I also felt compelled to share a little poetry of my own, though I prefer to think of it as doggerel verse.
Here's the piece I read:
Bad Theater Night
Friday’s the night when my friends all impose
Invitations upon me to sit through their shows.
Overage ingenues, fat men in tights –
These are required for Bad Theater Nights.
Dancers who jettae their bodies through space
Regardless of rhythm, or tempo, or grace,
Gilbert and Sullivan time after time,
The Family Von Trapp with a mountain to climb,
Workshops in basements that leave me annoyed,
Musical tributes to Marx and to Freud,
Chekhov and Strindberg with many…a pause,
Avant-garde “happenings” that get no applause.
Week after week I see play after play,
And when they’re all over, hell, what can I say?
I can’t be like, "Hey, your performance was shit.
The scenery was awful, the show really bit."
Or “Now that I’ve seen your performance as Puck
I’ve come to conclude that you really suck,”
Or, “Listen, I really don’t want to offend,
But the best part was when the play came to an end.”
No, even though they have just stunk up the place,
I venture backstage with a smile on my face.
I hug them and kiss them and that’s the time when
I say to friends, “Well…you did it again!”
Afterwards I went out for sushi with some of the writers, where I encountered several New Things.
Like the Bridge of Sushi:
As well as mango mochi, which is ice cream in a skin:
Yeah, it tastes as appetizing as it sounds. Seriously, it was like eating someone else's pre-chewed Bubble Yum.
Also on the "Don't Need to Eat Again" list is red bean ice cream which had the fruit and plastic feel of a Lip Smacker. Or so I was told by one of the women at the table. I liked the green tea ice cream much better.
Which isn't saying much.
5 comments:
I personally really dig mochi, with or without the ice cream. But I'd describe it more like eating felt.
What a great poem! Oh, I have felt that way, more than I care to admit.
Although I was never so ready for a play to be over as Albert Finney's version of the Scottish play, done completely without editing or cutting a word, and no intermission. I seriously wanted the man dead by the end of it. Just kill him. Or me.
And it was a fabulous performance.
Love green tea ice cream, so yay!
Thanks for the poem. How many times have my friends and I said "Wow, you were really UP there . . . I mean, you were just doing your thing and having fun." Yikes.
Also, I really like the green tea ice cream at the Takahashi (one in SE Portland and one in downtown). I've tried others and not liked them as much. Have fun!
Practice this poem as your own slam to do at your performances. Your audience will love how you've given them voice.
We've all been there.
Well done on the poem. It always makes me cringe when people make a point of rhyming at the end of each line but pay no attention to the actual meter required to get there. Your attention is greatly appreciated.
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