…and here a few scorched teeth/from some martyred, unknown saint./The sky was a scroll of pain/— each star a sacred name!/I saw through time in that light./But I turned and blood rained down/and I turned and dipped and drank – from “The Death Mazurka” by Charles Fishman.

Noted poet Charles Fishman will read poems on the Holocaust and Israel at the next Writers in the Library event on Thursday, October 30, at 7 p.m. in the Shiloh Room of the University Center. The event is sponsored by the Fern and Manfred Steinfeld Program in Judaic Studies, Writers in the Library, the Creative Writing Program, Religious Studies, the History department, and the Knoxville Jewish Alliance. Fishman will also participate in a conversation about poetry on the same day at 4 p.m. in 1210 McClung Tower.

A prolific poet whose searing lines on the Holocaust have earned critical acclaim, Fishman has given over 350 readings throughout the U.S. and Israel. His books include Blood to Remember: American Poets on the Holocaust (2007, Time Being Books), Chopin’s Piano (2006, Time Being Books), and The Death Mazurka (1989, Texas Tech University Press), which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry in 1990. Fishman’s works have appeared in many international journals, including publications from Korea, Ireland, England, and Canada.

Fishman’s awards include the Paterson Award for Literary Excellence in 2007 for Chopin’s Piano, The Long Island School of Poetry Award from the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association in 2006, and the Ann Stanford Poetry Prize of the Southern California Anthology in 1996.

Don’t miss this powerful reading by a unique poetic talent.

The Writers in the Library series is sponsored by the University of Tennessee Libraries and the Creative Writing Program of the UT English Department. For further information, please contact Jo Anne Deeken, head of technical services, UT Libraries, at 974-6905 or jdeeken@utk.edu, or Kali Meister, Jack E. Reese writer in residence, UT Libraries, at meisterkali@gmail.com.