Poetry of Death
Schedule
Sat Nov 01 2025 at 06:30 pm to 09:00 pm
UTC-05:00Location
Agitator Artist Collective | Oak Park, IL
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Gary Glazner, Event Curator, Poet, and Founder Alzheimer’s Poetry ProjectCin Salach, Poet
Luke Leisman, Astronomer/Fiddle player
Grant Kuchan, Novelist/Guitarist
Wendy Madrigal and Alonso Galue, Puppet Artists
Deborah Lader, Artwork and Calligraphy
Gary Glazner acknowledges support from the Illinois Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts
The event coincides with the closing party for Decaying: A Memento Mori Exhibit, curated by Jason Greenburg.
The event will start with a presentation by Puppet Artists, Alonso Galue and Wendy Madrigal in honor of “Dia de los Muertos,” (Day of the Dead).
We will use call and response to lead the audience in the performance of well-loved poems like Shakespeare’s Sonnet 71, “No longer morn for me when I am dead;” Emily Dickenson’s “Because I could not stop for Death,” and Dylan Thomas’” Do not go gentle into that
good night.”
We will sing along with spirituals like, “I’ll Fly Away,” and “Amazing Grace,” and blues songs like Reverend Gary Davis’ “Death Don't Have No Mercy" and “St. James Infirmary Blues,” lead by Leisman and Kuchan.
By asking the audience a series of open-ended questions on the theme of death, Glazner will lead them in the creation of an original Memento Mori poem. "Memento mori" is a Latin phrase that literally translates to "remember you must die" or "remember your death".
DELIVERING FLOWERS
The skin hung like fabric off the body of the dead man.
I could not turn away in the soft gray light
of the preparation room.
All day I shuttled arrangements to the funeral home.
The amount of flowers at a person’s funeral
is in direct relation to how well they are loved,
how suddenly they died, how tragic the death
and some unknowable calculation.
Flowers sweeten the air.
That is their custom.
Tom the mortician
gestured toward the chapel door
saying, “Go on in.”
His voice quiet as embalming:
the draining of dreams replaced with,
“How peaceful he looks.”
When I brought in the flowers
the widow was half holding his
body, lifting him, kissing, crying,
calling his name.
Tom coughed his tall thin
pardon us ma’am cough-
She composed herself.
“How beautiful,” she said.
I put the casket spray in place
then wrapped his hands
with a rosary of tight rose buds.
We left them alone in grief.
The counting had begun.
-Gary Glazner
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Where is it happening?
Agitator Artist Collective, 3851 W Fullerton Ave, Chicago, IL 60647-8026, United States, Oak ParkEvent Location & Nearby Stays:
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