communal thirst for poetry

The rain came in horizontally through my windows tonight. Almost half of my apartment was doused in puddles. Fortunately, most electronics, bills, files and other random un-soakables were far removed from the drenched sites.
Save for a pile of newspapers.
Catastrophes breed beautiful bouts of journalism.
I’ve salvaged a large collection of articles, primarily from the New York Times, pertaining to the disaster, the tragedy, and the beauty that coalesced in the aftermath of Katrina. They currently lie scattered on my apartment floor, hoping to survive their recent shower.
I trudged down Main Street to the coffeehouse where I now sit. Having temporarily forgotten of its recent re-opening, I wondered where I could possibly find some whiskey late on a Friday night and not have to deal with anything loud, crowded, bright, or high energy. Tired and seeking something like solitude and a nightcap on a weekend typically results in a less-than-satisfying end to an evening.
Kaldi’s is in rare form tonight.
It’s reminiscent of my favorite New Orleans bars: the hole in the walls hidden just off Decatur Street. Their dark, lax ambience and comfort...the decadent chandeliers and ornate fixtures dripping down blood red walls which serve as the canvas for cracked wooden bar tops steeped in voodoo allure…..
Tonight the lights are dimmer at Kaldi’s than usual. A red light beneath the bar casts eerie shadows through thick swirls of smoke as the lanky androgynous bartender stealthily mixes concoctions. A hushed intensity permeates the crowd - primarily clad in black with tattoos and chains to spare. They focus on the man behind the microphone, as poetry fills the air.
The power of spoken word above a soundscape of murmurs and ice clinking lightly in glasses invokes memories of slow nights at Manhattan’s Nuyorican Poetry Café.
Old friends here share a reignited passion for a place that so many of us once called “our second home” – most of us not really ever having a first one.
I want this place to always be here. I want it to always feel like a hybrid of Decatur Street and the Nuyorican and my living room all at the same time.
I want there to always be poetry.
Poetry does something strange to a crowd. Too often we hide behind the music, the whiskey, the surface conversation, the heightened energy of a room…but now walls come down. The vulnerability expressed by the man behind the mic can’t compare to the silent expectancy of a diverse crowd concentrating simultaneously on just one individual’s stream of consciousness. For a moment, we are all in sync. (Or as close to in sync as a large group of acquaintances could be on just another average night.) For a moment, this bar is a community.
And for a moment, I find myself thinking of the folks in New Orleans, struggling through this tragedy together. I imagine the camaraderie between the group of strangers who stayed on in the French Quarter and became family, sharing discovered supplies and makeshift necessities. I imagine them dolling out rations, sitting together on a scored stash of dry linens, passing the time sharing their poetry.

Gass prices are heading back down. My BBC homepage no longer has a front page link with a fancy Hurricane Katrina logo. That chick who was kidnapped in Aruba three months ago is back on the Fox News kingdom. Bush has declared once again that he’s an asshole, and the government will make this all okay, though no succinct plan exists.
New Orleans businesses are reopening. FEMA checks are being distributed.
Life goes on.
Just not for a few thousand whose lives are still in limbo.