Laguna Poets reading

Enroute to Cabo, we have a stopover in LA for a couple of readings.

11/21 Reading at the Cafe Cultural with John Oliver Simon and Rubén Martínez, then dinner with Lori and Jack Grapes, Rubén, and Sergio? We brainstorm CPITS and CAC residencies over meals.

It turned out John and I both knew Jim Duran separately. He called Jim Jaime whereas I called him Seamus. We once ran into each other in LAX enroute to Guatemala. John yelled Jaime while I yelled Jim, and Seamus simultaneously. We turned to each other and laughed.

On the even of JFKs assassination, we met up for dinner in Palo Verde, discussing linguistics and poetry, the origins of language and the uniqueness of  Irish language structure. We must've bought something expensive. Dinner was $34 plus tip.

Then we went to the Laguna Poets Reading Series. Terry Kennedy and Richard Weekly read. Then John and me. I also read some of my kid poems, distributed copies of ARC, and met the editor of Cal State Poetry Quarterly who wanted to publish some of my work. We set up another reading for next summer.

My cousin Eddie Walsh wasn't at home in Laguna Beach, a small hovel in the basement of an apartment complex (he must've been in Hawaii), so we rented a room at the Voyager Inn, and I bought Seamus Heaney's Sweeney Astray, reading about mad Sweeney over breakfast at Benny the Bum's Diner. Mad checkered tile floor and walls, like something from Nighthawks.

This is how I celebrated my birthday, among poets. We headed south to Solana Beach and crossed the border, headed for Cabo.


Added, rev. 9/17

AT THE LAGUNA POETS' READING
Remembering Jim Duran, (Séamas Ó Direáin)