Five Ones equals poetry and fresh food at Canessa

Food, Drink, Poetry: This Way!

Saturday was the second time I was able to make it to the Canessa Gallery Reading Series curated by Erica Lewis at 708 Montgomery St (near Columbus). I had such a good time the first outing (which was actually the 13th installment) that I made sure to go directly home and put the 14th on my calendar. I'm usually not good about following up on things like that, and even if an event does magically make its way to my calendar that doesn't mean I'll actually go. In fact, I usually don't. Things come up, I have work to do. Maybe I'm just exhausted or absolutely broke.

Warm and Intimate

The last excuse doesn't cut it at Canessa. For only $5 you can get a full-fledged meal—and that's not to mention three poets reading original, inspired stuff. Red and white wines sit, still corked, on the table—not left over from last time, trust me!—half a dozen quality wedges of cheese, fresh figs, hummus, pita, brocolli crowns—it goes on and on. Coffee, tea—even decaf. Canessa has you covered, and if you're "too poor" to pay even $5 for a poetry reading, consider whether you're rich enough to turn down a fresh five dollar meal. Huh? Call poetry bonus and feed belly and soul.

Cynthia Sailers 

The three readers Saturday were Julien Poirier, Cynthia Sailers, and Jaqueline Waters. The following biographies are from Canessa.

Julien Poirier started in San Francisco in 1970, grew a few inches in Berkeley (he lives there now) and then moved to New York City, where he went to school, taught poetry and other things to public school kids in the 5 boroughs, helped start Ugly Duckling Presse, and edited New York Nights newspaper to make endless war stink worse. His books include Absurd Good News (Insert Press), Zoco Harpo (Gneiss Press) and the newspaper novella Living! Go and Dream (UDP).

Cynthia Sailers is writing a dissertation on perversion and group psychology. She is currently in private practice as a therapist in San Francisco as well as working at a publicly funded clinic at the Mission. She serves on the board for Small Press Traffic and is expecting a second book out soon from CyPress.

Jacqueline Waters is the author of a book, A Minute without Danger (Adventures in Poetry), and a chapbook, The Garden of Eden a College (A Rest Press). Recent work has appeared in No: A Journal of the Arts and Zoland Poetry. She is an editor of The Physiocrats, a new pamphlet press.

The room was packed. Literally, I think some people had to stand. To hear Erica tell it, she wasn't expecting to make it nearly this far in the series. I think it was only intended for a one-time event. But ever since the success of that initial reading the gallery has invited three writers each month to focus on a specific topic. This months' was the un/familiar.

I think the theme is a great idea. It's always enlightening to watch different creative people set about the same task in their own peculiar ways. I was thrown a little off-balance, however, by the differences in these three authors' execution. Julien was always stretching his self-analyses and even his humor to fit the theme. It was a little too much though, and I think his reading suffered for it. His poems were mostly impulsive flights of language with a sharp, surprising ending. Sometimes to good effect. He claimed to have written a couple of the poems that very day, and I would like to offer this advice right now: if you ever give a reading of any kind, do not confess that you just finished a poem, that, in fact, you just started it; automatically I do not want to hear your poem because it can't possibly mean very much to you. Julien's language is intoxicating, and I was left to wonder what these poems could yet become. I have immensely enjoyed this old audio clip I found of Julien reading at The Bowery Poetry Club in New York.

Cynthia was quite the opposite of Julien in many ways. She is obviously a hard worker, is organized, and has an appreciation for heavy but sensitive thought, but her all-too detached narration of sex obsession was too dispassionate for my liking. Maybe because I was expecting poetry, but it felt as though her heart was not invited to this discussion on sex. She referenced Freud several times, and other psychiatrists ... which is fine. At a science fair. But if you're going to talk about sex and not disappoint then you'd better be shocking. Because physical contact is shocking. I have no problem with analytical musings—they just don't resonate well in a room set for poetry. There was too much 'is this OK. Is this wrong.' Poetry is not about morals, it's about feeling. She said the following: "... to examine myself and why I'm constantly writing in ways that no one can understand. That is: why you do not want to communicate your ideas." I appreciate this line because I want to be clear but I also want to have some esprit to my writing, and spirit often twists and is erratic and far from clear. It's OK not to know sometimes and to try to express that. And I think that's the allure to being obscure, unclear, esoteric: it represents a desire to communicate and understand what is not clear and not understood. The stronger our opinions the more blind we are, really, to other things, and it dawned on me while listening to Cynthia that poetry depends on perspective, depends on blindness to bloom. Her writing bent toward illumination (how dare her!), but because of that I think it would have been more rewarding to read.

After a short break for smokers and chronic nibblers Jaqueline spoke with feeling and even reserve, embarrassed or silenced by the respect she had for her own words. She spoke quietly but with force, and her control of language and form was very impressive. She was able to speak directly to the reader (or audience) without abandoning the world of poetry—this is the most important aspect of a reading because the connection is infinitely more fragile in real space than it is naked but cemented on the page. And it's a chance for the author to add a layer of meaning to the words by revealing what they mean to her. The room was still in the way that rooms get when someone who doesn't usually speak up has the floor. I will be doing a feature on Jaqueline and The Physiocrats soon.

I will most certainly return to Canessa. Erica and her husband (forgive me, I've forgotten his name) are very sweet and have put together a very cozy atmosphere for the word-hog who still likes to have a few hours of Saturday night for something else. We were well-fed, calm, and slightly enlightened—not to mention out the door—by 10:30. For five bucks, what else do you want—a tee shirt?

Last month's readers were Giovanni Singleton, Cedar Sigo, and Linda Norton. You can read more about that event here. October's theme, "location/exchange," will be addressed by Stephanie Young, Dana Ward, and Allie Warren on the 17th.