June 9th Slam -- And What My Relationship to Slam Poetry Is, Again

You know what's cool in Pittsburgh? The Slam Poetry community... Specifically known as: The Pittsburgh Poetry Collective. They run weekly slams and monthly workshops... I have to get these on my calendar.

I've attended only one other slam event before, and it was in the same format as this one: up to eight poets read poems in three rounds; each poem is judged by random audience members using a rating between zero and ten. The winner receives a $25 prize. The event this week was enthusiastically hosted by Slammaster Lori Beth Jones.

I was one of the randomly selected audience members to judge. I gave both high and low scores; in the first round I thought I was only going to give everyone 5's and 7.5's, but by the end I had handed out at least one 9. Slam poetry is unignorable. The poets put a lot of emotion and energy and preparation into their performance; and being able to deliver a good performance is one of the essential bases of the art, unlike in (for lack of a better term) "literary" poetry. There were several gripping performances the night I attended-- the highlight goes to the contest winner, Rhetorical Arts, who was able to deliver an intense & loud anger without ever losing the pace or clarity of their poems, covering topics including their own chidhood autism diagnosis ("they said autistic, when they should have said artistic") and troubles with depression (central metaphor: sharing a [relation-]ship with their disease, understanding that they have to live with it... but if it won't cooperate, they will starve it).

I'm at odds with the social justice and positivity that slam promotes. The emotional reality of what is being said comes through to me, but there's always a righteous moral positioning that I do not vibe with. At the Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange workshop earlier this month, Joseph Karas discussed how he always looked for poetry "which does not spare the writer." In that vein, I don't think the slam I've heard was composed with that kind of self-destructive tendency that I appreciate. This may be from the genre expectations: slam is still considered to be a community-building resource, a venue for positive social messages, while "literary" poetry has the benefit of being a mostly defunct mode of art. --poetryburgh@gmail.com

Millvale Mash-- Grist House Brewing

The Millvale Mash is an monthly open-mic run by my friend Adam Dove. Adam also runs the Writer's Workshop hosted at the Millvale Library; so I have to check that out too.

I had no idea Adam was a part of this, so it was a pleasant surprise to meet him at the event. Grist House Brewing is lovely: there's a large porch that merges into the bar which merges into the brewery itself. It's intimate and the crowd is local and friendly. During the Mash, it was raining outside sporadically, and the pirates game was playing in the background; when it wasn't raining here it was raining on the Pirates downtown.

I was the only poetry act; luckily, I killed it. I met a group of people incl. Adam's friends and Anita Kulina Smith, a kind of local historian; we had some great talks about the early days of Greenfield where there were apparently gangs outside of every store, which makes sense, because that neighborhood has always felt like a reformed gangland to me. Notable acts included Kim Sedlock reading her story about adultery-tempted skiers, Amy Dean playing a Japanese flute with a cover of El Condor Pasa, and Adam and his friend nailing a Mewithoutyou and Coco Rose cover. The night ended with a group performance of "You Can't Always Get What You Want."

I'm thinking about moving to Millvale. It's closer to the city than I thought, it's dirt cheap and it's beautiful. A valley neighborhood... tree enclosed, it feels so isolated and quiet... and Mr. Smalls is right there! --poetryburgh@gmail.com

Missed West Word b/c I've got flu... here's some thoughts on community

The dream of an imaginary community that allows total identification with one’s role within it to an extent that rules out interiority or doubt, the fixity and clearness of an external image or cliche as opposed to ephemera of lived experience, a life as it looks from the outside.

—Stephen Murphy

I'm fine admitting this blog is more of a self-care action, in a lot of ways, it's me searching for a community to inhabit with my poetry... but this goes along with a lot of what I understand poetry does: self-care... those at the Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange were talking about how poetry can be written just for the writer, how it doesn't have to be for an audience... and those at the Hour after Happy Hour were talking about how there are "more poets than poetry readers." It's an odd central thing w/ poetry: it's easy to write a poem, but not exactly guaranteed to be enjoyable to listen to: it's a cliche that poetry is bad. 

I'd like it if poetry was not bad. The central question of this blog is, how can poetry be [fun, punk, sexy, exciting == good]? Right now, in answering those questions, I'm hung up on communities. This is partially attributable to the lesson behind the quote above: I'm looking for the imaginary community that guarantees fun/punk/sexy/exciting poetry, along with commensurate fun/punk/sexy/exciting people. Think of the Beats, or the Modernist writers, or the popular image of artists in general; think of 'Midnight in Paris'.

As the quote suggests, though, this search for a perfect community is a trap. It is an attempt to displace personal pressures onto exterior social pressures; "someday I will find the right people for me."

I've been saying this repeatedly so I think I'll just come out and state that the purpose of this blog is not to "find the perfect community" but to learn as much about Pittsburgh's poetry communities as I can, for my own and for the reader's education. --poetryburgh@gmail.com

PRETTY OWL POETRY @ CLASSIC LINES /// Hour After Happy Hour Followup

Today's post is transcribed from the notes of my twin who visited Classic Lines's Pretty Owl Poetry Spotlight Series today. I was at The Hour After Happy Hour Workshop, who reviewed and trashed my poetry. They said it didn't connect with them! for the most part. I get it.

Reading at the Spotlight Series were: Deena November, Kazumi Chin, Dakota R. Garilli, and Dan Nowak. Here's Rob (my twin)'s notes:

Deena:
"Dickwad" (the title of Deena's chapbook -ed) is from a graffiti (sic) on a bathroom stall- where all wisdom comes from. Her poetry is ephemeral & familiar with the grossness of life, while holding back little, including alcoholics, sex w/ 15 yr olds, being a mean mom. Her voice is subtlety poetry voice, almost too quiet, although her piece about birthing was very pushy.

Kazumi:
Entertaining, enthusiastically bashing race politics. Really he seems alienated by his body due to him understanding his own whiteness. He uses his hands to tell us the meter, and enthusiastically sways. He makes beautiful metaphors while staying political. Mostly he could write less but it's not his style. He is telling these beautiful stories that mostly are about hate & alienation. Funny though, & he has obsessions with Ariana Grande.

Dakota:
Nonfiction writer turned poet --a queer poet, not that it matters. He has a sense of humor that's quiet. His poems are sexual, tantalizingly so- while his masculinity keeps it in check. His voice is powerful, measured & aware of the tension in his poetry. People know not to laugh, yet they sit; encaptured by his words. His brevity at times leads to cliche & often it ends without flourish, but with a whimper.

Dan Nowak:
In the introduction, he asked the person reading his bio to lie about him. Then he told us he did that. He thinks he is reading a storybook, but he's forgotten to show us the pages. His voice fails to capture the weight of what's being said. He's funny though, he can talk about armadillos & leprosy.

Thanks to Rob Webb for that --poetryburgh@gmail.com

The Haven // Squirrel Hill Workshop @ Hem's

I spent part of last night at Lou's Little Corner Bar w/ The Haven people and the rest of it at Hem's for the readers from The Squirrel Hill Poetry Workshop (or: the Squirrels).

The Haven: the group this week was four people not including me. It's an intimate space and they mostly workshop fiction, while drinking much beer and smoking a little pot, in the back porch of Lou's. Not much else to report besides that... I only stayed for ~30 minutes.

The Squirrell Hill Poetry Workshop: all the readers were either wearing orange or supposed to be wearing orange, in recognition of the issue of gun violence. There were about 13 readers! It was a long show! From what I've read Karen Lillis write about putting together a show, you probably should only have four or five; the event dragged, man! That's not to say the readers weren't good. There was a consistently high level of skill. Here are some of their last lines:

"Love is the loser in tennis, doesn't fare well in life either."
"Consider how even the most decisive action is mimicry"
"No longer chasing illusions of love/ I have had 20 years to value yours"
"We take things, not just because we have no money, but because we have parts missing."
"I regret nothing in my life, except I didn't stay in Paris with that other man"
"What is history but war? The rest is punctuation."
(Ann Curran, Erin Garstka, Christine Doreian Michaels, Rosaly DeMaios Roffman, Joanne Samraney, & Shirley Stevens)

Ziggy Edwards had a killer poem about Hansel & Gretel in space, and all of Shirley Stevens' poems were brutal. --poetryburgh@gmail.com

Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange--- the workshop @ brentwood library

Brentwood library is like a mile down Brownsville Rd and there's a poster about the "persecuted church" of Christianity above the waterfountain but it's a nice building located next to a nice high school campus with an outdoor street hockey rink. The workshop took place in the rec room below the library, a large basement-but-above-ground space full of book sale books, fooseball and air hockey tables and other churchy parephenalia that was very cozy. Does the PPE have ties to the church? Their second-to-last reading was at the South Side Presbyterian, albeit their latest one was at Hemingway's, so for now it's only my sneaking suspicion...

The group this week was 13 people, ages 60+ with a handful of exceptions, myself included. They are a delightful. intelligent, and capable group of workshoppers; informed digressions, such as the etymology of "normalcy" (at length!), were not uncommon. Michael Wurster is the bon roi of the group, hosting and contributing to and leading discussion; his work always goes last, and he is the only writer to actively defend his work, but he is pleasant and educated and fair and a great leader for the group.

The format is: everyone brings 16 copies of a poem to distribute during their turn and reads the poem aloud, once. Then everyone else gives feedback from that alone. Many workshops rely on email lists and the like to give everyone a chance to prepare responses, but the PPE does analysis by first impression. This gives the workshop a somewhat looser feel, a somewhat more informal and even playing field; everyone has to live by their wits so to speak and can only give the advice that is obvious enough to be formulated in a few minute's time. It also takes away the pressure of reading work before the event.

There was a mix of poems I personally liked and some I did not like; the group neither reserved judgement on controversial poems nor displayed passive-aggression or cruelty. There were strong opinions and tensions, particularly regarding one poem about elephant poaching, but those involved were mature enough to keep everything honest and respectable. It think it's the advantage of having an older group of people, that kind of maturity and above-the-board honesty, as well as the sheer education and experience; but there was also a great deal of energy in the room, it felt very productive.

I presented & read, too, and everyone loved my poem. My work, I think, was the least conventional of the bunch, I'd posit, so that might be both a) the thing distinguishing me from the group and b) the thing I'm bringing to the group... so often I feel like these two points are in conflict, I'm always looking for a group of poets who write like me who I can commiserate with... leveraging my own individuality against communities. What occurs to me is the advice given to me by members of the Haven last week: "you're looking for what you can get from the scene instead of what you can contribute." A continuing dilemma for poetryburgh... I'm going to go see the Haven ppl again tonight for their formal workshop and maybe some of the Hem's reading, so you'll hear about that --poetryburgh@gmail.com

Ben Gwin, Jennifer Bannan, Ben Stein, Michael T. Fournier @ East End

Host Karen Lillis introduced the night as "three novelists and a poet"; the poet was Ben Stein. Ben Stein reads with a lilting thick and high voice, and his poems covered everyday topics; many of these poems were from a collection of "Sunday Poems"; he and long-distance friends would send each other poems on Sunday.

"Either this cat think he's laundry,
or the half-empty hamper
is too warm to pass up"
- from "Apartment"

Ben Gwin and Michael Fournier both read fiction, in a way that really turns my dials: clear enunciation, slow and measured, stories about "fucking" or in the case of Mike, fast food service and "punching people in the face." All emotional rumination in their stories happened more or less in the context of action, and in simple-ish sentences. Mike did the voices of some of the characters-- these are all the qualities I would look for in performed poetry, a kind of conservancy of words, making an emotional impact with only a few tools. Plus they were both thirty-something-plus deep-voiced writers, reading stories about blunt subject matter, which as I said are just some things that I go for. And I'll honor that:  the writing that appeals to you immediately is the stuff that gets to the meat of what writing can be in our world.

I talked to Karen Lillis after the show in what was one of my most productive blog-network-conversations yet. She talked about composing and promoting readings, the trick thereof being inviting writers from several different "cliques", therefore bringing in several different audiences. Poetry in PGH is apparently made of "weird little bubbles" of people (this quote overheard from Ben Gwin in an adjacent convo). As I expressed to Karen, "it would be great for me [poetryburgh] just to know about all of those cliques." So, if anything, that's one good use of the blog part of this blog: I can verbally detail these different groups, come up with good ways of describing them, share my thoughts, document them, maybe make them a little less disparate, as Karen was doing.

I'm going to the Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange workshop tonight, as I said I would, so I'll have more to share on that group of people and their sensibilities. --poetryburgh@gmail.com