One of the best Bay Area series? Lunch Poems. 8 times a year and this Thursday is one of them: Clayton Eshleman will read from his translations of Aimé Césaire [read this | view last year’s series]. Say you’re able to hit that up and you notice the rest of your day has been pretty terrific, actually, and want to see what somebody else has to say. Options:

GRANTA celebrates the release of Issue 117 with readings by contributors Peter Orner and D. A. Powell, and—as a special treat—Oscar Villalon will read a previously unpublished Robert Bolaño story. This is guaranteed to be awesome! Orner is starting to read from his forthcoming Love and Shame and Love [he’ll be at The Booksmith on Wed, 11/9, and you can watch him read an excerpt here and something else entirely here], and Powell is soon to release a new book of poems entitled Useless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys [this interview has the genesis]—you can and should watch him read from that here and here.

Issue 117: Horror also has new stories by Don DeLillo and Steven King—this is obvious, right?

7pm at Green Apple Books
506 Clement Street
Free

I’m not sure what I’m going to do: GRANTA first and then to readings from Conversations at the Wartime Cafe, or have someone film GRANTA [interested?] and sit through the marathon 5+ hours of 30 authors responding in various ways to a decade of war. If you look at the  roster of authors you’re sure to understand what kind of event this is going to be. I am proud to be a part of this anthology and am very much looking forward to seeing this many contributors in the same place. I won’t comment on the timing.

Three relatively random one-sentence excerpts you might hear:

1. “Throughout my childhood I would return again and again to look at the sword and the case and the pistol and the vials.” —Gilian Conoley, from ” My Father’s War”
2. “Almost everyone I encounter walking down Commercial Street either lives, has lived, or has dear friends and family in New York, so there is a feeling that Provincetown too has been hit, though there is not a speck of ash in its deep blue, almost violet sky.” —Genine Lentine, from “Rupture”
3. “Disintegration is real, and out of it reality is sprouting.” — Sara Larsen, from “Disintegration and Sprout”

Doors at 6:30 | Readins from 7p-12a
DNA LOUNGE, 375 11th St
$5

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• Other Thursday, 11/3 events worth checking out
• The author of this post was Evan Karp. He is glad it’s Thursday, 11/3.