New York & Poetry

Well, Pete and I had a spectacular weekend in New York.

We were up for the Rufus Wainwright does Judy Garland concert at Carnegie Hall.  We went on the second night (Thursday) and it was, by all reports, the better of the two nights.  He was in fine form and the audience was eating it up.  Marq wrote me that he was there that evening and I'd love to get his report of the show.  I for one found Rufus up to the challenge.  No one can replace Judy but Rufus clearly was enjoying himself and it was such a treat to even hear that music played by a 40 piece orchestra.

Rufus' sister Martha came on twice to do songs.  The first time was an amazing performance of Stormy Weather that just shook the place down -- powerful and heartfelt and the second time was during the encore when she sang Someone To Wat ch Over Me (which was perfect, even tho' I'd hoped Rufus would sing this (one of my favorites) song.

A nice coincidence was that we were sitting right behind Mark Doty and his partner Paul.  We had a chance to talk with them during the break and share our excitement about the concert (Mark said the concert was a childhood dream of his.   I asked him if it was his dream to see the concert or to sing the concert.  He gestured to himself of course.)  Everybody was in this high level of elation.  Just happy to be there and to experience what is truly a once (or twice in this case) in a lifetime experience.

I took some pictures while at the concert and those are on my Flickr page here.  Do take a look.

   We had such an amazing time with our friends Bo and Bill, who hosted us for the weekend in their comfortable beautiful Brooklyn home.  When we arrived Thursday morning Bo took us out for brunch at the ever amazing Tom's Diner (of Suzanne Vega fame).  It's always a treat to visit this place.  Bo told us the story about how the diner was saved during the riots in 1968 after MLK was shot -- the neighbors stood out front between the rioters and the restaurant to safeguard it from being destroyed.  After brunch we walked over to the Brooklyn Museum to visit the new fountains and this amazing architectural graveyard. It's hard to describe -- basically a huge chainlink-fenced area where they've deposited rescued architectural features from buildings long demolished.  Such beauty and just there exposed to the elements  and covered with weeds.  There are more pictures of this trip here.

On Friday night they took us out for a celebratory dinner at a wonderful new restaurant in Williamsburg called Dressler's.  Fantastic place and it was so generous to take us there.  We were joined for dinner by an old friend Covelo.  The dinner was to celebrate Cove's retirement from teaching in New York City schools and to celebrate Peter and I's upcoming 6th anniversary.  Hard to believe its going on 6 years since we met.   Anyway, after the wonderful meal we walked over a few blocks to the East River to see the Williamsburg bridge and the river.

On Saturday we walked over to Grand Army Plaza to visit the Green Market.  I'd been there last Winter to do some gift buying for friends from the sheep growers  who sell wool and sheep's milk soap.  They weren't there on Saturday (must be seasonal) but the cheese makers were there.  As the Python's were fond to misquote the Beatitudes, "Blessed are the cheesemakers."  We picked up some goo d cheese to bring home. 

We then walked over to this amazing fountain of Neptune and these aquatic Gods.  This fountain is spectacular and we enjoyed being under its spray in the hot weather on Saturday.

The one disappointment was the cancellation of our Saturday evening dinner/concert with Blossom Dearie who was ill for the second weekend.  We were so looking forward to hearing her sing and just meeting her.   I hope she is okay.  At 80, I'm not sure how many chances we'll have to hear her sing, so it would've been nice.  But we enjoyed her music throughout the weekend.

Poetry Reading at Busboys & Poets
We drove back to the cabin on Saturday night and that allowed us a more leisurely way back to the city on Sunday for the poetry reading.  I'd been invited to read at Busboys and Poets a s part of their "Sunday Kind of Love" poetry reading.  This event is hosted by the incomparable Sarah Browning and this month's reading was guest organized by Kathi Wolfe.  I was one of four featured poets along with Barbara Orton, Venus Thrash and Tim'm West.  I was familiar with West from his queer hip hop work with the Deep Dickollective but I'd never heard him read.  He was fantastic.  I really enjoyed his reading and picked up a copy of his chapbook.  Kathi Wolfe read a few poems during the open mic portion of the event.  I would've loved to have heard more of her work as I'm a big fan.

I read a few of my poems.  Michael Gushue showed up to lend moral support as did our good friends Kate & Pat.  We were stunned to delight to see them.  Pete had mentioned it to Kate over lunch last week and didn't think they'd show up.  I wish I'd brought more to read but we'd been asked to keep our readings to 10 minutes and I was the only one to (stupidly) keep to that <grin> -- live and learn.  I read the new Ol' Yeller poem that went over well at Queering Sound a few weeks back and also read the new Emily Dickinson poem.  I also read a Queer Father's Day poem which seemed appropriate for a poetry reading on Father's Day.  I think they went over well although I always have a hard time gauging the effect at readings.  Kathi told me later that she had a poem about Emily Dickinson at the airport that she was going to share with me -- I can't wait to read it.

Tomorrow I'll try to post some pictures from the Andrew Holleran/Richard McCann reading I went to tonight with Kim Roberts.  Much fun and McCann's work is marvelous!

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Comments

[Irv]

Dan, I was also @ the concert on thursday nite. I ran into Marq & J outside & introduced myself as I recognized them from a pic on Marq's blog. My friend Michael treated me for my 51st B/day present. We loved it. Also saw Rufus @ Lisner last yr.

[jason]

Oh I love some of that statuary. I may have to steal some of those photos for use elsewhere. Visit our blog!!! :)

[Rainy]

I always enjoy reading about your travels. Thank you SO much for posting the pictures of the architectural graveyard! I love old buildings and detail like this - it made me really happy to see some of those images and to see that they've been saved. Great images!