The Active Aesthetics Conference was a marathon, not a sprint

Our professors in the English department, Lyn Hejinian and Eric Falci hosted the Active Aesthetics Conference, featuring both American and Australian poets this week in lectures and readings. Marathon readings, that is.

They read from 4pm-10pm that night. WOW. The conference extended from Thursday to yesterday, with passionate readers and lecturers. Here is a list of the participants to add to your collection.

Everyone was giggly and relaxed and responded with claps and chuckles at some poetic lines, unlike the formality I often encounter in the same room during lectures or presentations.

But where were my peers? The conference was open to the general public. The only ones who looked my age were some people regulating the book table in the back. It reminded me of an academic article I’ve read before, which observed the poetry culture to be within itself; basically that its producers and recipients are the same people, of the same group, and has not reached out beyond itself to the general public.

Sure enough, the majority of the people in the room were poets who were reading and then receiving the works of those around them. Where were the audiences like me, just come to hear it, as an outsider?

I sat down as a new poet, whose name I did not catch, went up to the podium. His piece was a conglomerate of “security questions” which he compiled from asking basically all kinds of websites that would require a password and recovery: “What’s your dog’s name?” “What’s your mother’s maiden name?” “What town did you grow up in?” With some oddly constructed questions: “What’s the dog?” “What’s your husband’s mother’s sister’s maiden name?” It was quite comical to say the least.

One line stuck with me from Rebecca Gaydos, who earned her Ph.D. in English at UC Berkeley: “Herbal essences was a synonym for the female orgasm.” Lots of chuckles.

During the break, I introduced myself to some poets. I asked them how they had liked the conference so far, and what had been noteworthy.

Alli Warren, who won the Poetry Center Book Award with Don’t Go Home With Your Heart on and is a local, enlightened me: “Well, the longer you stick around, the more drunk people will get. And then maybe, there will be more to say.” I remembered one line of her reading later, “If you can’t win with the one you love, love the inflated object.” Chuckles. 

Next, Michael Farrell from Melbourne, Australia, who lectured at the conference and has published several books and chapbooks of poetry,  came up. and there were two lines which caught the ear: “The alcoholics of the 19th dare make no reply / … I tip my beak to the sky.”

In my interview of him later, we discussed the significance of these lines.”I don’t drink,” he replied, holding his cup of decaf coffee, when I asked about “the alcoholics of the 19th.” He was not one of the drinkers tonight.

“Wow! Then I wonder why you put it in?”

“You know, I don’t remember now… I wrote it three years ago. Who knows.”

It reminded me of how poetry is that form of art which just comes when it does, and its source does not need to be discovered in order to be beautiful.

“I tip my beak to the sky” comes from  his focus right now on the cataloging of animal species in poetry, “to get away from people, humans… Tired of them,” he joked. We discussed how we’ve focused on our own species for far too long and how the animals should have a spotlight now. He focuses especially on the Lyrebird and the Kangaroo, and since the Lyrebird can mimic (and all that intends in literature), and the Kangaroo is a national symbol in Australia, they are great devices to work into his research.

Upon reflection, it was amazing to have the opportunity to talk to such a renowned poet and lecturer from Australia. Why don’t I do this more often?

I read this on a signboard on campus “Art is the highest form of communication” – poetry is art. Why don’t more of us flock to these conferences? Is there a disconnect between the public and those who love variegated words?  Shall poetry remain within itself?

I contend, that we may have a good time at these events, especially if drinks are involved.