Since I’m in Oakland for a month for work, and will be here on and off for the next five months working on a project, I decided to check out the poetry scene. As it turns out, there is a huge poetry scene here.

The first venue I wandered into was The Octopus Literary Salon.

octo_med_ish

Monday nights they usually have an open mic but the first Monday I stumbled into they had a set performance of two poets and one musician. The first poet was very deadpan in his delivery, which was entertaining for one poem but a bit tiring for poem after poem. The second poet was Steve Roggenbuck who apparently has a reasonably sized following but it wasn’t the kind of poetry I like. To me he seemed like he was high and had extreme ADD. But of course the great thing about poetry is there’s an audience for every poet.

On a Friday night I checked La Commune Cafe and Bookstore. They were having a poetry reading featuring Laura Glenum, Johannes Goransson, and Lucas de Lima. I wasn’t familiar with any of these poets but I’m always on the lookout for new poets to love. Unfortunately none of the poets were to my liking. Each had a style of his/her own, and it’s wonderful to find your niche, but it just wasn’t one that worked for me. When Lucas de Lima got on stage I really had no idea what to expect.

Lucas de Lima reading his poetry

Lucas de Lima reading his poetry

 

And while there were individual lines withing de Lima’s poetry that I liked, I didn’t like any poem as a whole. His book, Wet Land, is about the death of his close friend Ana Maria, who was killed by an alligator – definitely a unique book of poetry. The same was true of Glenum and Goransson – each had lines within a poem that I liked, but I didn’t care for any poem as a whole and I was particularly confused by Glenum’s work. But hey, it was a new experience and it’s always good to go in with an open mind because you never know what you might find.

I’ll continue my hunt for poetry in Oakland and I’ll continue reporting what I find, I’m certain I’ll eventually find something I love.