I know how we often joke about how cute our household is, but the truth is we really are adorable.
This week, on our rather regular Thursday night housemate outing, we decided to venture away from our usual beverages to the sounds of live music at Brew, to an entirely new form of art, the art of the spoken word. Down a dodgy little alley alongside an Irish pub, we trailed to find the little cafe called Bean which houses a little art venue called Bird which in turn hosted a magical night of spoken poetry about the hardships of aging.
Forgive me for this poor image quality – it really does the event no justice
I had not expected that listening to four guys speak poetry would be a life changing experience The emotional journey of the audience differed as the poets used the magnetism of their own life experience to draw us into their stories. From ethnicity, to race, to love, through the drama of their voices, the rhythm in the sound, I was confronted by thoughts I had thought long buried, issues I had believed resolved. In the hour of our lives that these poets borrowed, they did more than simply speak of the process of growing up. They claimed me – and the audience – and returned us to our bodies a little bit more mature, a little bit more capable, a little bit better. Each poet, though so very different in style, added to the performance with such coherence, such fluidity that though they spoke separately, each poem wove the night together into one instruction manual. The final piece reflected the daunting yet hopeful nature of their poetry, leaving us with an after taste of possibility. Though unable to stay and thank these beautiful men for what they had given us, May 16th has been preserved in the amber of our souls to ponder upon as we too experience these Growing Pains for years to come.
Faye Sakura Rentoule 