wall Street loot in vacant island homes
where squatters sleep in the beds
and leave black stains in bathrooms
where the water has been turned off for months.

Record markets

Banksters playing

the money spin game 

in one last mad dash 

for their private stash of cash

before the next crash

Sydney Performs Poetry at Dan Pels Tell Tale Show in Daytona Beach April 1

Come out to Daytona Beach April 1 for performance poetry by Sydney Solis at the Dan Pels Tell Tale Show for National Poetry Month at Wine Me? Daytona Beach, Florida

The Devil’s Mother

The toad that blocks the well from flowing wine. The rat that gnaws at the roots of the tree and withers its flowers. You would never have known about the toad and rat had you not travelled to the devil to pluck three golden hairs from his head and chin. You would never have married the princess if the devil's mother hadn't helped you and asked her son the questions for you of why the toad and rat were there, so that within the woolen folds of her skirt you could hear the answers hiding in the plain sight of darkness. You might have missed your fortune and been left stranded on the river bank.

Instead, for your courageous work, so clear the problem of the toad and rat. They bubbled up, because you went looking for them, even though the King sent you out on completely different business with the devil. To release dams and flow wine, strengthen roots and grow golden apples from the once twisted branches of your body, mended from the inside out, stitched together with moonlight and fairytales that map transport to the stars without ever leaving your seat. All because the devil's mother helped you and took you in her lap,
and sang to you these words

Dip deep into the inkwell of your body with breath.

Let it fill your voice with story.
Then enchant the whole world with its flowing song.

Work of Art

I am constantly an artwork, gazing, moving, living through landscapes painted with the blood of every mother's womb. Scenes with echoes of meadows hover nearby. Waiting doe catch the scent of approaching stags and wonder, is there any end to this mystery of who makes sunflowers gyrate their heads with the sun and whistling steam engines turn wheels of time framed within bones and flesh that provide a pitcher to pour the world as me, imagined fresh each day, as flowers in a vase, displayed in front of an open window, ensconced by the splendor of creation, born for all to delight their eyes upon

the Earth.

Wrong Men

They are like soldiers

all the same 

unable to feel

yet they come after you like the enemy to be won

claiming the territory of your body

clever spy
trained to extract information
knows how to invade

all the corners of your privacy
until you reveal your heart

the fatal opening

unsuspecting of a trap 

the snare at your ankle

sets off the explosion 

shellshocked
you're left on the barren field, bleeding
as they march away 

no remorse 

for their duty 

to woman 

left for dead

all those wrong men

who buried
you

alive 

Dreamwork

How luxurious this jewel

the eye of a flower

the flicker of a bird's wing

Listen to the deep where the lotus roots its material
in a mass of mud
below

Hear those voiceless words beaming
through the silence on the shores
of breath

My self

crowds out the mind

with a suit of space

that takes me to the door of my heart

There an old woman points me where to look in its cavern 

so deep

her speech

soft

as petals 

a dove's wing

constantly on the threshold of a dream

as if falling through space and exhaling last words

It is by dying that I live

so take me willingly, free and brave

Fisherman, St. Croix

Published in The Caribbean Writer Volume 29.

Tonio, old Puerto Rican fisherman, says, “I smell rain,” stops in his garden tracks, points a cracked finger toward the blue humid sky, then cocks his head and eye to the inner ear and bids me, listen

to the Bananaquit’s song, tiny yellow-bellied bird, its quippering pitch and flittering wings above my head, halo etched in memory, now inside my body, St. Croix, island, a silent soliloquy, rooting me in

flamboyant trees, great canopies just beginning to bloom, bright red in the heat along with June mangos.

More Story Poetica

Hibiscus, St. Croix, USVI 2013
Mixed Media Collage
 by Sydney Solis

Estudio Sol - Foto Arte

More Story Poetica 
by
Sydney Solis

My Beloved is My Twin

by Sydney Solis

My beloved is my twin.
Two birds are we
born from the same seed
arising from the same earth
protected beneath cathedral spirals
where a thousand winged angels sing songs of speechless paradise
to bless our union of love.

In synch we fly, beaconed by the chorus of our souls, attended by our hearts' throbbing beneath the sensual depths that sense each other divine.

My beloved is my twin.
Together we take flight in the sojourn of life
and perfect love.
Forever.