Book Release: Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars by Cory Besskepp Cofer
Event description
HYBRID EVENT
Join us for the release of Cory Besskepp Cofer's Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars.
Book preorders available with ticket purchase.
Purchase virtual tickets to join via Zoom or join us in person at:
World Stage
4321 Degnan Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90008
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Guest Poets
Mike the Poet
+ others to be announced
Hosted by AKoldPiece
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About Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars:
“The poems in Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars are one part joyful trumpet song, one part elegy. They capture the problems and pleasures of childhood with precision, rendering each image within with the complexity we know we lived through. There’s gospel music in these pages, neon lights flickering through a day dream, and a glimpse of singing cousins. Homies come through too. Fathers serve us sausage and eggs on Sundays. And mothers call us home when it gets dark. Each poem cracks open. Here you’ll find uncles embracing stories before passing them down. Cory Cofer sets these very stories spinning into a history he has been called to carry on.”
—Michael Torres, author of An Incomplete List of Names
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Praise for Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars:
Cory Besskepp Cofer delivers a poetic offering as creative and expansive as its title: Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars.
A true scribe, taking down the entire palette of life, his book touches on the joys, the tearful, the nostalgic, the spiritual. From coming of age stories to eulogies to shout outs, giving props to various polka-dots making up a vast constellation of stars.
This master of spoken word magically transfers that same guttural hyped-up flow onto the page. Firing on all poetic cylinders he employs rhythm, rhyme, wordplay, visual effects of stylized text with sculpted verse designs. Descriptive poems transport you along the chronology of his adventures through life, certain lines calling back to previous poems just like new experiences rousing up recollections.
There is so much tragically real and beautifully uplifting material in Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars. It hits like soul food, the realest and freshest soup for the spirit.
— Leonna Lovemoor, author of Puzzle Pieces of the Heart
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The familiarity of strength, resilience, and faith we share as Black men who grew up in the inner city is prominent throughout these poems. Besskepp gives my younger self a friend that lets me know I was never alone. A celebration of the Black experience and the Black family—this will be required reading for my graduate level Diversity courses.
— Dr. Jeremy Hart, Professor of Counseling, College of Education, California State University, Dominguez Hills
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This incredibly rich collection from Cory Cofer is infused with hip hop rhythms and playful forms with its undercurrents rooted in the spoken-word magic that he is known for. Filled with nostalgia for cabbage-patching leaves and moonwalking dust, there is also reverence here for the elders who tell our histories.
— K.E. Ogden, author What the Body Already Knows, winner of the Finishing Line Press New Women’s Voices Poetry Prize
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The poems in Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars are one part joyful trumpet song, one part elegy. They capture the problems and pleasures of childhood with precision, rendering each image within with the complexity we know we lived through.
There’s gospel music in these pages, neon lights flickering through a day dream, and a glimpse of singing cousins. Homies come through too. Fathers serve us sausage and eggs on Sundays. And mothers call us home when it gets dark. Each poem cracks open. Here you’ll find uncles embracing stories before passing them down. Cory Cofer sets these very stories spinning into a history he has been called to carry on.
— Michael Torres, author of An Incomplete List of Names
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Cory Cofer’s realism is magic! A memoir packed with lyrically potent imagery, Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars is deeply rooted in the power of connection—“somebody’s uncle is washing his car with no water”—reminding us that we are all extended family.
— Romaine Washington, author of Purgatory Has an Address and Sirens in Her Belly
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Cory Besskepp Cofer masters storytelling through vivid poetic portraits in his book Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars. There is no other poet who can paint the canvas of a memory with such delicate attention and tender intention. Cofer’s poetry collection celebrates a pride in family and an honesty in resilience while also challenging the current systems in place that have long forgotten humanity.
Dreaming Under Polka-Dot Stars is a sacred time capsule for the world to read so that we keep believing in each other and dream a new path forward. Cofer is proof that with this pen, poetry will save the world.
— Alex Petunia, author of Tending My Wild
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If you had Cory Cofer’s phone number, you could call him up and be greeted by warmth and laughter. He lives like he writes—making the best of bad situations and basking in the glow of good ones. Not happy-go-lucky—there’s righteous anger around the edges, knowledge of self at the core. Of course, you don’t have Cory Cofer’s phone number but you do have the next best thing—this book, a masterful piece by one of America’s best writers.
— Lee Ballinger, author of Love and War: My First Thirty Years of Writing
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About Cory Besskepp Cofer:
Giving a classic face to his urban inspired works, Cory Besskepp Cofer is a poet and storyteller who blends originality and rich heritage into his sought-after writings and performances. An HBO Def Poet, born and raised in Stockton, CA with brief stints in rural Texas, Cofer earned a Master of Arts in Education and has taught in California public schools for over 20 years. Raised on Langston Hughes and hip hop’s golden era, Cofer published his first book, Up the Street, Around the Corner in 2008 and was awarded the “Shirley Kaufman Memorial Teaching Grant” twice, granting funding for two published books of poetry created by his students. In addition to performing and teaching workshops at universities across the nation, as a playwright, Cofer's Homeless Beatboxer was featured at Disney’s REDCAT Theater and UC Riverside’s Hip Hop Theatre Fest. Cofer was also a contributing writer to Terraforming Marginalized Voices, featured at the 2022 Hollywood Fringe Festival. A member of two Los Angeles National Poetry Slam Teams, he is also co-founder and host of A Mic & Dim Lights, one of the nation's longest running open mic poetry readings, based in Southern California, established in 2000.