Arriving at a Poetry Reading Fashionably Late
We arrive at the reading an hour and forty minutes into the two-hour set. Fashionably late. Outside the venue stands an ironic smoker and two halfway tipsy women debating left door or right. We dust the pavement off of our shoes and enter with an air of pretentiousness that lets the room know that, yes, we’ve been to a reading before.
The room squirms to accommodate us and we fold into the back corner next to the half-finished wine bottles and solo cups. The poet that had been reading finishes her set and we snap with the collective as if we’d been here long enough to listen. But it doesn’t matter much what she’s said anyway, we knew before we came that the first poet was the only one worth listening to, and the last was the only one worth seeing.
The door opens behind us and a gust of cold air shepherds the tipsy women and the ironic smoker between us and the bottles. A hush comes over the crowd as the last poet takes the stage.
I use “stage” here loosely, as there was no platform to speak of, no curtain, no lights (save fluorescents that highlighted the high school insecurities of everyone in the room). No, there was no stage, but there was a clearing in the sea of heads and a microphone that passed from hand to hand.
Another cool breeze from the open door carried in an old man who looked like he must’ve frequented the SoHo space back when it was a bar or a factory or whatever the strange empty box had been in its past life, and was now looking earnestly for whatever he had lost there. He was wholeheartedly ignored by the rainbow-haired leather goddess and the tweed-clad poetry student, both of whom managed to look entirely comfortable in the space while still looking entirely uncomfortable with each other. The old man took his place in the back with the bottles and turned his attention, with the rest of us, towards the final poet of the night.
He was short. Too short for me to see him through the sea of heads, although it could be argued that it was less his fault for being too short to be seen but rather my fault for being too short to see him. Either way, my only impression of him that night came from his voice, his words, and the pre-reading gossip courtesy of my worldly friend.
As it happens, this poet seemed to be worth seeing only for the fact that he had been seen by many and judged poorly. Famous via bad behavior and the spite of women he’s set himself against, the parasite’s only skill seemed to be staying abreast in a river of shit.
“He was the one who was referenced in the reference of the poet at last week’s reading,” my worldly friend had explained in the brief moment we had shared outside the venue, with just enough severity to cue my manicured gasps.
The door opens and the cool wind stiffens the nipples of the sheer-tank-top-in-winter-clad woman beside me. Someone wearing sunglasses after 7 pm ducks their head as they shuffle along the back of the crowd as if trying not to draw attention to themselves in a room full of people that fully do not give a shit about them save the cold air they’re letting into the room.
My worldly friend, sardined next to me in the white SoHo box, was, luckily, tall enough to see the mop of hair atop the poet’s head and I wondered for a moment if her great knowledge came not from her travels and wealth but simply as a virtue of her being able to see over most everyone’s bullshit. She nudged me with an angular elbow as the poet took the microphone, the warning rendered mute when the small man tapped loudly on the mic, inciting an aggressive flinch from the crowd.
As I mentioned before, this was not my first poetry reading, but rather my third, so I considered myself pretty old hat at this point. The first had been at a rooftop with copious liquor, the second had been in a loft with copious liquor, and the third— well, to be honest, I should’ve known this wouldn’t be quite up to par when I saw the half-full bottles of wine. Of course, we had missed 5/6ths of the poets, but no one in New York should be expected to show up to an event of real repute on time.
The poet begins speaking with a flat kind of defiance, as most poets do. He mentions something about the air, which makes me realize just how much air the room lacks. Which in turn makes me angry at the poet for taking up so much of said air as he describes to us in that lifeless drone the act of squeezing the life-giving flesh of a virgin; a sentence that practically tied my tubes itself.
The door opens again and we are all pressed a little tighter together, still listening to what’s-his-fuck talk about a girlfriend he must’ve loved before he hated. I assume someone very important must’ve just entered because there’s absolutely no other reason to condense the crowd any further.
The poet is now talking about his father, but abstractly because he never learned how to access his vulnerability past weaponizing his art to prove his sensitivity. He’s referencing something biblical, the creation of Adam? No, it’s Adam and Eve— no, he’s talking about virgins again. I look up at my worldly friend and find her face twisted in some expression between disgust and glee as she simultaneously realizes just how low the bar is and how high she is above it.
The lesbian power couple to our left shared our disgust and was already working out how to channel their emotions into song lyrics while the tall men to our right had completely forgotten about the poetry and were far more interested in the skirt hem in front of them.
I try to remember the last time I heard good poetry. I’ve read much of it, usually through recommendation as I have no real talent for searching. I’ve read many exceptional pieces of writing in the past months. But I haven’t heard anything worthwhile. I imagine that should’ve been the reason for coming out tonight, but this only served as a precursor to going somewhere loud where I didn’t have to think. I would’ve preferred being proven wrong, in this instance at least. It would’ve been nice to be pleasantly surprised.
It’s a lack of presentation. That’s what it is. Why I haven’t heard any good poetry in years. It’s that thing they all do now, where they detach themselves from the words and the emotions. Everything is one note, one speed. There’s more life in an airplane boarding video. They read it dry because then it feels like the words are doing all the work. Like the piece is so good it can stand alone. But the thing is, it’s not. And I have to stand here and look impressed by words that sound like they have no meaning.
The door opens again and we are squished within an inch of our lives. The poet himself is struggling to breathe— or wait. No, he’s only feigning tears to appeal to the blonde that’s been thrown against him in the shuffle. I throw my glance to the back of the room and see that the Pope has come to bless the last half bottle of wine. Even he knows that showing up to a New York event less than two hours late is beyond pointless.
