Live from the Living Room, April 9

Some poets know how to do it right — Adam Tedesco, tonight’s featured poet, packed the audience with his wife, mother & an assortment of (female) friends; I was quite envious. Our host, Don Levy, did a series of announcements as we settled in then on to our featured poet.

Adam Tedesco said he doesn’t like to talk about his poems, which has its own aesthetic value of letting the work stand for itself. But the work doesn’t exist in a vacuum, it all comes from some place, & at a reading it goes by once quickly & knowing where it comes from sometimes helps us understand it. Adam’s poems can be complex & oblique in their associations & references so I don’t always “get” them, but always enjoy the play of language & images. Although, he did interject little personal asides before each poem which may or may not have anything to do with the poem, such as “the unwritten subtitle to everything I have written is Fuck the Police”. There were a couple of love poems, “Leaning Forward” & “Everything is Awesome” & perhaps the anaphoric, twisted images of “When Love Comes to Town.” Some poems were philosophical ponderings, as “Endless Joy,” “An Explanation of Life,” & the irreverently theological “Nothing Stands Between Us.” And there were the wild sex, drug & alcohol influenced “Hello Do You Have a Sister?” “Ace of Spade,” & a poem that was an inventory of drugs & friends & the nights. & other poems — good to hear more than the usual 1 or 2 at open mics.

Don passed his hat for donations then I read 2 urban responses to Earth Day, “How I’m Doing My Part to Preserve the Adirondacks” & “Earth Day 1991.” Brian Dorn read a love poem he has not read out before, “Suspended in Time” & another that is a favorite, “Plain to See.” Don described Samson Dikeman as “bendy” then Samson read the social commentary “Check Out Line” & an impressive “A Sestina for Spilled Coffee.” Avery’s first piece was a Spring-time shit poem, “Some Love Flowers Others Not So Much,” then recited a tribute to the rock-band Led Zeppelin, “Time to Flip the Record.”

Back in the area for a visit with family was Emily Gonzalez, who read a poem by Vicki Carp, “The Consequences of Waking,” then her own poem based on a mis-reading of the title, “The Consequences of Walking,” an urban stroll along Lark St. & beyond. Jacqueline K. began with a recently written, untitled piece on shattered love & the aftermath of sex, then another grim memoir “Nine Down for Miles Davis.” Our host Don Levy read a pop-culture memoir “Hullabaloo” then the poem he wrote on his recent visit to Florida, “In the Pool.”

We gather each 2nd Wednesday in the downstairs “Garden Room” of the Pride Center of the Capital Region, 332 Hudson Ave., for an open mic with a featured reader, 7:30 PM & a modest (or immodest) donation.