Jump to content
Registering As A Forum User? Read This Important Message!
Help Keep AwesomeDude Online! Donate Here.
  • entries
    140
  • comments
    802
  • views
    46,141

Poetry Readings Delayed in Adelaide

DesDownunder

Entry posted by DesDownunder

524 views

It's been an awkward year for me and I hadn't been able to get to the local poetry reading group for about 8 months (I think.)

Anyway, the stars aligned with Jupiter and the moon was in the seventh house, etc., and I had the night free to attend the local poets reading their poems. Most of them of course read descriptions of 'things' as if they were shopping lists delivered like a telegram, but hey, people were attempting to be creative, so who cares?

The first shock was that the admission had risen to $5, but the nice girl at the money taking table knocked off a dollar because I looked so old and decrepit. :icon11:

I picked up the handout for the evening and was shocked into the middle of next weekend. The group was going to reduce the allotted time for reading from 4 minutes to 3, for each reader, with a promise of looking to go to 2 minutes!

Okay so they were going to trial 3 minutes in April and May. Well I can tell you there is no may about it, I won't be there. I mean what can you read in 3 minutes? the dinner menu?

This irked me somewhat, in case you haven't gathered. In one fell swoop they would wipe out reading any of the classic works by Tennyson, Coleridge, Rimbaud (hi Jason), let alone my own unworthy efforts.

When I complained, I was told I could just read an excerpt. A what? Are these people insane or is their brain missing in action?

So I sat down and waited my turn to read. I managed to talk to few people during the break, and discovered that the bohemian element had decided to rename Adelaide as 'delayed, because we were always behind what was happening anywhere else in the world. The fact that it has taken so long to think of this is proof that they are right.

So I questioned people about the proposed reduction in reading time, and was told that people didn't want to stay out till 11pm as it was too late. Too what? Late? Do these people even know that 11 pm is the starting hour for the local gay bar?

Come to think of it I don't think they have heard about being gay yet, despite my gay poems and a couple of very nice young men skirting around the subject in their poems.

I watched as people revealed their total lack of knowledge on microphone technique, one man trying to lick it as if it was a black aniseed ice cream, while another woman decided it was in her view of her text and so pushed the microphone away until it fell off its stand. We all got feedback for her effort.

I finally got to read my Reflections and my All I can Be, poems. I was pleased with very enthusiastic applause, so they are not too bad a bunch of people after all.

Then I remembered I was in Adelaide and probably the applause was for the previous poet, his applause being delayed.

I've now had some time to think this over, and I have come to the conclusion that the Church controlled conservative government has decided to use its influence to eradicate the left-wing poets by limiting their reading time at poetry meetings because it won't fund someone to lock up the hall so late at night. The volunteers want to get home early.

This will mean that there is an opening for a really good poetry group to spring up but as it will take sometime I guess that will be 'delayed too.

Foo on the lot of them. If they want decent poetry, they will just have to come to AwesomeDude and Codey's World. :lol:

5 Comments

Recommended Comments

Camy

Three minutes?! They're totally bereft of any kind of artistic soul.You should have a 'read in.' Get on the stage and start 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' and don't stop until you finished it - no matter what type of polite coughing, or watch tapping, starts up.And - and this is key to getting some tabloid coverage for the cause - read it in the buff.3 minutes?! Pah!!!Camy - who would come and participate if he could fly.

Link to comment
DesDownunder

Trab, "addle aid"...I love it, so true. Camy, if had any money, I would fly you out here, I would love to see a buff emu reading the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, but it would be too dangerous as the locals would probably think you were an albatross and shoot you.I think I will work on a cynical poem called "3 minutes." :hehe:

Link to comment
Cole Parker

Three minutes to read this, oh, the pressureHow can I keep my poems so short?You force then to wither, to be oh so less sirThat it?s hardly worthwhile And as I?m getting senileInstead, I just may go for a snort.You realize I hope sirThe gay bar is beckoningAbout the time that we stopAnd it?s surely more fun thereI?ve got to be reckoningThan trying to read ?gainst the clock.When I?m bellying up there, no one?s watchingTheir watches instead of the menThey know what?s sublimeAnd it isn?t the time,But the drinkers acumen. (OK, you might have to look that one up.)Of course, you know, I think this is twaddleThis rule that we cut our stuff short.So we can leave by eleven, which forces scannableThree minutes or lessWhat is this, a test?And so great lines we?re to abort ? All this is silly, dumb ass and crazyWhen it?s otherwise easy to fixThree minutes a poemAnd then we?re all goin??Why not simply begin this at six?

Link to comment
DesDownunder

Cole, thank you so much, you seem to have got the idea.I love the thought that the gay bar is more fun than speed reading poetry. Acumen I actually knew, actually I have know many a-cum-men. :hehe:

Link to comment

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

PayPal

Help Keep

AwesomeDude Online

Scan to donate

QR code
×
×
  • Create New...