Amazing Awesome Rocking Reading

You would have to know how difficult simple things like reading and writing have been for Andrew over the last 7 months to know what an absolute triumph of will his about 18 minutes of reading his poems were on Monday night at Three Friends Coffeehouse.

Here is a very bad video I took of the first 6 minutes or so featuring three of his sonnets. Lots of folks came in while he was reading so by the end the place was full.

He got a much more respectful than normal response from the audience and I believe that he sensed that and it made him more comfortable as he went along.

This took everything he had so when he got home he fell asleep in his chair and slept for six hours straight. Thanks to all who came out to see him! His mood is good and he continues to write.

There should be a full audio podcast available in a few days.

The Last Feature?

Andrew has been preparing for a number of weeks for his feature reading this coming Monday at 7PM at Three Friends Coffee House. His voice might not be strong but his work will be.

I’ll be there with Neil and Patrick to act as a back-up if needs be.

Elizabeth

Creative Theft

The other night Andrew and I were talking on the phone, he'd had a good day, his energy was up and he asked me about what was going on with my poetry. (Not much because I am spending rather a big chunk of time taking care of him but...)

I told him I was entertaining an idea about The Dry Tortugas because I had heard an interview with a bird guy (Scott Weidensaul) taking about his book Return to Wild America and a trip he took to The Dry Tortugas (off the coast of Florida). It had for a long time one freshwater fountain in Fort Jefferson where weak storm battered migratory birds had learned to stop to drink, the only fresh water for many many miles. The fountain was destroyed by a hurricane in the late nineties but for a span of numerous generations of birds it was a haven.

Not being able to sleep that night, he stayed up late doing research and wrote this little piece. I particularly love the last line.

Dry Tortugas

A likely place to search for buried treasure...
or last respite for swindlers and their banks...
the 'floating world' of money, drugs and leisure
(first tortoise-slow, then yet so crazedly)
now slides, next claws, then burrows in her flanks.
The fortress, unremembered, echoes words
like 'sanctuary', 'prison', 'pardon', 'free'.
And 'Mercy!'...on the tongues of many birds.

The Second Series of Sonnets

Here is Andrew's new sonnet series based on the novel After the Banquet by Yukio Mishima. He literally put everything he had into these over the last few days.

I challenge you (oh so mighty arbiters of taste and metrical police who hang out on Eratosphere, a poetic pox on you) to read a novel and even do a tenth as well in condensing the essence of it into three linked sonnets and oh yeah, make the language beautiful enough to fall into too.