Monday, July 09, 2007

Poems & Curses

My buddy James Walke has curated a show at Eastern Front gallery in Toronto -- one block east of Broadview on the north side of Queen. The show is Poems, Curses and Dry Spells -- a look at how text infiltrates visual art. I read at the opening, with local poet Ronna Bloom. It was a great night.

James asked us to read from our own work and from the work of someone who inspired us. Interestingly, Ronna and I both chose American poets -- she went with Ginsberg and I chose Frank O'Hara, though I managed to slip a little Stuart Ross in there as well.

It was hot in the gallery, but the crowd was receptive to the reading. Afterwards, a bunch of us went to The Blue Moon pub down the street to watch Toronto FC tie 1-1 in Chicago. Big time poet guy Ken Babstock showed up for the game with the lovely Laura Repas.

Now I'm working on my next book of poems lakeside in Oro Station, Ontario, and preparing to read to four or five bookclubs in Thessalon, Ontario in late August.

2 comments:

Razovsky said...

John!

Thanks so much for slipping a poem of mine into your reading. I hope it was Parker Posey Has Collapsed!

Good luck with your new manuscript. Looking forward to it.

Stu

John said...

Stu!

Actually, it was Frank Poem #1

subtle