Ricardo Sternberg Poetry Reading - Victoria

Hillside Coffee and Tea, 1633 Hillside Ave #103, Victoria, BC V8T 2C4
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Ricardo Sternberg will be reading from his most recent collection of poems, Some Dance, at the October 31st edition of Victoria's Planet Earth Poetry series!

If you're nearby, come out to Hillside Coffee and Tea for an open mic (starting at 7:30pm) followed by poetry readings by Sternberg and Arleen Paré.

"If you needed any reminding, Some Dance is it; Ricardo Sternberg is one of the absolute best poets in this country."
Michael Lista, National Post review (April 2014)

Listen to an online reading

"To be able to pry apart: / this is object, this is subject / even though (confusion begins) / he can be both. Difficult then / to stand at the mirror and reflect: / I am this. This is what I am."

Some Dance is a meditation on stories, the intersection of stories, of things made up, of things imagined, and of things lived - perhaps. Tricks played by memory, scrambling events from life with fiction, are a constant. 

Ricardo Sternberg seeks a fixed point from which to understand the world, but finds no resolution save for another poem. Everything is in flux, unstable, and leads to unexpected places: a commune in the 1960s, a drunken doctor who deals in contraband, a palm reader, a classroom visited by Jesus, a dance in a darkened kitchen. 

A lively collection that turns towards the commonplace, classical, and strange, Some Dance masterfully balances serious thought, big ideas, and good humour through surprising, elegant, and colloquial expressions.