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Slam/Poetry/Slam All of us have tucked away, hopefully in a locked box, poetry written when we were callow youths full of raging hormones, indignation and seriously unrequited love. It’s not clear why we have the urge to keep it, but every decade or so we pull it out, read it, shake our heads sadly and then lock it back up. Perhaps we keep it to remind ourselves of what happens when we take life too seriously – we look and sound like idiots. My favorite poets, and there’s not a lot of them, are e. e. cummings and Sam Shepard. They are short, sweet and to the point. Get in, get out and leave an impression. I’d like to be one of those people that read Byron or Seamus Haney on the subway, slowly savoring page after page after page of verse, but I just don’t have the temperament or the time. I’d rather read a novel. Even so, it’s not like I keep e. e. cummings by my bedside and flip through a few poems before bed with my reading glasses hooked at the end of my nose. Yes, I’ve written poetry. And, yes, I’ve even read it in public. Don’t hate me. I was young. I was stoned and most probably drunk at the time. Which isn’t to excuse the pain I inflicted on those who listened to it. I was going to call them innocent bystanders, but there’s nothing innocent about it. There’s a certain masochism involved to willingly listen other people reading their poetry. My first brush was in my early twenties, shortly after I moved to Boston. I’d been writing some “killer” poetry (meaning that the people I forced to read it wanted to kill themselves afterward) and felt that the world might be ready for the power that my words held. Leafing through the once underground Boston Phoenix, I found a poets’ group (what do you call a group of poets? An Enclave of Poets? A Depression Of Poets?) which met weekly. My big break! I sat down at my typewriter, rewrote and retyped my poems with the zeal of Rasputin. They met on Boylston St in Copley Sq. I’m not sure what I was expecting to find. Maybe some high-backed leather chairs, white wine and Brie and, naturally, a sign welcoming me into the fold. What I found was four beat up folding tables, three fluorescent lights at the end of their life cycle and a bunch of people that I could not relate to. And they forgot the sign, too. I swallowed my disappointment and sat down. They were friendly enough and we all introduced ourselves. It’s tempting to gloss over the people in the room that night. Living just outside of Cambridge, mentioning the word “poet” would seem to be enough to describe them. And, truthfully, I have only vague recollections of them. There was the dumpy woman with the wild white hair and huge glasses in her middle sixties. There was the dumpy man with the wild white hair and huge glasses in his middle sixties. There were a few shy and mild looking men and women in their forties. And the leader, a man I only remember had a well trimmed beard. The only strong memory I have was of a guy named Fast Eddie. Fast Eddie was in his late twenties and was there to push the boundaries. He was there to cause trouble and to shake things up. Part performance artist, part anarchist, part asshole, his goal was to piss people off. His poetry was full of profanity and graphic sex. One poem was about him masturbating. It was anti-poetry. Poetry that explicitly proclaimed that it wasn’t poetry and that poetry was worthless. At one meeting, he arrived with a shopping bag full of magazines. “This bag contains things the Government doesn’t want you to see,” he proclaimed as he turned the bag upside down. Spilling out of it came about 15-20 porno magazines, all of fat people fucking. He picked one up and opened it, displaying the photos of grotesquely obese men and women having the most explicit sex their girth would allow. He spouted off what I already knew to be a Lenny Bruce routine about how a movie about killing people is less taboo than a movie about people having sex. I found it slightly amusing, but I was the only one. Several women calmly left the room. The funniest thing about it was watching these poets, dedicated to free speech and free ideas, trying to come to grips such a blatant assault on taste. To reprimand him would validate what he was saying. To not reprimand him meant to endure the sight of two six hundred people graphically going at it. What’s a liberal to do? In the name of freedom, they had to let him continue. Unfortunately, he was more insane than clever, so the whole show fell rather flat. My poetry was well received, but they obviously didn’t “get it”. I dropped out a few weeks later. Somewhat disillusioned by my lack of success, I found a locked box, threw my poems in and pseudo-concentrated on something else. That’s not to say I stopped writing bad poetry. I realized that in order for people to hear my poetry I had to listen to theirs. And I just couldn’t do that. Poetry Slams. The name itself begs for ridicule. “DUUUUUUUDE! You GOTTA hear this POET, man, he’s unFUCKINGbelievable! He’s got this allegorical piece that’ll knock you on you fucking ASS, man!” “OH MY GOD!!! She signed my DREAM BOOK!!” Ladies and Gentlemen, Fast Eddie has left the café. No longer is bad poetry confined to dingy, poorly lit rooms that takes true dedication to find. It’s become (or used to be) fashionable. Everyone with a computer or even a typewriter could participate and compete. Yes, poetry became a competitive sport. And while the Depression of Poets that I joined wrote poetry about themselves and their interior lives, Poetry Slam poets (I wonder if that needs a Trademark next to it) in my experience seem to be about politics and outrage. The culture of “poet” has changed. Perhaps this is a function of the dreaded “political correctness.” Art=sensitivity=left-wing. So maybe, as he often should be, Reagan is to blame for the shift in poetry. If Reagan hadn’t been elected people wouldn’t have felt so threatened and the politically correct movement would have never happened. It really is shocking that a president who tripled the deficit, ok’d Iran-Contra and greatly increased the disparity of wealth in this country can be considered a great man. But I digress… Where was I? Reagan is an asshole. Oops! Let me try that again. Poetry slams suck. That’s right. I’m back on track. The scary thing is that to be in a poetry slam or the even more ridiculous Open Mike Poetry Night, is that your politics MUST be in line with those around you. I wrote a song commenting that if you followed all the boycotts, you would be unable to eat unless you grew your own food. Not particularly original, but amusing. I’d been struggling with my music, which I’d always done under the guise of stand-up comedy. I hated doing the actual stand-up part and wanted to see if the music would stand on it’s own. The lyrics are always wordy and some of my favorite songs get lost because people weren’t really listening. As an experiment, I went to an Open Mike Poetry/Music night at a loft downtown. I felt uncomfortable as soon I as walked in. I had no bandana, no sandals, no Peruvian vest and I was smoking Marlboro’s not Cloves. I signed up and got assigned a late spot, which was only fair because they had no idea who I was or what I did. I waited patiently listening to any number of political diatribes disguised as poems. Then came my turn. My boycott song received thundering silence. “Wow,” droned the MC, “Always nice to have the Young Republicans here.” My jaw dropped. I have been called a great many things but never a republican. In the bastion of Freedom, dissent will not be tolerated. I gave up poetry nights right there. But somehow, they seemed to find me. If you don’t drink liquor then you don’t really want to go to bars. So if you want to meet a friend to talk you’re pretty much left with coffeehouses. And if you don’t want to support StarFucks and the like there’s only one kind of coffeehouse you can go to. And those usually have random poetry nights. And it was one such night that I’d met a friend for coffee. We’d gotten together around 7pm and were having a lovely talk when an ominous “Check 1 2 Checkkk Chhhheckkkk” filled the air. We looked over to see the sound system being set up. “What’s that,” I asked? “Beats me,” he said, “Music?” “Dunno.” We continued talking and blocked out the intrusion. About a half hour later, the talking became louder. “Oh, fuck,” I moaned. “What,” he asked. “Poetry Night.” “Damn.” “Yeah.” “We’ll just move back a little.” So we did. The poets’ words were not powerful enough to stop us from continuing our chat. Snippets would poke through every once in a while. The tone was mostly “don’t oppress me” “I am free” and “you can’t keep me down.” Every now and again, I noticed a short round little man with a beret and a graying beard darting through the crowd looking like the bastard son on Emma Goldman. He’d lean over a table say something and move on. My friend and I were starting to crack each other up over something (probably the poetry) when he appeared at our table and mumbled something. “What,” I said, “I didn’t hear you.” “The poets’,” he repeated gravely, “are reading.” I was dumbstruck. Was he really saying what I thought he was? This couldn’t really be happening. “And…,” I asked leadingly. He took a moment to compose himself. Surely I knew what he was saying. It was rude of me to make him spell it out. “And,” he chastised, “You’re being a little loud.” Oh, that wasn’t something to say to someone who’d just had four cups of coffee in the space of an hour. “I’m being too loud,” I started, “and I’m not letting the poet’s be heard, is that right?” “Paullll,” my friend said, “don’t start.” “Just a sec,” I said shaking him off, “I won’t. I just want him to know that they have a sound system and we don’t.” My friend shooed Emma Goldman’s spawn away and we continued our chat, though the topic had changed. An hour later, we were ready to leave and the poets were taking a break. “Wait up a sec,” I said to my friend, “I just gotta talk to this guy for a sec.” “Don’t do it,” he moaned, “just let it go. It’s not worth it.” “Oh, it’s worth it,” I said. The fire was in my belly. I marched up to the Grey Beret. “Hi,” I said. He gave me half a friendly smile. “I just wanted to talk to you for a minute about freedom.” “Okay,” he said, a little suspiciously. “See, most of the poetry that I caught seemed to be about freedom and being free and the evils of oppression, right?” “Most of it, I guess.” “And yet…and yet in the midst of all of this talk of freedom and free speech, you found it acceptable to come up to our table and tell us to STOP TALKING even though we were here before you even showed up. How’s does that fit with freedom?” His eyes narrowed and his nostrils literally flared. “You’re an ASSHOLE,” he growled at me, “An asshole! These poets deserve to be heard and you were so loud that people were having trouble hearing them.” “So what you’re saying,” I said calmly, “is that your freedom and the freedom of the people you like is more important than my freedom. Did I get that right?” “McCarthy-ite!!,” he shouted unexpectedly. Where he pulled that from I’m at a loss to explain. I wasn’t accusing him of being a Communist…quite the opposite. I couldn’t help laughing. “I’d say that you were the McCarthy-ite for prosecuting those that don’t believe what you believe. Are you now or have you ever talked during poetry night?” “It’s just like the Nazi’s,” he spat, grasping for yet another clichéd metaphor to describe the evil I was perpetrating. I hadn’t heard him read, but I was guessing he was a bad poet. “Look, I’m not calling you names and I’m really not trying to be an asshole,” I said evenly although I was slightly lying. “I really want to know why you think it’s ok to shut people up in the name of free speech.” He called me some more names and my friend who stood by bemused and shaking his head at me pulled me away. “C’mon,” he sighed, “Gimme a ride home.” “Do I have a choice in the matter,” I smiled. “No,” he said. There’s a group of people that would deny your access to certain kinds of art. There’s another group that would force it down your throat. Both extremes will become violent when provoked, which makes them somewhat the same. Maybe the next crop of poets will solve this problem. Until then, keep your box locked, but don’t lose the key. Special Bad Poetry Addendum This Poem Will not be read This Poem Will not be written The Powers That Be Will not allow it To live They will kill This Poem Before it has Lived Such is the power of This Poem So I beg you Read This Poem Send This Poem To the masses Let them read This Poem That is not written Before they kill This Poem Only in this way can This Poem Which they have killed Live |