SpokenWord Paris

“Paris est comme une prostituée. De loin, elle vous parait ravissante, vous n’avez de cesse que vous la teniez entre vos bras. Au bout de cinq minutes, vous vous sentez vide, dégouté de vous-même. Vous avez l’impression d’avoir été roulé.”

Henry Miller (read by Alexandra)

Baby and her ukulele, Pablo’s Haiku: you’ll break your dick/ if you fuck shallow people/learn from my mistakes. Kate reading about Passion and Revolt. Hatem from Tunisia sur le conflit de civilization entre Orient et Occident. Alexandra reads Henri Miller: “Paris est une prostituèe.” Oskar’s swedish sex tips. Our Featured Poet from Boston: Erich Haygun. David Barnes closes his new crunchy sketchbook, and part I.

Lula: You should be happier than you are. Steven Marsher: Don’t ever move to Crow Point, Indiana. Ok. Swa, the fourth brightest star in the Universe. Jason start reading Luca and I go and grab some beer. Alberto in a prison near Tarifa. Very very blonde Troy: “Busking in the heat of belligerance, this is me, my fostering self.” Victor’s already tired of the 21 Century singing: “Take me, Take me, Take me, Take me to the 20second.” Moe and 100 000 Poets for a change from Agadir. Paris responding from the Link. Amel covering Shelter, closing Part II.

Yann: Chicken Omelette for you intellectuals of Spoken Word. Iben: When you look at the stars / do you see epic heroes / or just thousands of lights? Imee: Bedford in Broadway. Ben: Speaking like you think you should/ Joking like some wannabe Jew. Demian: Wild Horse, a true story. Isaiah and a few of my father’s cassettes. Helen: “No more Lutemaker. He’s gone.” We go too. It’s midnight. See you next Monday.

Cheers All,

Alberto

Photos by Viola Manfra.

I looked into  Maintenant 6  (amazing quality dada mag from NY) to find out What’s going on in the mind of Bob Hart?  Well, are you sitting comfortably? This is going on: Suzie’s got a squeeze box but Daddy sleeps at night; Georgina’s kids are breaking out of the concentration camp; Helen has a novel about a guy with a low sperm count who talks to his imaginary marriage guidance counsellor – another piece of snooty-arsed trash; Anita has just written a novel in 15 days! Jason borrowed the morphologie of the metamorphosis and Kate’s Circe says ‘Men are pigs – who think they can wrestle nature from rawness.’ A collective ‘awww’ went round the room as Victor sang ‘I don’t have anything to do… but it’s all right – ‘cos I have you.’

Anas told a tale about a donkey that had a hard time being carried and ridden through about 6 villages; Gabrielle played ukelele and cried wet tears on her baby’s shoulder; Mathilde asked ‘Can I find joy in one of your dirty mattresses?’ Amel & Tania harmonised on a Nice Cave song; Mandoline sang Sinead O’Connor’s ‘In this heart.’ What’s with all this singing? We’re gonna have to change our name if this goes on. Beautiful, though. And great to have that alternating with flash fiction by Ime (fishbones) and Lula (the true story of Pandora’s box – it was lined with teeth and she opened it because she was afraid – well, wouldn’t you feel that pull?) Finally Alberto unscrewed our arms and Richard produced some bag poetry from the cold, cruel heart of autumn.

Alberto will be hosting this Monday at SpokenWord, sign up from 8pm as usual. Reckon we’ll probably hit 3 rounds this week.

And next Saturday 29th Sept, dear Spokenworders, there’s the link 3 which promises to be a fantastic event of poetry, music, dance and more in their vintage motorcycle hangar on the East edge of Paris (metro Galieni, line 3). This is in conjunction with 100 thousand poets for change and is dedicated to sparking change in a progressive direction. Theme: Sole Train Souled. More info here.

Cheers all,
David

“Hemingway said: You write drunk, but you edit sober. I guess I’m very lazy.”  Ben

Photos By Viola Manfra. To watch the whole album click here.

A little girl called Rachelle showed up at 8 stating that “Je parle bizarre”, asking why do I do that and what’s this soireè? She signed up and opened the night in Spanish, French, English. Then disappeared. Who is she and where are her parents? Pablo challenged Baudelaire. Kate reading “The Tickle”. Sue finally found her poetry muse. Jeff  “Je me suis engagè / Je suis devenu boucher.” And here Viola run out of battery so we don’t have pictures of the following performers. Accidentally the last one is her smismart Jason, who brought us back in Genova 2001: “Tenente!” “Hold!”. Our Featured Poet Number One: KAT GEORGES poet, playwright, performer, designer, founder and editor of Three Rooms Press. Cassady: If I loved you words wouldn’t come in an easy way. France two songs in one about addiction and innocence: I’ve never felt anything like this pain. Betty hit by a car. Moe jazzing under the rain. Alberto coming back from the southernmost beach in Europe. Our featured Performer Number Two: PEARLANN experimental dancer and coreographer from Pittsburgh: “All movement is dance… and everyone is always dancing”. David Barnes vs Le Parisien. (The Newspaper?) Ben: “Hemingway said: You write drunk but you edit sober. I guess I’m very lazy.” And we closed with our Featured Performer Number Three: PETER CARLAFTES playwright, poet, performer, co-founder and editor of Three Rooms Press reading from his book: Drunkyard Dog, 4 poems about his life in bars. Hey, Spoken Word official magazine submission deadline is getting closer. Chop! Chop! And see you next Monday!

Alberto

Well, ladies & gentlemen, here we are again for another season of words veering from the sublime to the ridiculous. A new photographer (Viola) but sadly the same SpokenWord hosts, myself and Signore Rigettini. We do however have a larger than usual number of top hats.

So, last week began with myself and Dareka of the Downtown Slam (46 rue Jean-Pierre Timbaud, same time and day as us… check out their parallel universe!). Dareka’s bathroom – a cage for Tasha’s drunken angel. Margot with a Liberation text on gay & lesbian marriage. Kate had Jose Saramago: Cain comments on Abraham’s readiness to sacrifice his son. Jason began a flight through dreams of violence; tear gas corroded skin. “I’m reading this for me, not you,” he began. An honest man. Alberto seems to be getting a lot of strange emails from concerned people who want to help him. You know, Russian brides who want to marry him, people keen to extend the size of his baguette, doctors stranded in airports who need a few thousand dollars. He decided to reply… Round one ended with Pearlann dancing to Let’s Dance…

Round 2: The Good Slamaritan pledged allegiance to a nation of underdogs & invisible dreamers. We grow numb and number by the day… He too is down at the Downtown Slam when not with us. Helen posted a postcard of a short holiday with a potential mother-in-law. Becca & Jacob translated into various Google variations. Ben’s every word was contagious. The workless gift darkens with the mind. Angela and Nick did piano and whistle, the forgotten pioneer. Joe’s pigeon heart shuddered. Moe Seager closed with a story of when beat was an attitude and the polyester stretch.

And that was almost it. Most folks left. But for those who stayed we did a more informal spontaneous Third Round. Which will remain entirely mysterious and secretive for those who weren’t there.
Well maybe I’ll just say that Nick sang along the road to Gundagoi, Pearlann was tension & release while the world was a pale blue dot – Voyager’s last photograph – Noemie was on automoatic, writing. I rattled off into the forest dark. Ben: She lent on him, and he lent back…

Be there tomorrow for more strangeness and poetics, song and other! Plus these 3 as Featured Performers:

PETER CARLAFTES is an NYC playwright, poet, and performer. He is the author of 12 plays, including a noir treatment of Knut Hamsun’s Hunger, and his own celebrity rehab center spoof, Spin-Dry. Carlaftes has recently published three books: A Year on Facebook (humor), Drunkyard Dog (poetry) and Triumph for Rent (3 plays). He is co-founder and editor of Three Rooms Press; their most recent books include Maintenant 6: A Journal of Contemporary Dada Writing and Art; Have a NYC: New York Short Stories; and Mike Watt: On and Off Bass, a collection of photos and distilled tour diaries from the great punk rock bass player.

KAT GEORGES is an NYC poet, playwright, performer and designer. Her full-length poetry collection, Our Lady of the Hunger will be released soon on Three Rooms Press. In New York since 2003, she has directed numerous Off-Broadway plays, curated poetry readings (including the bi-monthly Son of a Pony poetry reading series at Cornelia Street Cafe), and performed widely. She is co-founder and editor of Three Rooms Press; their most recent books include Maintenant 6: A Journal of Contemporary Dada Writing and Art; Have a NYC: New York Short Stories; and Mike Watt: On and Off Bass, a collection of photos and distilled tour diaries from the great punk rock bass player.

VIDEO of Kat
http://youtu.be/CUPeR3dcmyo

Pearlann is an experimental postmodern performing artist from the United States with a philosophy of using jazz as a verb. Her concept of ‘freejazz’ is a direct reaction to the commercialism, technical and presentation constraints of contemporary Western dance; an original method of physical-musicality that spontaneously plays the motion of the body as a jazz musician would play their instrument. Her work in freejazz intends to challenge the common perceptions of what is ‘dance’, who is a ‘dancer’ and where dance is found in the zeitgeist. “All movement is dance… and everyone is always dancing”.

Cheers all,
David

Report by AlbertoIzz been a great season of Spoken Word, if you want come and see some of the best moments and the great faces we had, you’re welcome at Marie De Lutz’s Vernissage.

But faces and poems keep on rolling twice a month all along the summer downstairs au Chat Noir. Evan’s opening: “Listen, we are Music”, Daniel-Ryan Spaulding a canadian gay boy learning to hate poor pineapples in French. If you want a preview of his Edimburgh’s show click here. Kate on the famous Kimberly 56 stars. You can still support her kimberlizing yourself right now, on line, with the Kimberlizer.  Chayma Boda and Mona Assayag, Guitar and Cello, Maya Papa: “Poets have a great tradition of  taxidermy.” Helen telling the story of Myra who cooks cakes with salmonella (for some reason). Our Featured Poet: the Palestinian-American poet Hala Alyan, author of ‘Atrium’, by Three Rooms Press:

“You ruin everything. I cannot wear

lipstick

without seeing cupped palms gathering blood from

wounds

like rain. Broken are the cuticle scraps of your

breakfast,

Mediterranean witch. Baby, save your thunder.”

Patrick Cash opening part II, Yann: “I’m writing a blog that will never end called the ultra-bible and it will be written in capital letters”. Alexandre aka The Dream Sailor jumping on benches (while playing the guitar, I mean), Luke reading some very old poems, written three years ago, Asha: “Only the rain is true to itself, falling”. Alberto found one line by Garcia Lorca in a street of prostitutes: “Estrellas no tienen novio / Stars have no boyfriend”. Georgina treating us like clever kids, telling us a fable. And Lucy Gelman, after one great season of poetry at Spoken Word Paris, is going back home “flying out from the bed”. Madga I don’t care what the Bible says, this was a very controversial poem on how to cook pasta, (I beg to differ) Emily’s childhood in Ghana, Talal don’t want to be eclipsed by his sister (Hala), Amelia (She’s leaving too/ we’ll miss you girls), James Jewell for the broke bohemian artists, we are! His bearded face hanging from the Poster: