At the Whitney Review’s Poetry Night
Whitney caught up with the readers after, to find out more about their rituals and realizations. They dished on water conspiracies, bird rehab, horny authors, and Marxist tea.
Journey Streams, 24 ( writer / artist )
Where are you from?
I was born and raised in Los Angeles.
What’s your latest epiphany?
Whenever we are talking about “space,” reclaiming space, making space, taking up space, we’re really talking about property. Social autonomy is so grotesquely linked to ownership and material circumstances.
What’s the last book that changed you?
Guy Debord’s The Society of Spectacle. It’s a heady Marxist text but it’s tea about the celebrity economy, the construction of human needs, and the ways in which we consume events as images rather than experiences. It kind of sucked the fun out of a lot of the ways I live my life, but also ironically informed my piece.
You beaded your text letter-by-letter into a friendship bracelet which you read from. I want to ask about the line "I don't want to be your friend anymore."
It was sort of a futile sentiment. I’ve fantasized about breaking up with friends in the past, but I’m learning now that friendships change with age, and the value of being known deeply often outweighs the petty crises. The catharsis of the performance was enough. The piece is a mosaic of a lot of people who have saved me the trouble of having to hold all my former selves at once. To diminish their presence in my life would be to lose pieces of myself, quite literally. This past year especially I've been more grateful for those friendships. It seems as though we may be bound for life.
Were you nervous tonight?
I was so nervous. I was worried the friendship bracelet would tangle or break, and concocted plans for those scenarios, fantasized almost. If it broke, I was going to command the audience to collect the beads while I finished the piece from memory. I showed the bracelet to some people outside like it was a watch in my trenchcoat and it settled my nerves a bit. My sisters were in the audience and that helped a lot. I still flubbed a couple parts but who cares.
Anne Hanavan, 56 ( writer / filmmaker / model )
What inspired you to move to New York?
Culture and the allure of the subversive. At 16 my friend and I would jump on the Peoples Express from Buffalo to Newark then take the bus to the city to dance all night at Danceteria and the Limelight. After a couple of those trips there was no place on the planet I wanted to be more than NYC!
Why did you start writing?
Roger Richards who used to own The Rare Book Room encouraged me. The fist time I read was in the 80s at St Marks Church and this place called Gargoyle. AA Pritchard, who used to do readings with Bukowski, loved my work and told everyone I was his daughter. I wasn’t but he used to sleep under my kitchen table from time to time so I suppose we were like family!
Have you ever had a sudden epiphany that made you change your whole life?
Yes. After being addicted to drugs for most of my 20s, I was told by a doctor that if I continued to use I was in jeopardy of losing my right leg. In that moment, I decided to find a new way to live.
Do you have any rituals before you perform?
Just breath deep, pop a Lemon Mint Ricola, and I am all set!
In your story you call the bluff of a fake cop threatening jail if you don't oblige to his demands. Are you still good at detecting bullshit?
I thought so until I started dating via apps this year…
Vivien Lee, age 31 ( writer / poet )
Where are you from?
Virginia.
How or why did you start writing?
I decided to become a writer after my grandfather, who was a North Korean refugee and celebrated screenwriter in South Korea, died in a car crash. I was raised by my grandparents, so his death left a strong impact on me and I pursued writing to feel closer to him.
What’s your definition of an epiphany?
Mental flickers of clarity.
Were you nervous tonight?
Weirdly, no.
Do you have any rituals before you do a reading?
Going through five different outfit options and then getting a $25 blowout.
What’s the last book that changed you?
How the World Swung to The Right by Francois Cusset. I don’t know if it's changed me, but it's influenced my grasp on recent history.
You read from a screenplay about a sugar baby and her client who's like "the Elon Musk of water." Who or what inspired this water maniac?
I’m very drawn to water and think about environmentalism a lot. One day I came across a few Christian conspiracy blogs about God being a metaphor for water and I wanted to tell a story around this fringe theory. I wrote it through a character who, in real life, might exploit this sort of thing, but also might not be taken seriously by the masses. I think it's significant that Michael Burry, the trader who predicted the 2008 financial crisis, is now investing in water!
John Belknap, nearly 30 ( writer / wikipedia editor )
Where are you from?
I was born near Detroit, Michigan, but my memory begins in Ankara, Turkey. My father was an Army tank specialist and my mother, an OB/GYN for clinics like Planned Parenthood. We moved around North America and Europe and Asia for my father’s military obligations.
How or why did you start writing?
In the MySpace era, I loved listening to music by AFI, Cute Is What We Aim For, Chiodos, Lovehatehero, Paramore, Panic! At the Disco, Say Anything, and The Used. And I wrote lyrics parallel to the things I heard. Then one day, years later, I logged onto Wikipedia. I made some edits for Juliana Huxtable’s page and have stayed online ever since. Words quickly changed meaning for me after that.
What’s your definition of an epiphany?
Watching a friend ask for help or for drugs is like an epiphany. Just ask for something if you want it. A subject in motion stays in motion, just dance, etc. It’s probably all going to be ok.
What’s the last book that changed you?
We Both Laughed in Pleasure. It’s snippets from Lou Sullivan’s diaries as he turned gay, transitioned, fell in love, hung out with his pet birds, changed the law to ensure anyone the right to transition, regardless of one’s sexuality, fell out of love and then back into it again. He was a total slut. Absolutely the horniest.
The first line of your piece “Our friend, the communist” — Who is she?
Funny. I’ve been wanting to ask Sheryl Crow the same thing.
Esmé Naumes-Givens, 28 ( writer / artist / babysitter )
Where are you from?
I’m originally from Chicago. I’ve been living in Brooklyn since 2017.
How or why did you start writing?
I’ve been writing and telling stories since I was a kid. Letting the words out keeps me from spinning off into the danger zone of my own head. I remember reading a poem about my crush in middle school out loud to the whole class, and causing so much drama, my English teacher had to be like, “Let her finish!!!”
What’s your definition of an epiphany?
The great epiphanies in my own life often manifest as the emergence of a newly shaped perspective. It becomes impossible to ignore the new angle any longer. Usually, it’s something I was being stubborn about, or cowering from, and that release, that reckoning, while somewhat bittersweet, feels like stuck air is escaping from the tightest part of my shoulder blades. Rare. Elite.
Were you nervous tonight?
Super nervous. I have to hypnotize myself every time before I perform like I’m Kelly Clarkson.
What’s the last book that changed you?
There’s a short story in Kelly Link’s book of short stories, White Cat, Black Dog, called ‘The Game of Smash and Recovery.” That fucked me up.
You read a story called “Why Are We Even Paying for Bird Rehab.” Can you explain a little bit about the premise? Do you yourself identify as a recovering bird?
The title of the story came from something I said out loud to myself, because I was lollygagging around, slow poking, not taking my shit seriously, thinking like, “man, I need to detox from being such a dummy bird all the time.” I just think about airhead shit. The epiphany of “Bird Rehab” is that bird rehab is for everybody. Everyone is doing this performance that they need to purge themselves of if it’s controlling them.
