Dan McCloskey wears a wig, hunches over, dictates a letter to himself describing the infestation of maine lobsters in his house and the 32 corgis he buys to root them out, as part of his "Little Known Predators" short story series. Caitlin Bender has lengthy poems about experiencing diseases, from an up-close and not impersonal or overstructured vibe, at one point turns her body away from the mike and kind of speaks out of the corner of her mouth. Adrienne Jouver has a long and notable poem about being a Patient Escort at an abortion clinic. Raiona Gaydos reads in the stead of Laura Warman, a piece re: body images for women, being used only for sex, working out at the gym, in an obsessive, close-cropped composition I originally interpreted as a performance-art interpretation of an identity "Laura Warman", but Laura turned out to be a real person who just couldn't be there tonight. Nils Balls projected some of his graphic art and read it aloud to us, which was (not surprisingly, for Nils) enjoyable.
I wore a big white sweater and went with my twin. I drank two beers and had to pee bad for most of the last act (Dan's). Caitlin Bender thought I was waving at her when I was really waving at my twin brother.
Bender's poetry was really enjoyable and good and in that "contemporary" style I like so much. Literary in the sense that it's free verse and complex and goes a bunch of different places and innovates and makes jokes but not in the sense that it's inscrutable or boring. She doesn't do other poetry though! She's a musician, normally she doesn't read. "If it doesn't turn into a song--".
links:
nils balls comics: http://www.skeletonballs.com/
dan mccloskey comix: http://danielmccloskey.com/
caitlin bender's punk band: https://calyxpgh.bandcamp.com/
--poetryburgh@gmail.com
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