“I didn’t really bring any material tonight to share, so I’m going to create this performance out of all of you, your energy…
“Imagine a world … without convention,” drawls the poet, who calls himself Ramses. The small crowd leans in quietly, captivated.
Around 36 people gathered outside Burton Barr Central Library in Margaret T. Hance Park Friday night to participate in its “First Friday Lights” open mic event in honor of National Poetry Month. In between performances, featured artist and master of ceremonies Divine apologized briefly for the clatter of skateboards, rolling nearby in the park, that framed each poet’s words.
But the audience did not mind. The noise added to performer Maria Gonzales’s recitation, which was a children’s poem about a fly trying to find his way to a jazz venue: “Za-ba, ze-do-ba, ze-bee-za-roni,” she buzzed. As Gonzales flitted from one side of the stage area to another, more First Friday passers-by gathered to watch and applauded each new onomatopoetic verse.
“(These events are) really designed to appeal to a wide range of people,” said Gonzales, who serves as an assistant organizer at the library.
“I’m not personally a poet,” she said, laughing. “I just memorize other people’s art. (These events are) really a lot of people working together.”
Arizona Western College student Kelley Jane took the mic to slam about a series of deeply personal experiences from her childhood.
“I drove all the way up from Yuma tonight,” she said. “My creative writing teacher heard about this through the library, and she recommended I go. Since I’m in town for the (Phoenix Pride Parade) this weekend, it seemed like a good idea.”
Local artists David Politzer, Sama Alshaibi, and Chris Fraser all had video art projected on the library’s south wall throughout the event. Fraser said he felt privileged to work with the library and honored that his art was complementing the poetry.
Chiona Clemons, a junior at Arizona School for the Arts, said that while she was unlikely to attend any of the rest of the library’s National Poetry Month events, she had a good time at the Friday open mic.
“I kind of just wandered by, and the poets were really interesting to listen to,” she said. Clemons, a Glendale resident, was also along the light rail corridor for Saturday’s pride parade.
“I just love this,” emcee Divine said. “It’s all poetry. You never know what you’re going to get.”
Linda Bentley of Burton Barr helped organize the night, which was only one of a variety of events going on throughout the month at the library to celebrate both poetry and art.
The day after the First Friday open mic, a small group gathered at the library to play with the historic Washington Press, an old printing press that the Rare Book Room at Burton Barr maintains as an educational and artistic tool. The group’s members printed a broadside of “Notes on the Art of Poetry,” a 1951 poem by the late mid-century poet Dylan Thomas.
On April 19, open mic for teens and poetry slam series Phonetic Spit will meet at Burton Barr and on April 22 the library is hosting an evening with Arizona’s first poet laureate, Alberto Rios. Rios will present a mix of previously unpublished and well-known poems from his body of work.
Contact the reporter at marianna@hauglie.net
