Poet
Bernstein writes poetry, which has appeared in The Texas Observer, The Progressive, ZZYZYVA, and The New York Quarterly. Bernstein's poem, Getting Tough, appeared in The New York Quarterly best-of anthology, issue 26, edited by William M. Packard.
Bernstein worked with Packard to record most of Packard's plays, including Ty Cobb.
Bernstein also worked closely with the late poet and biographer Muriel Rukeyser. Bernstein founded the Muriel Rukeyser Center for the Arts in the Park Slope section of Brooklyn, New York a place where Rukeyser said people had “the opportunity to experience the arts where they live and work.” In this context, Bernstein also aired the Muriel Rukeyser reading series, On the Air, which featured interviews with Rukeyser, Robert Bly, Grace Paley, Denise Levertov, Audre Lorde, Quincy Troupe, and Gregory Orr.
Bernstein also produced a series of portrait documentaries of poets including Packard and Rukeyser for the New Letters On the Air national radio show.
Bernstein's books with author Warren Lehrer, 'French Fries and Grrrhhhh: A Study of Social Patterns are a part of the special books collections of the Museum of Modern Art and the Louvre in Paris. French Fries was featured and performed at the International Book Art Festival. Grrrhhhh was visualized as a production at the Dance Theater Workshop of New York City.
Bernstein's poetry chapbook, Particles of Light, accompanied a traveling exhibition of woodcuts depicting family life in everyday America. The poems were greeted positively by the New York Times.
Bernstein's essays and writing have appeared in publications such as The Nation, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Denver Post, Rocky Mountain News, Minneapolis Star Tribune, San Jose Mercury News, Dallas Morning News, Vibe, Helicon Nine Reader, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The London Observer, Utne Reader, Mother Jones, San Francisco Chronicle, Kyoto Journal, Spin, The Progressive, and The Village Voice.
His essays and poetry have been anthologized in The Shape of the Century, Health and Society, Appeal to Reason, the Helicon Nine Reader, and Spud Songs.
He wrote a blues opera, Ann at 94, with singer/songwriter Biaja Solomon.
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Famous quotes containing the word poet:
“A poet is no rattlebrain, saying what comes uppermost, and, because he says every thing, saying, at last, something good; but a heart in unison with his time and country. There is nothing whimsical or fantastic in his production, but sweet and sad earnest, freighted with the weightiest convictions, and pointed with the most determined aim which any man or class knows of in his times.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“A poet is a combination of an instrument and a human being in one person, with the former gradually taking over the latter. The sensation of this takeover is responsible for timbre; the realization of it, for destiny.”
—Joseph Brodsky (b. 1940)
“The poet uses the results of science and philosophy, and generalizes their widest deductions.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)