Bathing with Kearney

The Bathhouse Event

            This year’s Bathhouse was amazing both Tisa Bryant and Douglas Kearney was unreal and fit so nicely together. This would be my third event and it was most memorable. Especially Douglas, to read his work is totally different than listing to it read out loud. When looking at his text, it can be read in so many ways, depending on who is reading it. Which I thought was interesting how he had the professor at EMU put it together on how they would read it, just to prove that point.

 I never even tried to read it out loud before seeing him perform, but that is what this is, performance poetry, a spectacle. Even on the page it performs and it changes. It is a living organism that is fighting with itself, to live, to be first. Today I went back and I tried to read it out loud and to change my voice like he did, as the text changes, as my voice it guided by the arrows, I change. I feel that the arrow and symbols are used to tell the reading to yell or to whisper. It moves itself forward with these arrows, it moves like music notes. But even when reading it out loud, it is difficult. To not have a rhythm or flow is a hard thing to get use to. It is interrupting is self over and over, while voices are interrupting itself in a large room. I also like that Douglas, before each poem he would briefly describe the theme, and what musical or historic references was in the poem. Which I had no idea he used them.

Overall, it was intense and uncomfortable with my fist tightly griped and off balance. Assaulted by the words and voices, but I listened, I heard. I felt everything, I smiled, I laughed, I was sad, and sometimes, I was nothing, I didn’t know how to respond. He was really intense, when he would yell the guy in front of me would jump each time. He was so loud you could hear the echo from the speaker, the echo from the words fighting with the auditorium, the Automaton. The Black Automaton.

Thanks EMU it was great.