Live from the Living Room, April 14

Actually, tonight it is "Live from the Basement AA Room" since there was a meeting going on in our usual space. Not that our host (Don Levy) does yoga but he is flexible, so we were in the basement, on folding chairs, not as comfortable as the couch & soft chairs, but we're poets, we're tough (or tuff).

I haven't seen the featured poet, Noah Kucij, in a few years when he used to come out to some of the open mics. His poems tonight ranged from Schenectady ("That Lights & Hauls the World," a 5-part memoir/love poem to that city, & "In Memoriam," to the Brandywine Diner) to "Arbor Hill" to the Adirondacks ("Burning," an I-want-to-be-Robert-Frost poem) to Bangkok ("In Thewes"), with a few other stops thrown in. Some of the poems are from the collection, The Fifth Voice (Toadlily Press, Chappaqua, NY). It was great to know he is still around & to hear his poems again.

The open mic began with me reading "Those Big APR [American Poetry Review] Poems" & my loving pastiche of William Carlos Williams most famous poems, "So Much Depends Upon This is Just to Say" (it is National Poetry Month, you know). Bob Sharkey's poem "Sky" was a mélange of images mixing in a fantasy of a witness protection program, then he did his Caffe Lena poem, "Mr. & Mrs. FedEx…"

Richard Morrell has been writing a couple of poem sequences & he read for us #37 of the 55 poems in the "Doom Sonnets," then read #4, "Power Point," from his Iron Pentacle sequence. Carolee Sherwood is one of those manic poets who are writing a poem a day because it is National Poetry Month (so what do they do during Breast Cancer Awareness Month?) & both of the poems she read are on her Blog, April 5 & April 10, & they are both worth reading again.

A new voice here, & her first time reading, was Jenn Armbrust who read an intense piece from her notebook, "My Love is Hate." Jason Crane's first poem, "Lottery," was a tender piece about an old woman remembering important dates in her past by the numbers she played, then he read "Muse Incorporated." Our host, Don Levy, read a poem by Ai, in her memory, & a poem by Madeline de Freeze, both from the old anthology, A Geography of Poets.

We gather at the Gay & Lesbian Community Center on Hudson Ave. in Albany for this "straight-friendly" reading & open mic every 2nd Wednesday, about 7:30PM, usually in the living room.