Wasted trip to Sappho Bookshop to listen to poetry

Wasted a trip in the car when I went to Sappho Bookshop for a poetry night and was asked to leave because I didn’t want to buy food or a drink. “Make sure you order something,” the waitress said to me as I sat waiting for the readings to start.

I’d gotten there good and early in preparation for the readings, and the guy who sat down with a beer at the table next to me said he’d tried to register for the open mic but hadn’t been successful as it’d filled up in 10 minutes. He knew what he was doing and had bought a Kirin. I don’t drink alcohol and coffee was out of the question.

The waitress suggested with her voice that I was doing something illegal or at least bad-mannered by wanting only to listen to poetry. It reminded me of how when Simon and I’d gone to the National Art School to build interest in the group it’d been impossible to talk about art and doing art because of all the staff hanging around watching people.

It seems as though the cash nexus has completely overtaken the arts, so that it’s virtually impossible to just be interested in poetry or painting, you have to also buy food, enrol in a course of study, or in some other way invest in a purely transactional bond with someone in order to fit in. If you merely want to enjoy the arts you’ll end up being marginalised.

I walked down Cowper Street in a huff and got in the car then drove back home on Harris Street. At home I consoled myself by watching ‘Rizzoli and Isles’.