Slammin’ at the library

First Fridays series highlights performance poetry

By MARY GREENE

NARROWSBURG, NY — “It’s not your grandmother’s poetry,” said Penelope Morgan-Lohr, who opens up the library every month for the First Fridays poetry series. Many of the poets who perform are slam poets, or crossover poets who do some slam poetry and some other kinds, said Laura Moran, Adult Programming Coordinator for the Western Sullivan Public Library, who founded and facilitates the series.

Moran herself comes from a slam poetry heritage. About 15 years ago now, she said, she and her peers in Providence, RI were trying out the new wave of presenting poetry. “A lot of people were really bored with the quiet readings and polite clapping,” she said. It developed with a poetry slam that “began in Chicago, stretched out to San Francisco and then came east with [performance poet] Patricia Smith, to Boston and then Providence.”

Performance poets pay just as much attention to the stage as to the page, committing most of their work to memory. “We’re infatuated with the performance end of it, and the immediate feedback,” Moran said. There is nothing to hide behind in performance poetry, she said. “It’s raw human-to-human contact.” This does not mean that such poets have abandoned their craft. “It has to be tight on the page as well,” she said.

There are still huge competitions nationwide involving slam and performance poetry among high school and college students, Moran said. New York City recently held its public high school “Urban Words” competition in Madison Square Garden.

The poets who perform at First Fridays, held at 7:00 p.m. at the Tusten-Cochecton library in Narrowsburg on the first Friday of every month from April through December, “are capable of moving a room of four people to moving a room of two thousand,” said Moran. They are often involved in educational work, and they have publications in the form of books or CDs. (Some use the guitar or other instruments to supplement their voices.) And not all the poets have been around for a decade and a half.

“About 25 percent are younger poets, the new upstarts, the up-and-comings,” said Moran. “It’s a nice mix of the old and the new: this is where we’ve been, and this is where we are going.”

There are three parts to the evening, said Moran. It begins with an open mic (one poem or song, five minutes or less), continues with a 15- or 20-minute reading by a “local poet of distinction,” followed by the featured presenter. “The open mic is a great place to get behind the mic and try out your stuff,” said Moran. “It’s a real loyal, supportive audience.” She chose to include the local aspect because “we have so many talented people in this area. Beginners in the open mic can learn from hearing the more experienced local writers—their peers, really—who, in turn, can learn from getting exposure to the visiting artists.”

Audiences of, at times, 60 people regularly supported First Fridays last year, and the 2007 series began this month, which is also National Poetry Month. The poets often place Sullivan County into their nationwide tour; so it’s, like, Cleveland, Toronto, Boston, New York… Narrowsburg.

Moran enthused that First Fridays is the perfect way to spend a Friday night, and she laid down the gauntlet to The River Reporter readers. “If you have said that you hate poetry, I challenge you to come on out and see First Fridays, and say that again as you walk out the door.”

“It’s a wonderful gift,” agreed Morgan-Lohr. “We are really lucky to be able to see these people. I am just blown away by the diversity and professionalism. The whole library vibrates.”

For more information call 845/482-4350 or email lmoran@rcls.org.

The Quiet World

By Jeffrey McDaniel (visiting artist June 1)

In an effort to get people to look

into each other’s eyes more,

and also to appease the mutes,

the government has decided

to allot each person exactly one hundred

and sixty-seven words, per day.

When the phone rings, I put it up to my ear

without saying hello. In the restaurant

I point at chicken noodle soup.

I am adjusting well to the new way.

Late at night, I call my long distance lover,

proudly say I only used fifty-nine today.

I saved the rest for you.

When she doesn’t respond,

I know she’s used up all her words,

so I slowly whisper I love you

thirty-two and a third times.

After that, we just sit on the line

and listen to each other breathe.

First Fridays 2007 Writers Series Schedule

(subject to change)

May 4 – Barbara Adler with Brendan McLeod

June 1 – Jeffrey McDaniel (local presenters: Teen Amphibian contributors)

July 6 – Ray McNiece

August 3 – Richard Cambridge

September 7 – The Piper Jane Project, NYC, featuring Lynne Procope, Rachel McKibbens, Marty McConnell and Emily Kagan

October 5 – TBA

November 2 – TBA

December 7 – TBA