Western Canada Poetry Tour, Part 1: Brandon, Manitoba

As promised, and against my better judgement, I am going to keep a record/account, via this blog, of my reading tour. The tour is 22 days, covering six cities (in four provinces) in Western Canada. All together I think I am reading thirteen times. My first stop was Brandon, Manitoba. For those who don't know much about Brandon, and as I've learned the hard way, Brandonites don't like their city of 50 000 or so people, being called a town. Though I meant it as a compliment. Any way, Brandon is a small city in south western Manitoba, about 10% of the population is made up of Native Canadians. Also, Tommy Douglas went to Brandon University (then Brandon College). For my American friends, Douglas was the founder of Medicare/Single Payer Health Care in Canada. For my American friends that means "socialized medicine."

It took me 12 hours getting from NYC to Brandon. I had a layover in Minneapolis, and then had to take a shuttle bus from the Winnipeg airport to Brandon. There was snow on the ground when I arrived and I considered turning around and getting back on the plane (but its finally Spring now on in Manitoba!). I was also sent to that little interrogation room by the Canadian customs officials. I am assuming because I said I was on a "poetry reading tour" and that sounded ridiculous to them (I was also using my U.S. passport). In the room, a different customs official asked me what the purpose of my trip was. When I said I was a poet. His co-worker asked me, "do you know it?" I confirmed that I did in fact, know it, even though I wanted to say something else, and they sent me on my way. The experience kind of summed up how I feel, in my darker moments, about being a poet - that it's a joke to most people, worthy of mockery and little else. In many parts of the world poets end up being jailed or even executed. Here, we get mocked... 

Moving on...

I enjoyed the 'bus' (really a van) ride through the prairies. I imagine a lot of people find the flat, seemingly endless landscape kind of boring. I find it both fascinating and scary. It threatens to swallow one whole. And at first it is dull, or rather looks all the same for miles and miles. But I find all that expansive, empty space requires one to meditate in a way on space itself. 

I did two readings (well one reading and one workshop) at Brandon University. I had a pretty good turn out (40 people or so) mostly it seemed of English and creative writing students. Apparently in preparation for my reading some of the classes had read a few of my poems. 

 I was also asked to hold an open and free workshop for the community. Considering it was Easter weekend, it was also well intended, about a dozen people or so. It went well I think, but was not without... well, let me tell the story. One of the participants was a Byzantine Catholic Priest (I didn't know one could be Byzantine and Catholic, but apparently so). I was nervous from the start, especially since one of my planned workshop exercises involved reading an excerpt from Ginsberg's "Howl" - which of course is full of language that any moderate practicing Catholic would consider blasphemous. I considered not doing it, but as the coordinator of the workshop pointed out, he came to me - it was my workshop. At any rate, he didn't throw holy water on me or anything during the exercise. But at the end of the workshop he asked me if one has to be alcoholic or a drug addict to be a poet. I was, well, caught off guard by the question, so I just laughed. Actually, I laughed for quite awhile, before finally answering "not necessarily." I still wonder, if that's how I should have answered it. 

I arrived in Winnipeg yesterday, after taking the infamous greyhound through Portage (where the beheading occurred) and will write about my experiences here soon. Thanks for reading.