Tree (30 years old this month and now with a new revamped site) had an Open Mic and two features on May 11th.
People always seem to ask when will it be over so they can plan their energies and evening. (Many poetry events only state start time, which is kind of funny, isn’t it?) Poetry workshops start at 6:45. The readings start at 8:00. It’s often over by 9:30. The last people leave and the door is shut by 10:00. There are usually 2 short breaks so if you need to go, or stretch, or chat, there’s a chance to do so built in.
Dean Steadman opened Tree with a couple poems by AJM Smith along with a mini-bio of that man who who had a longstanding running against Layton and Dudek. Apparently Layton and he lampooned each other in publications for decades as a public sport. Odd. Each time someone gives a tribute to a poet who has passed on.
Because the open mic has returned, numbers were up. Maybe that’s overgeneralizing. There are so many variables and vagaries. Weather and whether the babysitter cancelled, or the Habs are playing, random number of people too pooped, or suddenly feeling like poetry tonight. Or who told who about who was reading. So much randomness informs crowd behavior. Anyhew,
Last time there was someone from the The Recipe group at Umi Cafe came. This time another new face here…Bardia Sinaee from the in/words circle. He read a couple poems including a sonnet about Elgin Street.
Bywords-published poet Mike Fralic was at the Open Mic. To tell you he writes of cows and houses becoming derelict before our eyes would say nothing I suppose. It’s all in how you tell and reveal and he’s one to watch, as I also thought last time I heard him.
There was a pretty full open set, some first timers and some almost first timers who nearly went up to open mic after the workshop of a dozen people, plus lurkers who eyed the workshop from a safe distance. Some migrate in eventually.
Suzanne Bowness also read at the open mic. (I got no good picture of her.) She gave a practice run for her book launch in Toronto next week. Her poetry collection, The Days You’ve Spent will launch May 20 at T Cafe (511 Bloor St W), 7 – 11 p.m. [sample poem]
One of the feature readers was Suzanne Steele. Below she pulls out the burqa she wore while in Afghanistan.
She is one of 5 artists in the Canadian Forces Artists Program. She’s the only poet. It’s traditionally visual art. She was talking about her war experiences with a slideshow at the Ottawa Public Library yesterday and will again May 16th.
Steele will take part in the second annual Mini Festival of Poetry and Fiction May 16 as part of an Ontario tour that includes Ottawa. She will join a group of other writers for a public reading at the downtown branch of the public library between 1 and 5 p.m.
She read some from the magazine pictured and a sonnet she had published in CV2 which she arrived at she said via tweaking a Manley Hopkins one.
The way she dramatically rolled poems out in hooking sounds reminded me of Sheri-D Wilson performing. [Hm, the sample on her site isn’t the comparison I had in mind tho.] Steele’s Refuelers shows that sort of pace and energy that isn’t very typical on the page or on stage. Powerful, sympathetic sort of takes on the soldiers, those “three quarters formed men”, that even can reach even a pacifist peacenik like me with the odd chill and goosebump.
Recently (relatively recently) back from a New Zealand Poetry festival Connolly read from a few of his books, including an errata slip poem from drift. I hadn’t heard of this structure. State the poem’s name, in this case a Paul Muldoon poem, and then list your substitutions, “for _____, read _______”, “for _____, read _______”. As a stand alone, it’s interesting, and then multiplies in weight when you have the source poem. It’s a dialogue of a poem. Neat.
Those who missed Kevin Connolly live missed the chance to hear the out takes of what nearly made it into Revolver, and, if you don’t have it already, he was throwing in copies of his first book Asphalt Cigar with every purchase of Revolver.
The night concluded with Rod Pederson asking people to “come out, listen, workshop and enjoy the bejeeepers out of our art form”.