Caffè Lena Poetry Open Mic, November 3

Tonight’s featured poet, Jessica Cuello, had been a feature here before which is when I became a fan of her poetry, but I also came here tonight for the grand variety of local poets who come here to read in the open mic. It was a full sign-up sheet, over 20 open mic poets.

Our host, Carol Graser, started us off, as she is wont to do with, as they say, an OPP (i.e. other person’s poem), this by Vasko Popa, “The Admirers of Little Boxes.” Click this link to read it. 

Then on to tonight's featured poet, Jessica Cuello, who was live-streamed & captured forever on YouTube which you can watch here. She read poems from her new book from Barrow Street Press, Liar, which was the winner of the Barrow Street Poetry Book Prize. Listen to the poems then buy the book. It is this kind of thing that makes my Blog unnecessary — except that the record of the open mic exists nowhere but here (like the header says, “it ain’t the truth but it’s pretty darn close”).  Her poems were frequently persona poems in the voice of a young girl; she also read one of her poems based on mis-spellings by her students, “Hungur;” the title of the book is based on another mis-spelling poem, “Liyer.” Jessica did what all good community poets do, brought her family & friends to her reading, because after all if you don’t, who will show up? I, for one, was glad to be there & to take Liar home with me.

Carol Graser started off the open mic with her loving poem “Prayer for the Sorrowful Brain.” Rachel Baum began with a tribute to her dog, then on to the recently revised family memoir “How I Learned to Smoke.” Marilyn McCabe who has been a featured poet on this stage read a poem beginning “Some which some where…,” another about a physics course. David Graham addressed a dreaded subject in his poem “Ode to Pandemic Hair.”

Amanda Blodgett introduced herself as being in a 12-step program, & read 2 related poems, “To My Soulmate” (whom she hasn’t yet met), & “Finding a Sponsor.” Effy Redman is one of my favorite of these North Country open mic  poets, she read a piece that might have been titled “Anemone” a loving memory of being on a beach in Wales. 

Zoe Epizon’s poem “Balsam Pillow” was a letter to a memory of one she loved, from a poetry manuscript that she hopes to publish. Elaine Kenyon read a painfully descriptive piece titled “7 Teeth Out,” then one about a less painful experience in a poetry workshop “She Gave us 5 Words.” My poems were an automatic writing exercise turned into a prose poem “Ferrini Ginsberg Blake & Me,” then the much more concise text-message-poem “for Amanda.” Jeannine Laverty is a story-teller, read a piece about farming “Savory October Days.”

James Knippen was here from Utica, he read a Halloween poem that he said was based on a World War I tune “Hearse Song.” More death from Elizabeth Threadgill, but this of a house, a piece titled “Dementia.” Heidi Woolever said it was her 1st time here at Caffè Lena, her 1st poem was titled “Set it Down” & sounded like a dream poem to me, then a play on words “Bark.” 

Barbara Ungar also used word play in her poem “Self Diagnosis 2,” which she described as “a not-perfect pandemic poem.” Stu Bartow had a Halloween Haiku about a witch ringing doorbells, then read “Looking for the Leonids” which I have heard before & is in one of his recent collections. Randee Renzi began with a sexy love poem titled “Each Time He Flows” (his rap makes her “flow”), then to “Collateral Fallout” (or starving). Rodney Parrott said the poem he read about “human flying” was an “end poem,” fitting with the recurring themes tonight of death & Halloween. 

It was good to see the poet James Schlett back here, he read a cluster of Haiku about his 6 year-old daughter, a proud Papa. Jeff Stubits was another poet I hadn’t seen since even before the pandemic, he likes to season his poems with humor & tonight was true to form, “Exploring New Options” with origami boats, & “Buddha.” Ishan Sumaner read a seasonal piece “The Trees Are Blushing,” then an untitled piece about the inscriptions on our bodies of our experiences. Lâle Davidson was announced by Carol as a “future feature” & read 2 poems with Biblical connections, “Lilith Confesses” & the ekphrastic “Rodin’s ‘Eve After the Fall’.” The final poet of the night was Alex Bell with 2 poems with provocative titles “One Long Struggle in the Dark” & “Emancipated for Thought.”

The Caffè Lena Poetry Night is back with an in-person open mic & an in-person & live-streamed featured poet on the 1st Wednesday of each month, starts at 7:00PM, 47 Phila St., Saratoga Springs, NY.

Invocation (of the Muse), November 1

The Fuze Box on Albany’s Central Ave. was recently purchased by a former employee from years back & has “reopened” — sort of — no liquor license yet so no booze, just water & bad coffee in styrofoam cups. 

The history of The Fuze Box goes back to 1997 when the building was the QE2 & The Fuze Box was across Townsend Park on Washington Ave. where it was the back room dance hall of a bar called The Power Company. & back in February 1999 a young poet started a poetry open mic there, that poet was the host of this night’s poetry open mic, R.M. Engelhardt. After the QE2 closed in January 1999, & The Fuze Box moved into the building sometime in 2000, there was an open mic hosted by Don Levy for a while. Then in mid-2005 Rob brought his School of Night open mic series to The Fuze Box when he left doing poetry open mics at Valentines. & now he’s back here again.

This night there were a mix of old-timers who had read at not only The Fuze Box but also the QE2, & folks who weren’t even born when swing dancers were twirling on the floor of the original Fuze Box on Washington Ave. Rob got us started with a reading of poem by Alan Kaufman, editor of The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry, an anaphoric piece “Let us …”

Then I ended up 1st on the sign-up sheet to read 2 poems, “This Is Not Trick or Treat” combining a black cat with Election Day, & the an older poem I wrote back in the time of the open mic at the QE2 about the false prophets (aka bullshit artists) some mistake for beat characters. Sally Rhoades is one (of many) who first read her poetry out to an audience at the QE2 on Central Ave., & continues to read at various poetry open mics in the area, tonight reading the celebratory “I have Danced with the Druids,” then a consideration of life after the pandemic titled “What is the Answer?”

Joe Krausman has also been around for awhile, in life as in the poetry scene, & received a round of applause making for it to the stage, to read 2 of his popular poems, “Specialist” & “Gratitude” which address where we come from, sort of. Austin Houston is a more recent poet on the scene, reading at open mics & even featured in Poets in the Park, the first poem he read, “Corporate Greed,” is in his recent self-published book Existence: Chaos in Our Own Backyard, then read a new poem about those who deny the riot on “January 6, 2021.”

Sami Ring, the first poet of a string of new voices here, began with a break-up poem, then read one pondering the question “what is the true me?” titled “Identity Rusts MRI.” Our host, R.M. Engelhardt, was next up, took up donations to “go to the bar,” read poems from his new book, We Rise Like Smoke, the poems titled “A Hundred Thousand Poets” & the other titled “Epitaph.” 

Billy Stanley has also been to many open mics in the area, tends to do his poems with humor, in his distinctive New Orleans accent, & from memory as he did tonight, the first an apocalyptic piece about “strolling on the streets of madness” confronting the dental hygienists of America (seriously (or not)), then an outrageous rant about ranting in a toilet. Sydney has also read at other venues in the area, such as Poetic Vibe & a couple venues in Albany, began with an angry poem about “shitty guys,” then one about her need to apologize to her “great boss” the poem titled “Sorry Sorry Sorry.”

I also recognized John as someone who had read at pre-pandemic open mics in Albany, both poems tonight in a style that used a bewildering string of images, the first one titled “The Same Thing Many Times” & the second one I missed the title but had images of gulls in a poplar tree. 

El, the final poet of the night, had also read out in the pre-pandemic days & began with a the last poem she “wrote about a year & a half ago” about doing the best we can, then  one about her family talking together in Spanish about each other.

So this new series, Invocation, was off to a good start, at least as far as the poetry goes, but the venue itself needs some work, like getting a liquor license, & adding some chairs. Check back next month on the 1st Monday of the month, at The Fuze Box, 12 Central Ave., 7:30 sign-up, 8:00 start; don’t get there too early, the doors might be locked.

The Holy Local, October 27

Back for our 2nd event here at the High Ethic Stalwarts Gallery, & I was gratified not only to have some repeat readers from last month but also new readers here. Our evening’s Muse was the great, gone poet, Jack Hirschman, as I read his poem “Jack Kerouac: a Meditation” on Poetry! from All That’s Left (City Lights Foundation, 2008). 

First up on the sign-up list was a true “Holy Local,” Sylvia Barnard who lives only a few blocks away, to read 2 poems for her deceased friend, Brian, one she read last month here, then a newer poem seeing a vision of her friend out her window.

A new face/voice not just to this reading but to the area, Kate Crofton, read a poem about going home, mixed with childhood memories of borrowing a cup of sugar, “US Route 6.”

Tom Bonville said he was pleased to be out reading in person again, & read his poems “The Hidden Word,” & one mixing in a childhood memory of his family of immigrants “To Like What I Don’t.” 

Tamara Gray came back again this month, started off with a short, but intricate poem, then another about “auctioning off” her days, also short & trenchant.  The Reverend Nadine Morsch, who had been known to read at the open mic at The Low Beat read an excerpt from a long, multi-part meditative poem, “The Naropa Echo.”

Tim Verhaegen, another habitué of open mics, read a Halloween poem set in1969, “It’s Halloween Everyday at Our House.”  

Christian Ortega read from his 2014 self-published chapbook Red Poems, 2 pieces, “Factotum LTD,” & the longer rant “Red Roses Roman.”

I read an older poem that mashed up Halloween & Election Day, “This is Not Trick or Treat.”  Our last reader signed up as ZaZa, but we knew her when she was a reader at open mics at the Lionheart & the original Fuze Box on Washington Ave., she read a breakup poem, “Nicky,” & one about her mother, “Mom,” from her notebook.

The Holy Local is an open mic for the written & spoken word at the High Ethic Stalwarts Gallery, 345 Myrtle Ave., Albany, NY, each last Wednesday of the month (except this November), sign-up at 7:30PM, 8:00 start, $3.00 donation. Hope to see you in December.

Compass: A Chapbook in Film, October 23

This was the premier screening of a collaborative project between poet Mary Kathryn Jablonski & filmmaker Laura Frare, at the Saratoga Arts Center. The project was funded by the New York State Council on the Arts, & had originally been scheduled to be screened at the Saratoga Springs Public Library, but has been cancelled three times due to the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, until Saratoga Arts opened up their space for this event.

I have known both these artists for many years. Laura Frare did the cover art for my 1st book, Meditations of a Survivor (A.P.D., 1991), & I published Mary Kathryn Jablonski’s book of poems To the Husband I Have Not Yet Met (A.P.D., 2008). I have also seen some of their prior video poems at the Hyde Collection, & at the University at Albany Art Gallery.

Compass: A Chapbook in Film consists of 9 short pieces, poems read (or sung) by Jablonski, at times accompanied by traditional &/or original music. Local musicians Mark Tolstrup & Dan Hubbs provided some of the musical backing. The run time is about 35 minutes, but viewing it seemed outside time. As one audience members commented, “it was a transcendental experience.” The combination of the often dreamy videos, bending & twisting images of birds in trees, or wandering in a cemetery, the tide washing over sand, with the words of the poet spoken quietly, & the music, sometimes familiar, sometimes new, had me drifting. While I’m glad to not have the text of the poems to distract me, the experience begs to be repeated. There is in the piece titled “So Many Mothers” an almost abstract image of a close-up of a sewing machine (this filmed by Jablonski) that I realized with a shock was actually run in reverse, the machine un-sewing, so to speak. In “Two Roads/One Road” the image is of driving on a deserted country road, but without seeing the vehicle, so that it was like what we see sometimes in a dream, an empty road twisting & turning, going where? We don’t know.

The theme of Compass is, in the broadest terms, death, the reminder of mortality, as some of the titles suggest (“Flowers named for our dead,” “All Souls,” “Death in Winter”) but more specifically that of a close relative, a brother. One could say that death is all around us until it touches us directly. Five of the poems in the film have been published in Tupelo Quarterly or Atticus Review. But reading them, as masterful as they are in print, is not the experience of seeing the film, where all the elements — words, images, music, sound effects — blend & circle around each other, evoking that “transcendence.”

One can hope that Compass, A Chapbook in Film, will be shown in other venues, perhaps even at the Saratoga Springs Public Library as originally planned, in other libraries in the Region, or other arts/entertainment venues. I certainly would love to see it again.

 

Writers Mic, October 13

Another of the regular, monthly open mics surviving very well, thank you, on Zoom, hosted by poet Jackie Craven, with a “virtual” sign-up sheet on a clipboard "virtual” .

With this the season of baseball, I read 2 poems on that theme, “The Cardinal” from my 2019 chapbook, Baseball Poems (A.P.D.), then a short piece (one of my “poem cards” I keep handy to give away) “Dusty Baker.”

Scott Morehouse, always one to amuse us, read a trick or treat piece, “The Halloween Visitor” an absurdist tale (“I come to discombulate…”) with an Halloween appearance by Gertrude Stein of course playing with words in Gertrude Stein style.

David Graham began with a memory poem, “Back Lit” on a student’s suicide, then pondered "how can they be?" in a piece titled “Talking with Uncommitted Voters.”

Looking thru his back files of pieces inspired by his tavern job, Alan Catlin came up with a dialogue between a bartender & a clown, & mentioned his recent book of fiction from Alien Buddha press, Chaos Management — look for it; he finished up with a dystopic vision of grandchildren in odd colors titled “Melancholia.”

Sarah Chaviano added a bit of humor to the evening with a piece titled “Eating Your First Lobster: The Lobster’s Point of View.”

Our host, Jackie Craven, said she was reading some old ones too, began with “Under Anesthesia I Remember Watermelon with Slippery Seeds” in which she mixed the now & the future, then the funny, imaginative “As The Last Egg in the Carton I Should tell You About the Others.” 

So if you want to share your writing — funny, dark, imaginative, whatever — with this funny, dark, imaginative, whatever group & read in this open mic on the 2nd Wednesday of each month on Zoom, you can find information & the link on the WritersMic Facebook page. Do it.  

 

2nd Tuesday All-Genre Open Mic Out of Bennington, October 12

A nice bunch/club of regulars “here” in Bennington, VT courtesy of Zoom, with our veteran host of open mics from Chicago & East, Charlie Rossiter. The rule here is 2 poems, not always obeyed, one in each round.

In the absence of an actual sign-up list on an actual clipboard Charlie asks for volunteers, so I ended up first; this is the season of baseball playoffs, & the World Series, so I read 2 baseball poems, “October Land” which is a pastiche based on T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land;” then in the 2nd round a poem, based on a chant by Frederico Garcia Lorca, that has little to do with baseball except I mention the Chicago White Sox, “I’m Going to Chicago.”

Jim Madigan dials in from Charlie’s former town of Oak Park, IL, a suburb of Chicago, with a different take on Homer (which Jim noted is a baseball term), “Odysseus & the Sirens;” in round 2, sticking with the baseball theme, he read one titled “America’s Favorite Pastime” with a history of Cubs baseball.

Kenn Ash began with meandering poetic words on time, then squeezed in a 2nd one; then in round 2 another poetic meandering by someone else & a song he wrote, “I just had fight with my head …” on using a prescription for someone else.

Bridget’s piece was “trying out words” in a wintery sky, with a murder of crows; in the 2nd round, “a little sketch” which was indeed very short.

Bill Thwing in his first round read from from one of my favorite books of ancient Chinese poetry, The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain, translated by Red Pine, Han Shan’s poem #100 pondering life & death, then reads his own 5 haiku; in round 2 he brought out his guitar to sing an anti-Trump song on COVID-19, oxycontin, etc, “A Ride on a Hurricane.”

 

Our host, Charlie Rossiter, read from from his 2007 book, The Night We Danced with the Raelettes (Foothills Publishing), “Defiantly Undeclared” a poem from his college days; in his 2nd go around another poem from his past, this a descriptive piece about  a character on the beach in Vancouver carving Totem poles, “People Have to Live.”

Tom Nicotera read seasonal poems in both rounds, in the 1st a ghost poem “Green Lady Burlington CT;” in the 2nd, a Halloween poem titled “A Clove of Garlic,” from his experience of working at the School of the Deaf.

Always an interesting night of poetry “in Bennington” on Zoom on the 2nd Tuesday of each month. If you are not on Charlie’s preferred list, send him an email at charliemrossiter@gmail.com & he’ll send you the link. I hope to see you there.

 

2nd Sunday @ 2: Poetry + Prose, October 10

The mushrooms keep growing, the poems keep being written, & the poets keep showing up for the open mic. & Nancy Klepsch & I keep on being the co-hosts.

First on the open mic list was Rhonda Rosenheck, who read one of her “crime” poems as she did last month, sounding more like a “revenge poem,” in rhyme with Biblical references “Hoarding Death,” then an old, untitled poem she recently uncovered. Cheryl A. Rice made the drive up from Kingston with her partner Michael, her first poem, according to my less-than-adequate notes, was about “fish — as fish?” then a love poem about when she met Michael years ago during one of the Albany Word Fests, “Morning Has a Life of Its Own.” 

Our host here in Collar City Mushrooms, Avery Stempel, read a poem titled “A Single Crow” that he intends to paint in an upcoming workshop here, then a poem just written, “Thursday,” about all the things not done when Thursday comes around again.  Sue Oringel was glad to be back out at an IPR (in-person reading), read “Dirt” an ode, then a pantoum playing on the differences/inferences of “May Day.” Joel Best read only one piece, an intricate word-mix about forgetting titled “Last in Series.”

Tina Mazula returned, said she was reading some random notebook jottings from thinking about writing, then stopped to read a more finished piece, “Words,” a list poem of modifiers to the word “word,” then returned to her original jottings. My co-host Nancy Klepsch began with a draft rant about “America …” sounding a lot like Allen Ginsberg’s poem of that title, then one about art (& the lack of renumeration), based on a Fran Leibowitz bon mot “Artifice, or they Clap for the Money.” & I followed with a Halloween piece “Zombie Gourd,” then a short riff on “Troy.”

Julie Lomoe read a couple of seasonal pieces, an eco-poem titled “Abnormal Autumn,” & one about scaring away the neighborhood kids “Halloween Crone.” Therese Broderick began with a descriptive piece about “Rest Stop Near Exit 34,” then one titled “Gatha for the Cat.” Tim Verhaegen joined us this month with a tender piece about a conversation with his long-term boyfriend just before he died “My Bones,” then an effusive celebration of football “Heroes.”

Laura Ellzey drove over from Vermont & brought with her a couple of her “calligraphy poems,” Dumpster Kitten” written for her mother’s cat, & one written to tabulate how much of her life has been filled with poetry, “Poetry Entered In.” One could tell that Linda was the youngest poet on the sign-up sheet since she read her poems from her phone, the first about walking in the snow & thinking of depression, & another untitled one about her love of thunderstorms.

The poet who signed in as Za Za said that it has been 8 years since she read her poetry out, indeed I remember her from the early 2000s at open mics in Albany, she read an August poem “Tree Rat,” then a tender, nostalgic, untitled piece about not having any photos of her with a past lover. Naomi Bindman also made the trip from Vermont, began with a short poem, “Pendent,” inspired by Avery’s poem, then an excerpt titled “Circle of Healing,” mixing in images of her daughter’s childhood, her own hypnosis session, & her daughter’s fatal car accident in the rain, from a longer memoir.

Phew! a grand mix of styles, genres, moods, modes — the variety that makes community open mics so exhilarating. We gather here among the mushrooms at Collar City Mushrooms, 333 2nd Ave., Troy, NY, on the 2nd Sunday of each month at 2:00PM, open to the public, free (but donations appreciated for the mushroom themed snacks).