HoboEye Q&A:
Stephanie Berger, NYC, USA

McInnis: Let's start with the obvious. You've maneuvered quite a journey over a short time with the Poetry Brothel. From getting kicked out of your first venue to finding a home at the National Arts Club on Gramercy Park in Manhattan. Virtually every notable poet in the past century has read there, including none other than W.B. Yeats. How in the world did you manage to land this gig?

Berger: Believe it or not (given our tainted past and all...), we were invited to perform there! A member of their Junior Committee, Chrissy Crawford, had been to one of our very early events at the Jonathan Shorr Gallery, loved it, and was later reminded of it by a mutual friend of ours, Tracey Langfitt, the artist who had recently designed The Poetry Brothel's family crest!  From what I gather, the Junior Committee's role within the National Arts Club is to support younger, emerging artists, and also to host events that will attract younger potential club members.  You know, to keep an old club still fresh and youthful!  Chrissy thought that hosting The Poetry Brothel would be a great opportunity to both support a large number of young artists and also to expand that younger network art supporters.  We're pretty thrilled.  They've been very generous, and the space is so wonderfully perfect for what we do.  

McInnis: As you mentioned, the Tilden Mansion seems the ideal venue for the Poetry Brothel. It's a gorgeously ornate example of Victorian architecture. Inside, it's a maze of galleries, parlors and other rooms. How will you inhabit the space?

Berger: We'll be taking over the entire first floor essentially--the four front parlors, the music room, the bar room, the main dining room, the members only dining room, and the grand gallery--but we have a fairly intricate map and schedule planned out for the event, such that we'll have greater control over directing people's attention, at least for the first few hours when it's more "theater-y."  (Eventually it tends to sort of devolve into a bunch of dressed up people laying around on the floor reading poetry to each other in one area, and a crazy, swingin' dance party in the other).

We've been working with John Chaneski, who is the husband of one of our poets, Jennifer Michael Hecht.  He has this sort of incredible background in experimental theater, so he's been helping us think about the layout, the best ways of herding people where we need them to be a little.  (We've never used a venue so large!  It's kind of intimidating!)  We'll be opening up new sections of the mansion at particular times, so that people can suddenly find a whole new element to the show that they didn't know was there as the evening wields on.  

We're using the offices on the second floor as our dressing area, so the whores can make a grand entrance on the gorgeous "Grand Staircase" at the beginning of the night.  We're really trying to take advantage of all aspects of the venue.  In fact, we're even having a violin-playing busker stand just outside the mansion all night on the street to play, just because I think it will be sort of lovely to be walking along Gramercy Park (where I'm pretty sure it's typically illegal to busk) toward The Poetry Brothel, and to know you're headed in the right direction because you're following this beautiful violin sonata.  Plus I bet the violinist will make great tips in that spot!  (Hopefully not better than the poets though...)




Conversation: Pigeon in the Cafeteria

I've been reading too many essays, creating tenuous links.
This descent regards lamenting the fuck.
Stevens, you slut nut!
You may or may not have noticed.
I think you're amazing.
On Thursdays.
But I don't care for "you."
On Thursdays.
I'm guessing you have plenty to say about all this.
Pigeon in the cafeteria.
You've stolen my appetite.
And you'll use me.
Four reckless occurrences, very little interest.
Chestnuts in balloons make rattles.
This is something of interest.
Set it down gently.
Scissor my eyelashes, Dandelion, tell me a lie!
I'll applaud you, give you the clap.
Kandinsky, you sick cock!
It's not a color sickness.
Sordid ultimatums, survey questions.
Elaborate or masturbate into my eyes.
Pigeon in the cafeteria.
What was that like?
Pheasant under glass, you fluttery fuck!
Clearly.
I have little things to say to you with long spines.
I never intended to call you Little Man.
Anomalous shards underneath the kitchen table.
Despondent and delicate things to be bellowed from rooftops.
On Thursdays.
Pigeon in the cafeteria.
I'm telling you something important, but I can't tell.
Which is the broom and which is the Ism?
Let's clean the floors!
Using the genitals in appropriate rhythms.
This is something of interest.
And I'll use you.
You've stolen my appetite.
But I've plucked your Adam's apple, taken two bites.
This is something of interest.
I present you with an evening of cellophane and marionettes.
Harry Matthews, John Ashberry, you curdled cunts!
I think you're amazing.
What was that like?
Anomalous shards underneath the kitchen table.
Looking for something in between the broom and the Ism.
I've been reading too many essays, creating tenuous links.
The kinds of ideas in which cunts are copouts.  
And I'll use "me."
Pigeon in the cafeteria.
But I don't care for me.
Clearly.
This descent regards lamenting the fuck.
I'm telling you something important, but I can't tell.
Elaborate or masturbate into my eyes.
I'll applaud you, give you the clap.
I think you're amazing.
Nietzsche, you slivery clit!
I'm guessing you have plenty to say about all this.
But I've plucked your Adam's apple, taken two bites.
Set it down gently.
You may or may not have noticed.
I've been sleeping underneath too many masters of varying degrees.




Conversation: Sexual Assault

Excuse me, are you curious George's father?
I'm afraid.
The uncle?
You have the wrong girl.
Certainly.
I'm little curiosity.
Have or are?
Half or wrong?
23 years old.
I have difficulty speaking the language but understand it perfectly.
There's a market for that on the Internet.
I hear.
Had I stopped I might have moved in some other direction.
Half or wrong?
Right and left I can deal with.
What about north and south?
Too tied up with the up and down.
In this culture.
Makes a girl sea-sick, a little more consistent.
Can I have a cigarette?
You have one in your hand.
Do you want the panties or not?
You have the wrong girl.
Has anyone ever told you those things will kill you?
That's not a question.
79 years old.
My father was a sociologist.
Too tied up with the up and down.
He appreciated fine wood-working.
I believe he hated the French.
I hear.
I have difficulty speaking the language but understand it perfectly.
In this culture.
I was eight and nine when I lived there.
He kept a wooden fisherman out on the deck.
He showed little interest in metals.
I like your mustache.
Certainly.
I like your hook.
You have one in your hand.
Yes, less to lose.
Have you ever felt such shimmering exhaustion?
She bet me she couldn't sit on my stomach for an hour without my crying uncle.
There's a market for that on the Internet.
The uncle?
Do you want the panties or not?
My father was a sociologist.
That's not a question.
In this culture.
Excuse me, are you curious George's father?
I hear.
Had I stopped I might have moved in some other direction.
But I've little curiosity.
Have or are?
23 years old.
Perhaps it is better to walk around very isolated.
Yes, less to lose.
Less to emboss.
Maybe more to enamel.
He showed little interest in metals.
Half or wrong?
I'm afraid.
Right and left I can deal with.
Can or have?
Can I have a cigarette?
I can be the wrong girl.




The Pickle Branch

The olives had dried up,
and the children
mistook them for raisins,
popped a few into their mouths,
put on their whiskey faces
and fell asleep 
wearing them.

The sticks laid around
in the dirt outside,
not really basking
but proud.  Someone 
needed to reach out.

You did, but sometimes 
moister limbs feel a little 
too good too
and take something else 
out.  

Small floods 
of produce
fermenting in the fridge.

I can mold a little more life for us.

TO TOP >