Today we’re sharing a bit of beauty with you.
First, some news, and we need your help in getting the word out. We’re sorry to say that due to illness, we need to postpone our scheduled upcoming Dec. 5, 2022, evening with our beloved friend, acclaimed Native American poet Georgiana Valoyce-Sanchez. We will let everyone know when we reschedule this event, co-sponsored by Idyllwild Arts. Looking forward!
Special Memories
Meanwhile …
Pismo Beach, traditional Chumash homelands, photo by Sergei Gussev courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Elder, storyteller, poet, culture bearer, longtime university teacher, activist, advocate, and leader Georgiana Valoyce-Sanchez (Chumash/O’odham (Tohono and Akimal)) says her poems tell stories from her life.
These poems contain special memories, such as that place on Morongo Reservation where one could smell the almond trees blooming.
And, memories of the music of traditional Cahuilla bird songs.
Another story from her life takes us to a light shining through the window on the day her father died — “It’s a good light to do shellwork by,” he says — the title of her new poetry book published by Scarlet Tanager Books.
Here is that title poem for you on this last day of November 2022: 1
Sand on Pismo Beach, traditional Chumash homelands. Photo by Mark A. Wilson, Department of Geology, The College of Wooster, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
A Light to do Shellwork By
By Georgiana Valoyce-Sanchez
One day all of life catapulted into one day one moment of sunlight filtering through a high bedroom window framed by blue curtains filtering through the waiting of the grownups sunlight and the laughter of children outside warming my father's dying My father turns his head to acknowledge the sun The light the light he says and the light within It's a good light to do shellwork by The ocean sang in my father's hands abalone pendants shimmered rainbows from the ears of pretty girls and shellwork dotted driftwood carvings cowrie shells, cone shells, volute shells red, black, white, blue, brown, green shells the life they once held sacred old stories etched on the lifeline of my father's palm I hold my father's hand my own shellwork words my poet's eyes noting the light how through the bedroom door the ears of fresh white corn piled on the kitchen table harvest the afternoon sun how it shines through a glass of water touches my mother's white hair as she leans to embrace my father the hush of twilight and how the sunset like a trail of wild lupines or the tracings on seashells tells stories of our origin as it lights up the sky with fire
Thank you!
We look forward to the new date for this special gathering. Read more about Georgiana Valoyce-Sanchez in our September 14, 2022, News from Dorothy Ramon Learning Center newsletter. (Photo by Carlos Puma)
Thanks for supporting our 501c3 nonprofit Dorothy Ramon Learning Center and joining us in saving and sharing Southern California’s Native American cultures, languages, history, and traditional arts.
News from Dorothy Ramon Learning Center welcomes your EMAIL. Thanks from Center leaders Ernest and June Siva, and Editor Pat Murkland, November 30, 2022.
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Georgiana Valoyce-Sanchez, “A Light to Do Shellwork By,” in Red Indian Road West: Native American Poetry from California. Scarlet Tanager Books. © 2016 by editors Kurt Schweigman and Lucille Lang Day. Introduction by James Luna. pp 21-22.