SECOND New Date: … Not Without Love and Care: A “Peaceful Revolutionary” Returns

Walter Pietsch, Korea-based Army veteran, noted, in particular, for his attempted citizen’s arrest of Richard Nixon and his record-breaking entanglements with the Supreme Court, comes to Curley’s Diner for a second visit with PoemAlley this Tuesday, December 11, to present his hot-off-the-presses autobiography, Walter Pietsch: Evolution of a Peaceful Revolutionary.

Walter and his wife, Anita

Credited by acclaimed actor/activist Edward Asner as “a fighter for the right things that occupy our lives and are usually ignored,” Walter will discuss the humorous and, at times, heart-breaking development of his tenacious passion for domestic and universal justice, how it interwove with the meeting of his wife, Anita, his lifetime enthusiasm for golf and the formation of the non-profit ARISE, from which springs his three-point proposal for “expanding democracy.”

"Highway of Death", Iraq, 1991

South Vietnam, 1969

A self-published effort, following Walter’s 2009 release, They Stole Our Country: We’re Taking Her Back!, Peaceful Revolutionary was produced with significant support from two of our Curley’s regulars, Rolf Maurer and Richard Duffee. The evening will also be an occasion to acknowledge and appreciate their efforts in helping bring out a book with great potential for changing our political landscape, hence our lives.

contemporary tent city, Sacramento

homeless veterans' families
celebrate July 4th, 2009

Adds Ralph Nazareth, founder of Yuganta Press and PA moderator, who served as consultant on his friend’s new project, "Walter’s life and work are testament to his beliefs that there is no poetry that’s not political and that no positive change is possible without love and care.”

... tomorrow?

drone victim, Pakistan, 2011

Inspiration for what is possible along these lines can be found in this contemporary rendering of Charlie Chaplin's stirring closing words from 1940's The Great Dictator, extolling the grace of our shared humanity over the exploitive misery of always being afraid of one another:

“My Roots In Sparta, My Branches In Stamford”

In proximity to Stamford’s high-ticket commercial and corporate core, Curley’s Diner remains a resilient testament to real community that has served customers 24-hours-a-day for decades.

As co-owner with her sister Maria, Monday’s featured Barnes & Noble Open Mic poet, Elena Begetis Anastos, opened the doors of Curley’s to sustain PoemAlley and its various functions since its inception with the same combination of firmness and unhesitating generosity with which she serves and assists her customers, earning her the affection nickname, “Big Mama”.

Big Mama, her 2009 poetry collection (Turn of River Press), like all her work, flows prodigiously with first-hand peeks into human behavior and trials, love and nature, all delivered through a special brand of magical expression shaped by her childhood experiences and the mythic tradition of her homeland, Greece. Her poetry has also appeared in assorted magazines in New York and Connecticut, as well as the PoemAlley collections Beyond the Fence, Eating Our Hearts Out and Wednesdays at Curley’s. You can read selections from Big Mama, or order a copy at http://test10.itexvideo.com/.


Hosted by Frank Chambers and PoemAlley's Nick Miele, the Barnes & Noble's Open Mic Poetry program meets the second Monday of each month in the cookbook section on the main floor of the bookstore (located in the Stamford Down Center), beginning at 7:15 p.m.

For more information, contact:

Barnes & Noble

100 Greyrock Place Suite H009

Stamford, CT 06901

203-323-1248