I've had a wonderful life + Philadelphia, my pics-+ doll house Cedar Grove Mansion, Fairmont Park .

https://www.pewcenterarts.org/grant/1995-grants

Knew of--

Lorene Carey

Molly Russakov

Major Jackson--did a poetry reading with at local radio station.

Woon-Ping Ching--knew her relative

Roko Kawai--saw her picture in local magazine--decided she could dance my Shee-Monkey--contacted her--

she pulled quotes from my book-length poem--danced 3 versions with Susan Hess Studio--3 evenings--while I read excerpts--she danced facets of themes--rather than the narrative story--I liked the first one best.

She also danced a duet with Rennie Harris --in which I think Rennie or she slid off the other's back and stood on their head. I think it was Rennie--

Rennie's troupe did a group dance--sneakers squeaking, dreadlocks flying-- Rennie did a solo dance in which his body shook like a leaf under his baggy sweat shirt and pants--"Popping"

I also met Pew grantees--poets Aaron Yeats Perry (no relative to W B Yeats)--at the reception. AYP told me about a car trip when he was a teenager--for his girl-friend to get an abortion--"and all the way back in the car I heard a baby crying."

I also met Linh Dinh--Vietnamese-born poet, whom I met again in Berlin 2005 as "writers who dare to confront." I was a Pew Finalist in Literature twice.

I've had a wonderful life-- I met many A-List people.

If I'd continued living in Burma--I wouldn't even have heard of any of them.

In Helsinki I met a young man who had just come from helping victims of Cyclone Nargis--he had scratches on his hands--

he thought Salman Rushdie was a woman.

It breaks my heart.

Another drew a diagram of how corrugated iron sheet roofs peel off during a cyclone. One can be cut in half--or beheaded trying to pickup these in high winds.

Kyi May Kaung

8-26-2023