“I am very excited about my residency! Am very much looking forward to writing & sweating, sweating & writing.“

We think Emily Carr arrived at just the right time. Find out more on her writer’s page and look for announcements of when she’ll be reading in and around the community.

Here comes the sunshine….Welcome Emily Carr!

the garden was rented: in other words, it did not know how to mourn & would change instead. the trees yes the trees would go on breathing, the poison oak would choke the telephone poles, immense white roses festooning the airstream in slaphappy wreathes, the sun slowly unwrapping the white of the verandah wicker, like bandages.

everything: flimsy lids & thin folds/ everything: gone amorously to seed: good soil, sprout here. in the mesh & vagrant shade of sunfat firs, sweet death of leafmold & mackintosh & the last stubborn floorboards ript, uninhibited from temporality & man’s passion for nomenclature.

just listen: I was there, I remember birdsong & the sun breaking, many-fingered in the firs. god speaking to adam in a language such as lovers use: a duet in which there is no dominant gesture, only permutation & extension, the words shuffling helterskelter, inarticulate, a broken wing.

already adam was looking at a cow & thinking meat. turning the trees over in his mind, whose swift & terrible magic was in making matter matter as in so many ticonderoga per calocedrus. whose whole life had been surrounded by angels & endlessly dreaming, beautiful uncut grasses.

that’s right adam signed on the dotted line signed in a single stroke, aching with the loneliness of I. the world turned insideout emptied & we are left holding only the crumpled receipt. you see how easy it is, how necessary that I would have to get up on one elbow turn away from him yes, absorbing the terrible symmetry of the fruit trees

blank bride of the hour

she is twenty-five. sawing the plastic bracelet with a grapefruit knife. has the child enough teeth for an apple she wonders. adrift in the spectacular liquor, she refuses to be familiar with the choral warbling, pupils like blue flowers in milk, in its spilled blaze the stag—

she remembers how she sinned… it was so simple! the light begins its slow foggy wash over God’s visible kingdom: immense banyan tree, swimming pools & backyard citrus, in the second-hand sunlight low fragile houses advertising yard eggs crickets turpentine. where in the heavy delirium of beginning nothing moves but the coin of a bird

she is a guest. she is smashing icecubes with a wooden spoon. sewing sequins on the child’s witty improbable parrotgreen jeans, ecstatically ironing. of course when the baby was born there was no where to put it—

she has no memories. though she remembers the wedding clearly. it had taken place in a lush tropical forest with dinosaurs. the sun was bubbling at the end of the world. they had drunk a lot together & then fallen asleep, lovingly entwined in the brilliant epiphytes

she is waiting. Thanksgiving begins, with a terrific roar of shotguns. she is wearing a thin tshirt hibiscus shorts & sunglasses the colour of champagne bottles. her wrists are wrapped in calamine & Saran. there are clingpeaches & cigarettes & fireworks & ham, fisheggs in a sand bucket & tiny dead songbirds, clustered like grapes—

already she cannot remember him. putting on a facemask & looking at the baffled guileless heart of the sea, this necessary fiction—. the proof of the memory is scratched out by the charred antlers of your eyes. she will tell the child this, at any rate

she does not have to make anything of these moments. a man & a woman & a child scrambling from a torched trailer. fire licking the ground like a tomcat lapping at scraps. a thin lemon lake of brightness rises from the crimson ground—

she is a stranger here. hungry & dangerous. white nunca, red meat, a beautiful suitor. morning rises from the earth like an animal & it goes

committed to hurrying after it, alive—

we woke yesterday not in optimism but by accident, obeying our nature like the coyote or the sparrow always does. with the dream still in our eyes & the sloppy blonde light spilling across the hour & an electric waterfall onto the avocado pine secretary & a parrot singing in the gourd grown in a terra cotta mould, we were helpless the wings of our mind still flapping. we lay naked on the bed & the television [so clean & so light] arrived to us from other time zones, where we were wearing la marque roses on our lapels & shining, patriotic trumpets filled the air with ballooning birdlike song, reminding us it is morning & we are hopeful—on the brink/ brim/ cusp…

… take out your pen. begin. we. today, as yesterday, the hand-carved coyotes in the motel lobby are mutely howling, there are brave caring men with beautiful muskets & custom lawn irrigation systems making this great continent safe for wild boars, sugarcane & Mrs. Thompson’s Golden Free Peach, there are, for a modest sum, shrimps available on Midwestern menus, there are also Canadians who lease forty-six pristine lakes as real-world test tubes. seen from space with no detail of buildings the world is a stallion rolling in a pasture of blue ether & we are politics human hands. walking forward now in the shimmery, spectacular never-ending daylite of our twenty-first century world—

Two out of the four writers selected this year had applied previously. Timing can be everything.

We received applications from an amazing pool of over 80 talented writers. The paperless application process was a success. We eliminated the cost and time for copies and saved some trees.

The Board of Directors and the Selection Committee members are all unpaid volunteers. Therefore the application fees collected will contribute directly to support the residents that were selected for the coming year. The residents thank you!

Fall 2010
Mona Washington
Alternate: Barbra Hammond

Winter 2010-2011
Caitlin Doyle
Alternate: Chloe Honum

Spring 2011
Erica P Lazure
Alternate: Ellie Watts-Russell

Summer 2011
David W. Berner
Alternate: Susan Kim Campbell

Kelly Luce’s story collection, Ms. Yamada’s Toaster, won the 2008 Jackson Award from the San Francisco Foundation and is currently a finalist for the 2010 Bakeless Prize. The title story was awarded Tampa Review’s Danahy Prize in 2008. Kelly’s work has been recognized by fellowships from the MacDowell Colony and Jentel Arts, and can be found in The Southern Review, Massachusetts Review, Crazyhorse, Nimrod, The Gettysburg Review, and other journals. She keeps a hula hoop in her car. Find her online at Crazy Pete’s Blotter: www.thecrazypetesblotter.blogspot.com.

The Yard Sale will be held on Saturday, May 15th 8 AM – 4PM (one day only) on the lawn of the Kerouac House, 1418 Clouser Ave., Orlando, FL 32804 (at the corner of Shady Lane Dr.). All proceeds will benefit The Jack Kerouac Writers in Residence Project of Orlando, Inc., a 501 (c)(3) publicly supported charitable organization. There will be readings and fun stuff throughout the day, maybe even an “old-fashioned” lemonade stand. If you have donations of books or furniture that you would like to contribute to the sale please contact us at kerouacproject@gmail.com for drop off information.

April 10 & 11, 2010
Orlando, Florida
Free Events, Open to the Public

Panel Discussion: Beyond Beat – The Turning Point
Saturday April 10, 2010, 2 PM to 4 PM
Johann Strauss Ballroom, Grand Bohemian Hotel
325 South Orange Ave., Orlando, FL 32801

Panel Members David Amram, Joyce Johnson, and John & Mellon Tytell will share insights based on their personal relationships with Jack Kerouac and their direct participation in one of the most significant periods of American art and literature development. The panel members ability to communicate their firsthand experience is sure to captivate all who attend.

Books, Art and other items will be available with sales to benefit the Jack Kerouac Writers in Residence Project of Orlando, Inc. (The Kerouac Project).

Reception and Film Presentation
Saturday April 10, 2010, 7 PM to 9 PM
Johann Strauss Ballroom, Grand Bohemian Hotel
325 South Orange Ave., Orlando, FL 32801

Filmmaker Alan Saperstein will present two short documentary films made on the occasion of appearances by David Amram and Chris Felver in 2009 at Bellamy Road in Melrose, Florida.

A casual reception to start the evening will allow attendees to meet and mingle with the Symposium presenters, coordinators, artists and other notable guests that may be in attendance.

Hors d’oeuvres will be served. Beer and wine will be available for a small donation.

Jack Kerouac: The Florida/New York Connection
Music by David Amram
Sunday April 11, 2010, 7:30 PM to 9 PM, Reception starts at 7 PM
The Timucua White House
2000 S. Summerlin Ave., Orlando, FL 32806

Musician, Composer, Author David Amram presents a one-of-a-kind program to celebrate the legacy of his good friend Jack Kerouac and Jack’s twelve years in The Sunshine State. David and friends will honor the birth of Jazz Poetry traditions by joining Kerouac’s words with original music. Special guest artist, Frank Messina will present original spoken word pieces flavored by Amram’s compositions. Performances are sure to inspire spontaneous collaborative works including the evening’s Grand Finale.

Featured artists work will be on display. Proceeds from Art sales will benefit the Jack Kerouac Writers in Residence Project of Orlando, Inc. (The Kerouac Project).

Note:

Events are sponsored by Bellamy Road (The David Turner Warner Foundation, Inc.) of Melrose, Florida in cooperation with The Jack Kerouac Writers in Residence Project of Orlando, Inc. (The Kerouac Project).?Timucua White House venue is graciously provided by Benoit Glazer and family.

Contact Information:
Find us on Facebook: Kerouac House
Kimberly A. Buchheit, email: kimberlybuchheit@gmail.com

Kelly Luce’s collection of Japan-set stories received the San Francisco Foundation?s 2008 Jackson Award and is currently a finalist for the 2010 Bakeless Prize. The title story, “Ms. Yamada’s Toaster,” was awarded?Tampa Review’s 2008 Danahy Prize. Her work has been recognized by fellowships from the MacDowell Colony and Jentel Arts, and can be found in?The Southern Review, Massachusetts Review, Crazyhorse, North American Review, Nimrod, Fourteen Hills, The Gettysburg Review, and other journals. She’s the newest Writer in Residence at the Kerouac House in Orlando.

Businesses and schools closed that first day; there was no way to handle the ash, no plows on hand in that tropical city. It was a nuisance, we were told, but not really dangerous; children poured outside to play wearing bathing suits and surgical masks. Housewives vacuumed the street. Dust got into the air raid siren and it blared over the city for the first time since World War II. Our family was freed from obligation?Lou from teaching at the university, Alex from a day of second grade, and me from filling time. We steered our bicycles through the fine dust and joined other families making ash angels in the park; we communicated through exclamations and gestures and in that bizarre world I felt, for the first time in three months, part of something.

I got arrested on the way home from the park. A policeman flagged us down and checked the registration numbers on our bicycles; the name on mine did not match the name on my alien registration card and I was put in the backseat of a police car while my husband and child stared. He told my son, whose brain had soaked up Japanese without even trying, not to worry, that I would be calling them soon, to go and play and enjoy his day off of school. Lou kept pointing to the bike and repeating the name of the university. His voice shook and rose. In shock, I watched them get smaller from the backseat, half expecting my husband to chase us on his bicycle.

The police station was dark; the power must have gone out. A man with eyes too big for his face sat next to me at a card table. Five older men looked on, smoking and chatting. Occasionally they laughed. The man opened a laptop computer, then typed something and angled the screen toward me. A window popped up:

Why do you steal a bicycle?

Ah, the misunderstandings never ended. My fingers flew as I explained.

He read the translation carefully, as if inspecting a scroll. He shook his head and typed. The record of bicycle is not found. University worker has no availability today for the confirmation.

I argued my point. Suddenly one of the older men flicked his cigarette butt to the ground, bent down and shouted, ?Why you steal??

A bored-looking woman arrived in uniform, her black hair still wet from washing. She sat on the other side of me.

When can I go home? I typed.

That is difficult.

Why is it difficult?

Yes, I see. You see, it is not believing you tell the truth. He said something to the woman. They both stood up; she took my wrist. I jerked it away. I yelled, ?I didn?t steal the goddamn bike!? They looked embarrassed, as if I were a senile grandmother they must humor.

Handcuffs. Photographs. Fingerprints. Somewhere I gave up speaking; no one could understand me. The jail was half an hour away by car, and before I went outside, the woman fastened a leather belt around my waist. A rope hung from it like a leash. She gripped it in her fist and avoided my eyes.

Credit: Gettysburg Review, Winter 2007

• Write in the historic cottage where Jack Kerouac wrote Dharma Bums and learned On the Road would be published
• Stay in an historic art deco, period-furnished hotel
• See the original Dharma Bums manuscript
• Enjoy classic Kerouac spoken-word and jazz recordings
• Participate in a public reading
• Learn about one of the most prolific periods of Kerouac’s life from pop culture historian Bob Kealing, author of Kerouac in Florida: Where the Road Ends.

Work and learn within the very walls where Jack Kerouac lived hand-to-mouth, plied his trade, and ultimately made literary history.? ~ Bob Kealing

$295 fee includes a 3-day seminar, 2 nights at the Wellborn Hotel, admission to the Orange County History Center, transportation between the hotel and the Kerouac House, and a copy of Kerouac in Florida. Meals are extra, at restaurants that are an easy walk on roads Jack Kerouac traveled. A portion of the proceeds will support the work of the Jack Kerouac Writers In Residence Project of Orlando, a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving Kerouac’s home and legacy in Orlando. (Cost sans hotel: $145.)

For a full schedule of events, registration and questions please contact Darlyn Finch by email darlyn.finch@siemens.com