Poetry Night

Last night, Lamb's class turned their class room into a Poetry Cafe, with black table clothes and candles and the only light by the stage for the young poets who read from their poetry books they'd made (and written) over the last month.

We were requested to wear black shirts and sunglasses. And Lamb asked me if I could bake cookies. So done, not done, and done. I drew the line at sunglasses.

At one level it amused me that the celebration of poetry required a uniform (But hey, that's what "individualism" is all about, right? Dressing exactly like your peer group?), but these were young elementary school kids, so there was not deep brooding in the corner sipping coffee and chain smoking clove cigarettes.

It was quite fun. I'm sorry I didn't even think to bring my camera. Lamb read her poems wearing her hear-shaped red sunglasses. And while she wore black, the red flower in her hair encouraged me that she won't ever really become a Goth when she is older.

Mind you, I have nothing against them. At some level I found Goth girls attractive in my youth. But they still seemed too potentially emotionally damaged for even me to pursue, in the end.

Anyway, snacks were had. Poems were read. And I declined my daughter's frantic hand signals to volunteer to go up during open mike time to read a poem of my own. It would have been this one, and I didn't want to start a riot.

Bravo to my young poet. Daddy is proud. And kudos to the teachers who put this on. They did a really nice job.