Stay Home Session: Poetry Night at Caffè Lena, July 1

One of Caffè Lena’s responses to the restrictions on large gatherings of folks, this the monthly poetry night on the first Wednesday of the month, hosted by Carol Graser, held on YouTube. You can also find their music events on YouTube, including this year’s SPAC/Friehofer’s Jazz Festival which I enjoyed as it was happening in the comfort of my home & cheap drinks.

Tonight’s reading was a trio of poets who make this region such a hotbed of vibrant, engaged poetry, Joseph Bruchac, D. Colin, & Bunkong Tuon.

BK read first, primarily from his most recent book The Doctor Will Fix It (Shabda Press, 2019), focusing on his daughter, his wife, & his own response to becoming a father. His poems are part story, part personal questioning, part meditation on existence. BK’s grand theme is family, this book the latest in that exploration. He also read briefly from his other 2 books, And So I Was Blessed (NYQ Books, 2017) & Gruel (NYQ Books 2015). Gruel deals with his early years as a refuge from Cambodia, while And So I Was Blessed contains poems about returning to Southeast Asia as a tourist. He also included a recent poem beginning “America you were brave once… “ saying he loves America so he must criticize it.

D. Colin, who has the amazing task of hosting Poetic Vibe open mic & reading every Monday, (formerly at the Troy Kitchen, now on Zoom), said she was trying tonight her best to balance the positive & the grim. She began with “Magpie” a “fairly new” piece about trying to protect her plants, her self, from racism. From her book Said the Swing to the Hoop (Empress Bohemia Press, 2019) a poem in tribute to her mother & the lessons she taught “The girl dream,” as well as the powerful anthem/manifesto “for every Black Woman who has been called angry.” From Dreaming in Kreyol (Empress Bohemia Press, 2015) she put together into one piece the first 3 poems in the book paying tribute to her family in Haiti. & with careful hope she read her poem, “For the Days Ahead” written on the window of the Arts Center in Troy.

Joseph Bruchac is a familiar figure here at Caffè Lena & throughout the region, & he began as he does with a greeting in “the old language“ (Abenaki) then some notes on his flute, & on to a poem he had just scribbled for Danielle about his own time in Haiti, “Travel Trivia.” He said he was mostly reading new poems, some were “a little raw.” There was a poem for a new anthology of native writers to a young poet who stood up to protect the Missouri River, also one titled “My Grandfather’s Hoe,” another titled “We Remember” (but titled in Abenaki), another to 2 Abenaki rebels, “Tracks Not Left Behind.” The poem “What the Eagle Says to Us” carried the message that a new day will begin, we are not alone. He ended with a piece about walking across Lake Champlain on snow shoes.

You can watch the entire program (& hear poems I didn't tell you about) here.

While this was a stellar evening of local essential poets, I do miss the open mic with its variety & the unexpected unknown — maybe someday again soon — in person.