Report from 4th June...

By David
Photos by Marie De Lutz

Shane, last seen somewhere near the Bois de VIncennes.

Round 1:

Dareka spoke the language of asteroids. He co-hosts the poetry night at the Downtown, 46 rue Jean-Pierre Timbaud, Mondays - check it out, it's like a parallel universe in which we're all French).Benjamin brought us the planet of the flakes. The comedy sketches show he's in is on this Wednesday at the Petit Theatre du Bonheure, (info here). Melanie: the glowing butter brilliance of the waxing moon. Pablo... drags your body into a bathful of ink. David (me!): heart is slow, heart is quick. Pat Cash was full of demons, dawn, gods... Celine: no bit can keep her tongue quiet. Apparently this was a response to me asking her previously ''What do you do with your tongue when you're not using it?'' Kate: archery and silicon; revealing the past is dangerous.

The moment when Helen has her big idea about castration 

Round 2:
Nicole plunged into the abyss of love; broke a tooth in the lost room of lost hearts. Murder (also from Downtown's poetry night) has it gravé dans son coeur. Helene has a plan to eliminate war by turning men into castrati. Michele brought news from his earthquake-riven home town in Italy in My Secret Earthquake. Alec dissected an accordionist in the metro. Andrea sang. Beatrice arrived on the stage, sang God Save the Queen then ripped off various clothes and wig to reveal herself as someone else entirely! Christian saw lives bound for a collision; a selfish dream of fleeing what is essential. Alberto discoursed on drugs in frog-lickin' poetry. ''Don't let them change you'' he intoned.

God Save the Queen!

Round 3:
I lost my pen so don't have notes for this. Which was great as I forgot about the report and enjoyed listening more. I do remember we had Shane's thoughts on Paris (now available in an extremely limited edition book made by Louisa), Billy, Pierre, Evan, Elena, Lucile... and 2 fantastic slam poets in town for the slam competition run by Cabaret Populaire/Culture Rapide: Harry Baker from England: news from a paper people world. Tobias Erehed from Sweden, with an account of how Swedish children become the flat, repressed Swedish adults we all know and love. They were definitely the big finish of the night.  

Tonight - June 11th, we have a Featured Reader, Valery Oisteanu, and hopefully a dancer. Be there! Sign up from 8pm, 3 rounds starting 9pm. Hopefully Alberto arriving back from Russia to host.

Bio of Valery Oisteanu:
Valery Oisteanu is a writer and artist with international flavor. Born in Russia (1943) and educated in Romania. Immigrating to New York City in 1972, he has been writing in English for the past 40 years. 
He is the author of 11 books of poetry, a book of short fiction and a book of essays: ”The AVANT-GODS”(in progress). A new collection of poetry with collage illustrations titled   “Perks in Purgatory” appeared in” Fly by Night Press” New York, 2009.
For the past 10 years he is a columnist at New York Arts Magazine and art critic for Brooklyn Rail 
As a performer his style is : Jazz + poetry = Jazzoetry

David

Murder