Ellen Hagan is a writer, performer, and educator. Her
work has been nominated for a Pushcart
Prize, and can be found in the pages of Failbetter, La
Petite Zine, Check
the Rhyme, 42opus, Submerged,
and PLUCK.
She is a regular contributor to Underwired Magazine and
was named a winner of the Next Great Writers Competition
at the Carnegie Center in Lexington,
Kentucky. Ellen is an Affrilachian Poet,
and has received grants from Kentucky
Foundation for Women and the GSA Toyota
Alumni Fund.
Her performances have been featured at the LA Women’s Theatre
Festival, American Living Room Festival, Russell
Simmons presents Def
Poetry Jam, The Kentucky Governor’s
Mansion, La
Pena Cultural Center, The Gramercy Arts
Club, Bluestockings, and Bar 13, among others. Ellen is
a co-founder of Girlstory, a multi-cultural,
multi-generational women’s collective. Braiding time,
place, gender, and ethnicity, Girlstory members were
recently named Vagina Warriors for The Adelphi
University V-day Celebration. Her
two-woman show, Becoming Woman, a featured selection of
the New
York International Fringe Festival,
travels to high schools across the country.
Ellen has recently returned from a residency in Cuba with
a new performance
piece, and will be doing a new residency in New
Orleans at the Louisiana ArtWorks gallery. Crowned,
her first book of poems, is due out from Sawyer House
Press in winter 2010.
if names
were prayers
for my old/new students from PS 315, bronx,
ny
shaheim hanley. daisy santos. carolina blaco.
saleh fata. guadalupe grande. esteffany
martinez. jamel allen. eliani santos. edgard
bocio. dennis martinez.
ali khan. angela cruz. and on. and
on. hands. palms facing in. the bowing, the
crossing. the fingers spread, the ashes. the
chorus of song.
shaheim hanley. shaheim
is the wind for sure. sh, a whisper. ah,
the sound of a peeling fruit, mango, sha-
heim, the hem of a dress, the mellow
melt-down, lazing, lounging, an out-
back name, shaheim, a slow hustle, a
game of darts. sh, the sound of quiet,
crisp air. sha, song. some reggaeton,
shaheim, the long bus ride.
home.
guadalupe grande. big. big. big. beach
ball, the wide sun, a full, fat rainbow slurpie,
guadalupe, the sound of grapes growing
from earth. guadalupe like the rolling of
marbles, marmalade, maravilloso, the new
words i am rolling around. the tread of
sneakers. grande, the world, a mix of letters
that drop like avenue blocks under my feet.
ali khan. ali. a-li. ali khan. the distance,
a
wide measuring device. ali, the zoom of the
number 4 train,
frequent flier miles, wings, of
planes, of birds. ali, the settling dust if it
settles at all. khan, coffee beans, khan,
thyme,
smashed garlic. ali khan, elementary, the
simple lay out, the un-complexity of language.
and there are more. names walking stride
through my busy, busy mind. continue. and on,
and on.