Third Thursday Poetry Night, June 21

Sadly our featured poet, Anna Eyre, at the last minute could not make it tonight, but that only meant that the "one-poem rule" became a license for 2 poems for the open mic poets. But before that, the invoking of the Muse, tonight the painter & poet Dorothea Tanning (1910 -2012) -- I read her poem "Artist, Once" from Coming to That (Graywolf Press, 2011).

Alan Catlin was up first again, remembering "Walking Home in Winter, Utica NY 1969," then a more recent piece on the arrest of the last of the uptown gunners in Schenectady, "Mr. D. He's Dead." Bob Sharkey read "64 Shades of Meaning," a string of words & commentary, then a piece dedicated to the late Nadia Trinkala, "Meditation in Orange & Indigo While Listening to Abbey Lincoln & Stan Getz." Joe Krausman's first poem, "Suppose," was about writing, then he pondered mortality in "Things Passing."

The 2 poems Tess Lecuyer read can be found on her FaceBook site, "Haiku to My Sticky Summer Self" & "Pebble Blessing Sonnet." Emily read her wonderful poem, sprinkled with Spanish, for her mother, then from her cell-phone, "Potpourri," the dried up flowers of love.

Amy Nelson Hahn had been here last moth for the first time & she came back! She read a poem from her Blog about a beautiful Albany sunset, "How It Is," then a poem by her ancestor, the colonial poet, Anne Bradstreet (1612 - 1672) "To My Dear & Loving Husband" (which she plans to read to her soon-to-be husband at their upcoming wedding). Avery followed with verbal portrait of "The Beasts of L.A.," followed by an effusive poem about brewing tea. Anthony Bernini ("being well trained") had only 1 poem, "Where the World Turns," upsidedown it seems. I ended the night with a poem written at the beginning of June, "The Transit of Venus."

This reading is every Third Thursday, most usually with a featured poet, & always with an open mic, 7:30PM, at the Social Justice Center, 33 Central Ave., Albany, NY, a modest donation supports this & other poetry event & the work of the Social Justice Center.