Back in Week 13, I learned how to write poetry with the help of American children’s poet laureate Jack Prelutsky. Then, I challenged myself to read one of my poems in public. (And not just by standing on a street corner murmuring.)

It happened last Friday (April 12). The event was an evening of readings by professional poets, followed by an open mike session.

The two professional poets — Shawna Lemay and Kimmy Beach — were marvellous. I highly recommend you take a read through their work, which you can find here:

http://shawnalemay.blogspot.ca/

and here:

http://www.kimmybeach.com/

I’m pleased to tell you that the open mike session went very well. Everyone’s poetry sounded great, no one threw things and they actually clapped at the end.

If I was a good blogger, I’d have remembered to take a photo of me reading, but I was nervous and that didn’t happen. I do have a picture of the wine I drank a glass of afterward. I hope that’s sufficient.

And the poem is below.

Deep Green Smoke
Open empty deep green smoke & paint that soft absurd picture to me.
Basement jazz club.
Paris.
1949.
Low-light stars twinkle off empty bottles.
Pretty girl in one corner.
Cherry taffeta skirt makes a swishing sound.
Shh … shh … shhhhhhh.
Listen to the music.
A little rough, but she likes it that way.
Three men capture a stage with saxophone gunfire.
Tossing notes between them like a dizzy black ballet.
Hypnotic, erotic, psychotic.
Rusty needle hides in a crack in the floor
Tiny drops of smack cling in the barrel, buried in ashes.
Slap those beats!
Stretch them out.
Crazy notes scramble one on top of the other,
Touch the ceiling and run away through a Gauloise haze.
Handsome soldier in another corner.
He don’t see out of that eye anymore.
Mais, ca c’est rien. It is nothing.
The only thing to see here is the music.
Open empty deep green smoke & paint that soft absurd picture to me.