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Patti Smith's Night
Nov. 28th, 2006 08:27 amI'm waiting for Kevin when she walks past, a young guy carrying her guitar case. Short, thin, long hair growing white, glasses, that hooked nose and a suit jacket (that is probably second-hand) over a floral-print shirt. Jeans tucked into cowboy boots. We wait in line and sit in the middle of the cinema (not a big room). She comes down the main aisle to our claps, smiles on stage, two books under her arm and a set list for what she wants to read (which falls and floats away, then disappears into one of her pockets by the end of the reading.)
She reads from her new "mature" work, as she jokingly calls it, as well as poems from the 70s. In between, there are songs on a badly-strung guitar and much fumbling for the glasses she keeps inside her breast pocket. She also chats a lot, cracking jokes like a stand-up comedian. Anecdotes about Mick Jagger and Bob Dylan, her parents in heaven, her love for Amsterdam's coffee shops, even a praise for Antony van Leeuwenhoek, the dutch man to whom all glass-wearing citizens should praise and be thankful.
On her mother's first birthday -- after her death -- America bombed Baghdad. This draws a pause and a heartfelt confession of how ashamed she is of what America has done to Iraq. The poem is about the birds in Baghdad who stopped singing just before the bombing started, as if they knew what was coming. She also can't hide her anger when someone asks her opinion on America's current politics: "the Republicans are evil and the Democrats are wimps." Incidentally, the first poem she reads is dedicated to Ralph Nader, one of her "imaginary" boyfriends. When she says she'd rather find a small island off Ireland and take care of her goats, you know she's only half-joking.
Later, she sits in the ICA's bookstore signing copies of her new book Auguries of Innocence. Every person gets to sit across from her and have a chat as she signs their albums and books. She smiles and chats away with each one of them. I catch the security guard studying me as I peak through the books at this ritual. I look at the line up snaking all the way inside the ICA and decide to go home.
She reads from her new "mature" work, as she jokingly calls it, as well as poems from the 70s. In between, there are songs on a badly-strung guitar and much fumbling for the glasses she keeps inside her breast pocket. She also chats a lot, cracking jokes like a stand-up comedian. Anecdotes about Mick Jagger and Bob Dylan, her parents in heaven, her love for Amsterdam's coffee shops, even a praise for Antony van Leeuwenhoek, the dutch man to whom all glass-wearing citizens should praise and be thankful.
On her mother's first birthday -- after her death -- America bombed Baghdad. This draws a pause and a heartfelt confession of how ashamed she is of what America has done to Iraq. The poem is about the birds in Baghdad who stopped singing just before the bombing started, as if they knew what was coming. She also can't hide her anger when someone asks her opinion on America's current politics: "the Republicans are evil and the Democrats are wimps." Incidentally, the first poem she reads is dedicated to Ralph Nader, one of her "imaginary" boyfriends. When she says she'd rather find a small island off Ireland and take care of her goats, you know she's only half-joking.
Later, she sits in the ICA's bookstore signing copies of her new book Auguries of Innocence. Every person gets to sit across from her and have a chat as she signs their albums and books. She smiles and chats away with each one of them. I catch the security guard studying me as I peak through the books at this ritual. I look at the line up snaking all the way inside the ICA and decide to go home.
