Euro Tour: Berlin

The Vermin on the Mount + VLAK European tour kicked off at the Normal Bar in charming Kreuzberg. I welcomed the audience and poet Jeroen Nieuwland served as emcee for the dark and intimate affair. Catherine Hales read a mix of new and old poems from a spot along the bar that sat under an overhead light and the rest of the performers did the same. She was followed by Travis Jeppesen from North Carolina who read an excerpt from an essay published in Frieze about the death of a close friend. Louis Armand was next and he entertained with excerpts from a cycle of prose poems published by VLAK Records (more on that later). The always entertaining and alarming Thor Garcia performed a piece that comprised excerpts from a half-dozen stories, novels, and miscellania and I read a short section from Forest of Fortune. During the intermission David Vichnar of Equus Press manned the merch table. After a brief break, the next slate of writers took the stage. Sam Langer read from works in process (“I was a lot of things, then you came”) and was followed by Donna Stonecipher who read excerpts from her new book Model City in which all of the poems begin with the phrase “It was like…” She was followed by Lotto Thiessen, a German poet who grew up in Portugal, who read from new work. Australian poet Joel Scott was next and Jeroen Nieuwland finished with a reading from a new chapbook. All of the writers have work in the new massive issue of VLAK, which features over 160 writers. The  performances were followed by a slideshow. Apologies for the scarcity of photos; it was very dark and I was frightened.