Debra Dylan: Explosions on Gay Street
THE KNOXVILLE WRITERS’ GUILD RELEASES NEW ANTHOLOGY
Rip Lydick said the pairing of the launch party with the Body Sacred art exhibit was a coincidence. This wonderful art exhibit focused on the body, and two ironic pieces by Denise Sanabria were particularly popular. In the booklet accompanying the exhibit, Ms. Sanabria states that when she appropriates “images of individuals represented in historical works of art, I like to use them in a way that contrasts what they represented at that time with the cultural distortions and absurdities of present day American values and norms.” In her piece entitled “The Neo-Classical Time-Warp Apollo, this beau ideal of manhood is outlined with the following words: Sedentary, Cholesterol, Pump, Steroids, Six Pack, Height, Prozac, Alpha, Stress, Strength, Viagra, Inches, Testosterone, Training, and Fitness. We ladies don’t escape scrutiny either. Sanabria’s “The Mutilation of Venus” is surrounded by: Liposuction, Starve, Lift, Implant, Shave, Wax, Bleach, Prozac, Diet, Pill, and Dumb. We humans are very harsh on our selves. While the marathon reading from this new anthology covered many topics, in the spirit of Ms. Sanabria’s art, below is a brief review of our “cultural distortions” regarding the aging and attitudes toward different body types.
At the standing room only reading from Low Explosions: Writing on the Body, the first immediate theme to emerge was aging. While an unpleasant topic for those of us getting on in years, thankfully, we had Julie Auer, Rhonda Redden Reitz and Kay Newton to provide some comical relief to this inevitable, unstoppable natural phenomenon. Julie Auers’ “creative non-fiction” prose piece, “The Corner of Freud & Gay” (p. 22), which she disclaims as “not being entirely true” is a marvelously hilarious journey of a 40 year old woman’s frustration while making her way through a Santa parade crowd while observing youthful women. “They’re so pretty. So young. So unaware of the horror of their future.” Rhonda Redden Reitz’s “Lamentation” (p. 33) brilliantly describes the “beautiful ruin of our faces,” “the sweet slippage of our skin/like frosting on a cake to warm,” and “the gentle corporate merger taking place between our jawlines and our necks.” She goes on to define the three types of aged necks. None of it is pretty. While Kay Newton, in her “Sonnet to My Self” (p. 139) also tallies a hit list of less than enchanting aging wonders, she is clever to remind us that “Still, what a privilege we count it to endure/our problems - they won’t last long, that’s for sure.” I was delighted when Julie Auer’s surreal December journey through the Santa parade triumphantly concludes, “Fuck age; let’s live.”
So many times, many of us aren’t living due to what we perceive as our physical imperfections. Lucy Sieger gently takes us into the world of body self-consciousness and competition in her prose piece “The Woman in the Red Bikini.” (p. 14) Our somewhat physically fit narrator is initially mortified by an obese bikini clad woman frolicking on the beach. Eventually our uptight narrator, who admits to spending decades commiserating about her own weight and “flawed figure,” begins to see the free and cavorting Renoir-like woman as sexy. While the narrator admits this experience did not liberate her from her own exercise routines and scale watching, she did come away from this beach occurrence with “a glimpse of possibilities.” “Like a tiny sapling piercing the shell of its seed, this radical concept is taking root inside of me.”
Other pieces of note regarding nature and the passage of time are Jesse Graves’ “River Gods” (p.4) and Rebekah Goemaat’s “The Scent of Prairie Air” (p. 63). Both of these poems are beautiful in their descriptions of particular places and time. Also of note is Laura McCoy’s “Parts” (p. 17). Casie Fedukovich described this poem as “the most passionate 4 lines written.” I’ll leave it to you, dear reader, to determine what this poem is about.
Parts
That your eyes were my blue ocean
And your lips my tallest ship;
happily would I sail you
eastern tongue to western hip.
Writing poetry and prose is not easy; neither is reading it aloud. There is a particular art to reading aloud and three of Saturday’s presenters were phenomenal. First, actress Christine Omodi-Engola’s reading of her very rhythmical and comical poem “Ripe Blackness” (p.41) stunned us all. Her reading was angry, ironic and thrilling. Kali Meister’s reading of her wrenching non-fiction incest recovery piece “Nice Day” (p. 175) was striking due to its content and Ms. Meister’s voice and delivery. University of Tennessee’s distinguished English Professor, Marilyn Kallet, woke us up with her dramatic and engaging reading of her kinky catholic creed “Father Trey Makes an Offer.” I marvel at this woman’s imagination and delivery.
On November 14, at 8:00 p.m., you can experience these great writer/readers, and several others, at a spoken word show the Turkey Creek location of Stir Fry Café. This reading will include art, music and movement. Other readings from this anthology will be held on the following dates and locations in Knoxville:
October 19 Barnes & Noble at 6:30 p.m.
October 28 Carpe Librum Booksellers at 2:00 p.m.
November 9 Lawson McGhee Library (downtown) Time to be announced at a later date
Members of the Knoxville Writer's Guild
Comments
Very late in saying so, I must congratulate the voices that continue to print. Life is much brighter for the effort and the grace of stirring up perspectives and making points. Keep the darts flying.
Posted by: John Dominic Barbarino | January 27, 2007 11:36 PM