Arts

Miami, you have exceeded our expectations.

When we asked for poetry, you delivered in droves.  And we didn't even offer an open bar.

The concept behind WLRN and O, Miami Poetry Festival's month-long project, "That's So Miami," was simple enough: Write us a poem that starts or ends with "That's So Miami."

In 1998, the cultural climate in Cuba wasn't exactly conducive to artistic freedom.  While a thriving underground music scene did exist, official radio and television channels were notoriously selective, only airing artists who echoed the Communist Party line.

Actor Colin McPhillamy is finishing up his run in Exit the King at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach.  He is also a published author, and reads an excerpt from his second book, An Actor Walks into China.  To learn more about Colin, visit www.mcphillamy.com, and to hear more excerpts, log onto www.artsradionetwork.com.

I was sitting on the verandah of a hotel overlooking Waikiki beach waiting for a lunch menu. The mighty Pacific Ocean purred like a Lamborghini in the distance. I'd spent hours walking in Chinatown from early morning looking for beautiful and unique dishes I love to use for the thematic ‘Tasting Menus’ at our restaurant. But I had little luck and a keen hunger was rising up in me.

Miami's quickly growing bike scene remains tightly interwoven with the city's other do-it-yourself-spirited, artsy subcultures.

Sure, there are plenty of people with fancy road bikes and Lycra suits joining Critical Mass and speeding along on group rides. But a large number of the scene's most outspoken two-wheelers are young people who push for bicycling less as an exercise form per se.

This weekend, you might notice that the humble coaster beneath your drink has a surprising message. Unlike the fool sitting next to you at the bar, the verses on your coaster are lucid, articulate and wise.

Paul Christiansen, a poet and graduate student at Florida International University, spearheaded the poetry coaster project. It's part of O Miami, a month-long poetry festival with the goal of exposing everyone in Miami-Dade to a poem in April.

I spent a recent night watching a performance of the New World Symphony being broadcast on a wall at the New World Center. As the symphony performed inside, the video played simultaneously on a soaring, 7,000-square-foot projection wall on the building’s façade. It was a dazzling night, with hundreds of people speaking multiple languages gathered on blankets and chairs, toting picnic baskets, children and pets.

It's almost a chicken-and-egg question. Do reporters and hosts with worldly or intellectual-sounding names naturally seek out public radio? Or are they drawn to this career after recognizing their fellow fancy-monikered peers on the air? Either way, among the staff at National Public Radio there are definitely a lot of fancy first-and-last-name combos like Ofeibea Quist-Arcton and Douali Xaykaothao.