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Sunday, May 17,
1998
Last night I had the best time I've had in awhile. I went
to my first San Francisco Poetry Slam at Cafe du Nord. Mary Anne met me
at work(they let me off early, the sweeties), but I was on break and my
watchslowed down, so I ended up making us run really late. However, even
thoughwe got there a good 45 minutes after the final sign-up time, I still
got tosign up to read. Mary Anne, well, chickened out. Which was
probably agood thing, as it lets her judge the scene and be prepared and
polishedwhen she finally does take the stage. Me? Oh, well, I was brash,
thinkingthat since I was a big fish in a small pond in the Indy poetry
scene, Ishould do swell here. And I will, I just got extremely nervous as
I tookthe stage (they drew my number SECOND! Argh!). I stuttered out the
lamestnon-intro and started into a poem that was rather lacking in
subtlty. Ithought I'd hit them over the head or something. Whoops. The
crowd was abit smarter than that. I got a decent score (22.2), but it as
hardlyclose to the winner (27.3). Oh, well. Live, learn and change my
workschedule so I can start attending regularly. There were some awesome
poetsin the slam. There was a romantic poem about nature and yellow by a
womannamed G. L. from Oregon. I thought it from Willa Cather's
predispositionto relate the color yellow to sex, but when I talked to her
later, I foundout that no, she was referring to the Emily Dickinson poem
about yellowbeing nature's favorite (rarest?) color. There was also a
really cool poemby Cass (who won) about his haze-filled pot-smokin' days
as a student. Hecalled a J an L, but other than that regional difference,
I think everycollege student could relate to his smooth voice describing
through thememory of a confused daze. What else? Oh, a poem that
started with astrong idea (and a bit of song) about Gertrude Stein being a
Top. I feltthat one wandered too far away, and it ended up being about
Critical Mass.I think she switched poems in the middle, it was so strange
to me.
And then, then, there was the bartender. No, she didn't read,
but she madeMartinis in the sexiest way I've ever seen. I love deftness.
She was alsoblond, with a beauty mark and an attitude, and I felt
deliciously podunkasking her for my beer. Yes, eventually I ordered a
Martini (aBeefeater's, trying to impress a little), even though they take
too long todrink as they're so *strong*.
After the slam is the Poetry
Bout, where last week's winner of the slamcompetes head-to-head against
last week's Bout champion. It was Eitan(pronounced A-Tan, I think)
"8-Ball" Kadosh vs. Tarin "Top Shelf" Towers.Wow. Eitan read a poem about
dating a 27 year old woman who would let himdo everything but see, touch,
caress or taste her breasts. He was so*cute*, Mary Anne and I practically
cooed at him from the front row. Tarinis a strong poet, and the one of
hers that sticks in my mind is her sad onedescribing the difference
between lonely (temporary) and lonesome (trulyalone) to her little 10 year
old sister. I'm a sucker for sisterpoems.
Afterwards, MA and I ran
into G.L. and then the host, Charles, at aTaqueria down the street. It
was fab, talking about poetry life (I'lladmit I was a bit jealous that I
didn't have a book to whip out like MA,but oh, well). MA and I mentioned
we had to public transit it back to theEast Bay when Charles, who lives in
Rockridge, offered us a ride. What asweety. He has the coolest little
bug named Lucy, and it was afun-but-noisy ride back to the East Bay. I
don't know how to work in thefact that he called the sky "Maxfield Parish
Blue".
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