The Somerville News Blog

Lyrical Somerville

Edited by Doug Holder, Arts Page Editor

This month Lyrical Somerville presents local poets Linda Haviland Conte and Mary Buchinger Bodwell. Linda is the author of "Slow As A Poem," and the winner of a Cambridge Poetry Award. Her work has appeared in Manifold (U.K.), Ibbetson Street, Cambridge Tab, Somerville News, and other publications. Mary is a published poet, and the recipient of a Cambridge Poetry Award. (2004) She is an assistant professor of English at the Mass. College of Pharmacy.

Both poets will appear Aug. 13 at the Toast Lounge as part of the Somerville News@Toast series.

Doug Holder http://www.authorsden.com/douglasholder.

Tingle pours Sahl on Bush's wounds

by Doug Holder

Mort Sahl. He was always an enigma to me. When I was a kid, Borscht-Belt style comedians like Joey Bishop, Myron Cohen, and Don Rickles ruled the day. Sahl was a totally different kind of cat. Here was this guy, dressed in a casual crewneck sweater, with the daily rag tucked under his arm, cracking jokes not about his wife, or his nagging mother-in-law, but about politics and current affairs. So I was tickled to find out that Sahl was performing at Jimmy Tingle’s Off Broadway in Davis Square as part of the Jimmy Tingle Un-conventional Comedy Convention: A Celebration of Political Humor.

Lyrical Somerville

This week our featured poet is Lo Galluccio. Lo is a vocalist/ poet who will be reading Friday July 23 8PM at the Toast Lounge in Union Square with poet Jennifer Matthews, as part of "The Somerville News@Toast series. Lo will be releasing a poetry collection this summer: "Hot Rain." For more information about Lo go to:
http://logalluccio.com  To be considered for Lyrical Somerville send your poems to Doug Holder  25 School St.  Somerville, Ma.  [email protected]

Poetry @ the Toast Lounge

To view the complete photo gallery of Friday Nights @ Toast, click here.

by Doug Holder

Poetry is infectious. It invades the most unlikely places. Deep in the bowels of Union Square’s Toast Lounge, poetry invaded the former subterranean holding cells for the Somerville Police Department in the form of poets Deborah M. Priestly, and me, Doug Holder, local bard and arts editor of the Somerville News.

On a hot Friday night, July 2 to be exact, Priestly and I opened the poetry component of the Somerville News @ Toast series, an event sponsored by the paper that alternate among music, comedy and poetry each Friday at this innovative watering hole.

My kid brother Don: Lighter of The Lion King

by Doug Holder

When we were kids, my brother Don (or Donnie, as I still call him) was always involved in a frenzy of activity. In high school, in Rockville Centre, N.Y., he was like a hyperactive Mickey Rooney, running from one project to the next. And now at 46, he hasn’t changed.

Since graduating from Yale Drama School in the mid 80’s, Don has been lighting stages for a slew of Broadway and off-Broadway productions. My kid brother, the one whom I pulled countless pranks on—and with—is now a Tony Award-winning lighting designer of “The Lion King,” and winner of the Drama Desk and Outer Critic Circle Awards. “The Lion King” will be in Boston this month, so I figured I’d speak to “Donnie” about his creative life, and perhaps give him a well-deserved noogie.

Lyrical Somerville

edited by Doug Holder

Russell Koty works for a real estate appraisal firm in Ball Square and raised in Somerville. Koty’s poems have such power because he recognizes that those emotions and thoughts which we think are the most personal and private are actually the most universal. Too many poets pull back, afraid to reveal too much. Yet, the deeper and further Koty goes, the more familiar the terrain. The more familiar the twinge. His journey is our journey, he is just braver than we. To have your poems considered by the Lyrical , send them along with a brief bio to: Doug Holder, 25 School St., Somerville, Ma. 02143; [email protected].