Hoboken Historical Museum to Honor Puerto Rican Poet in Nov. 2 Event

On Sunday, Nov. 2, at 3 p.m., the Hoboken Historical Museum will host “Broken English Lessons: Through the Eyes of Pedro Pietri,” to celebrate one of America’s most important contemporary Puerto Rican poets, Pedro Pietri (1944-2004).

The event coincides with the Museum’s current exhibition “Hoboken, Ellis Island, and the Immigrant Experience, 1892-1924.” The Museum’s Poet in Residence, Danny Shot, has organized the event to explore and honor the Great Migration of Puerto Ricans to the tri-state area in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s through the lens of the poetry of Pedro Pietri. Admission is free, but a donation of $5 is requested to cover refreshments.

Hoboken historically has had a large Puerto Rican population, as well as a thriving artistic community. Although gentrification has reduced the numbers of both of these communities during the past decade, both communities remain a vital part of Hoboken’s make-up and culture. The public school system, for example, is 64% Hispanic.

Poet and playwright Pedro Pietri was a cofounder and leader of the Nuyorican Poets movement. He was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico, on March 21, 1944, and passed away in 2004, and lived most of his adult life in New York City. His English language publications include Out of Order (2001), Illusions of a Revolving Door: Plays (1992), The Masses are Asses (1984), Traffic Violations (1983), and Puerto Rican Obituary (1973). A posthumous publication of The Selected Poems of Pedro Pietri is forthcoming.

Participating in the Hoboken event will be some of the major Nuyorican poets currently living and writing in the New York metropolitan area: Urayoán Noel, Sandra María Esteves, Jesús Papoleto Melendez, Nancy Mercado, Mariposa, Bonafide Rojas, Sam Diaz, and Juan Valenzuela.

Each poet will read one of Pietri’s poems, and a poem of their own inspired or influenced by Pietri. Then all seven will perform a group reading of Pietri’s epic poem, “Puerto Rican Obituary.”

Urayoán Noel is the author of several poetry books and also a new critical study, In Visible Movement: Nuyorican Poetry from the Sixties to Slam. Sandra María Esteves is the author of numerous poetry collections, including Bluestown Mockingbird Mambo.

Jesús Papoleto Melendez’s most recent publication is the bilingual volume Hey Yo! Yo Soy! 40 Years of Nuyorican Street Poetry: The Collected Work of Jesús Papoleto Melendez. Nancy Mercado is an assistant editor of Eco-Poetry.org, and the author of It Concerns the Madness.

Bonafide Rojas is the founder of Grand Concourse Press and the author of three collections of poetry. Mariposa has been featured on the HBO Latino series, “Habla Ya!” and is the author of Born Bronxeña: Poems on Identity, Love & Survival.

Sam Diaz is among the cofounders of the Nuyorican Poets Café and the author of Our Nuyorican Thing: The Birth of a Self Made Identity. Juan Valenzuela has directed plays by Pedro Pietri and his most recent book is Love, Ambition and Destiny (2007).

The event is free and open to the public. More extensive bios of the participants can be found at the Hoboken Historical Museum’s website.

Poetry Events Continue into 2015

In his role as Poet in Residence, Mr. Shot is planning a series of events showcasing the vitality of the poetry scene in and around New Jersey, starting with “Broken English Lessons.” He co-organized the popular event “Something Old, Something New (Jersey)” in April 2014.

Other events will include a poetry workshop in December and performance in February by selected Hoboken-area high school students, inspired by a sense of place. The title of the event, “There’s a Here Here,” refers to Gertrude Stein’s lament, “there’s no there there,” about her hometown of Oakland, Calif.

On April 19, the Museum will host the second annual “Something Old, Something New (Jersey),” a celebration of the state’s best-known poets by some of its most talented contemporary poets. A video recap of the April 2014 event can be found on the Museum’s website.

Shot was longtime publisher and editor of Long Shot, an arts and literary magazine he co-founded with Eliot Katz in 1982 in New Brunswick, N.J. He is both a scholar and writer of poetry, whose work has appeared in: bum rush the page (Def Poetry Jam) Aloud: Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Cafe (Henry Holt), In Defense of Mumia (Writers and Readers), The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry (Thunder’s Mouth), and the French anthology; Changing America: U.S. Poems of Protest 1980-1995 (Le Temps des Cerises), Paris.

About the Hoboken Historical Museum

Founded in 1986, the Museum’s mission is to educate the public about Hoboken’s history, diverse culture, architecture and historic landmarks. In 2001, the Museum moved into one of the oldest buildings on the waterfront, in the former Bethlehem Steel shipyard, at 1301 Hudson St., Hoboken, where it maintains a series of rotating exhibits.

The Museum is open six days a week, 2 – 7 pm on Tues. – Thurs., from 1 to 5 p.m. on Fridays, and noon to 5 p.m. on weekends. It offers special exhibits, tours, events and lectures, as well as educational programs for adults and children on a weekly basis. An updated schedule of events and an online catalog of many items in its collections are available here. The Museum is a nonprofit tax-exempt 501(c)3 entity.

Information courtesy of Melissa Abernathy. Photo courtesy of the Hoboken Historical Museum Facebook page.