Topic: 04.02-07.10 Prospero’s Books stages a 120-hr poetry marath
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Posted on Fri, Apr. 02, 2010
Prospero’s Books stages a 120-hour poetry marathon
By TIM ENGLE
The Kansas City Star
Five straight days and nights of poetry reading sounds like a colossal undertaking, but it all started Friday morning with one little boy and an even littler poem.
“Day by day the ghosts go past,†recited almost-5-year-old Riley Werner-Leathem, hoisted up to the microphone by his dad, Prospero’s Books co-owner Will Leathem. Riley dressed up for the occasion, wearing a paisley tie over his Prospero’s T-shirt.
Minutes earlier it wasn’t ghosts but an ill-tempered thunderstorm that passed by. Former Kansas poet laureate Denise Low of Lawrence acknowledged it with her work “The Bear Emerges,†part of which goes:
In bed we hear the rumble,
distant, as we find again
under blankets and skins,
the deep-set thud of heartbeats.
All through the hard winter
we forgot about rain and lightning.
Prospero’s, 1800 W. 39th St., is spending all weekend and part of next week celebrating National Poetry Month — and trying to beat a record for longest poetry reading. The round-the-clock marathon will feature 200-plus regional and national poets, most reading in 20-minute chunks and most performing their own work.
It got under way at 10 a.m. Friday with about two dozen spectators and will wrap up at 10 a.m. Wednesday. The actual record-breaking moment, however, should occur around 7 p.m. Sunday — that’d be the 57-hour mark. Organizers are hoping to wallop a record set in Cincinnati in 1978, when a poetry marathon lasted 56 hours, 25 minutes.
If all goes well, the local effort will rack up 120 continuous hours of poetry, more than double what those disco-era dudes did.
For the marathon, Prospero’s — most famous up till now for a why-isn’t-anyone-reading? book burning in 2007 — has opened a second-floor loft space (the door is on the Bell Street side of the bookstore). The room seems suited for the purpose, with scuffed wood floors, old brick on some of the walls and bare lightbulbs overhead. One corner, its walls painted lavender, serves as the performance space. The podium: a stack of milk crates swathed in fabric.
Nearby, a refrigerator resting on a dolly sports this sign:
!ALL READERS! You must sign the ledger for the Guinness Record
(Leathem has talked to the Guinness World Records people, but he couldn’t afford to fly a Guinness monitor here, so it remains to be seen whether the nonstop poetry will be officially recognized as a record-setter.)
Friday’s first-hour kickoff included Connie Dover of Weston, who’s known as a Celtic musician but also has been honored for her poetry. She read “Cavort,†which starts out:
I have learned
this year
so far
that:
pink is the new orange
amazing is the new awesome
and bread is the new antichrist
a smile is a vestigial combat position
and fellow politicos rarely disagree
They simply view enigmas from different perspectives
I don’t meditate
I just lie in bed in the morning
and think about stuff…
As for what she’s thinking about the 24/7 marathon …
“Sometimes for poetry to be noticed, it has to be noticed in a big way,†Dover said. Poetry “can explode out your interior life.â€
Poet Dan Jaffe of Parkville was backed by Mike Ning on keyboards and Victor Perelmuter on drums. Jaffe, however, performed his first piece, “I’m Talking to You, Lucky,†alone. He’d finished writing the tribute to his friend Oscar “Lucky†Wesley of the Scamps, who died last Saturday, only that morning.
For a section of Jaffe’s “Finding the Blues Way Home,†poet and drummer carried on a “conversation†that honored jazz and blues greats. Both musicians accompanied Jaffe on “All Cats Turn Gray When the Sun Goes Down.â€
Incidentally, you don’t have to stop by Prospero’s at 3 in the morning (or any other time) to enjoy the poetry. The whole shebang is being broadcast live online (see box on C1); four video cameras are recording some of the action in high definition for a possible DVD. Leathem, also a publisher, is planning a book about the marathon as well.
Kansas City, he says, “has one of the finest literary arts communities in the country — it’s very vibrant.â€
Not to mention not easily cowed — by downpours, ghosts or records set in Cincinnati.
24/7 POETRY
The poetry-reading marathon continues through 10 a.m. Wednesday at Prospero’s Books, 39th and Bell streets. You can also watch it live at www.ustream.tv/channel/ metaphormedia.
•On C5: The “prime time†schedule of poets.
•On KansasCity.com/fyi: Find a gallery of photos.
PRIME TIME
Organizers of Prospero’s poetry reading marathon have put some of the bigger names in “prime time†— 7 to 9 p.m. daily.
•Today: Marc Kelly Smith, founder of the national poetry slam movement; Mark Tom Hennessy, former frontman for grunge band PAW
•Sunday: The Recipe, founding members of the Black Poets Collective; California poet David Smith, author of the collection “White Timeâ€
•Monday: Poet Connie Dover; Nairba Sirrah (aka performance artist Brian A. Harris), who’ll recite from Book 2 of Milton’s “Paradise Lostâ€
•Tuesday: Philip Miller, founder of the Riverfront Readings series and author of six books of verse, who now lives in Pennsylvania; Patricia Cleary Miller, Rockhurst University humanities chairwoman
A victory party with live music will run 7 to 9 p.m. Wednesday at the Conspiracy Room at the Uptown Theater, 3700 Broadway. Admission: $3.
For a day-by-day schedule of poets, visit www.prosperosbook store.com.
