“Risk it!” is tonight’s topic at Open Secret, the open-eyed, open-eared open mic for performers of every ilk (yes, I feel ilky today, sayeth David Leo), at Le Bistrot des Artistes in the Latin Quarter, where “Amor vincit omnia,” precisely at 6 rue des Anglais (a pale, skinny passageway that pokes Boulevard Saint Germain on one side & rue Lagrange on the other). At 8:30 rolling sign-up sparks up, & at 9 the conflagration (congregation?) of creativity begins, down in the cool stone “cave.”
We are all quite fortunate to have a particular professional mystery woman presenting her featured performance tonight, in the character of La Copine de Ferdinand. You may have seen a 5-minute teaser of this act at SpokenWord (our Mother Ship), or at Edouardo & Friends – involving odd props such as a fish bowl & a roll of toilet paper. Whether you have had a glimpse or not, it is worth a goooood long look at our special guest: a full-time actress, performance artist & comedian. Unforgettable!
La Copine de Ferdinand takes countless artistic risks, like Walt Whitman when he almost wrote “I Hear the Bank of America Singing,” saying so subversively: “I will go down to my bank by the river, & make myself undisguised & naked – I am mad to be in contact with my cash, it is for my fingers forever, so youthful & crisp I could request a red wine vinaigrette to sprinkle upon it!”
Come, make a leap, take a risk! If you wish. I will preach what I practice in the park around my corner – my newest, bestest song, “City With No Moon.” I’ll leave you with a lyric…
_______________________
When will I see whom I wish
in the glass?
The past gets better always
but I fly forward fast.
You come at this time when
I look for the Sound
that holds every language –
all tones can be found.
I saw you on the cusp of
sleep into dream.
Wanted to speak –
don’t know what I mean.
You were wearing white light like
hypnotic perfume –
& I’d like to see you
in this city with no moon.
See you,
Leo
Artist in Residence for Dickens 2012 Bicentenary, the Saison Poetry Library, and has written and performed commissioned work for Billy Bragg, BBC Radio 3, Old Vic New Voices and the Royal Shakespeare Company.
Nina Karacosta is an actor and poet. Born in Athens, Greece she moved to London, to New York City and then in 2009 to Paris. Since 2003 she has studied with many exuberant living poets (Ann Waldman, Alice Notley, Marge Piercy, Simon Pettet, Sparrow) at the Poetry Project and the Poets House in New York. Work of hers has appeared in Pomegranate Seeds: An Anthology of Greek-American Poetry, Best of Stain Anthology, Surreal-zine, The Melancholy Dane, The Smoking book, Upstairs at Duroc, Ditch, Upstart, issue.Zero, Tears in the Fence, Core, can can, Big Bridge, Shearsman magazine. She is a poetry editor at Upstairs at Duroc. Her chapbook “Previous Vertigos” as well as its French translation by Anne Talvaz “Vertiges Précédents” are published by Corrupt Press. She is currently working on a collaborative collection called “kaleidograph” with Irish poet Anamaria Crowe Serrano.
SpokenWord Paris 