two kinds of hell by Charles Bukowski

I sat in the same bar for 7 years, from 5 a.m.
(the day bartender let me in 2 hours early)
to 2 a.m.

sometimes I didn’t even remember going back
to my room

it were as if I were sitting on the barstool
forever

I had no money but the drinks kept
arriving
to them I wasn’t the bar clown
but the bar fool
but at times a fool will find a greater
fool to
admire him,
and,
it was a crowded
place

actually, I had a viewpoint: I was waiting for
something extraordinary to
happen

but as the years wasted on
nothing ever did unless I
caused it:

broken bar mirrors, a fight with a 7 foot
giant, a dalliance with a lesbian, many things
like the ability to call a spade a spade and to
settle arguments that I did not
begin and etc. and etc. and etc.

one day I just upped and left the
place

like that

and I began to drink alone and I found the company
quite all right

then, as if the gods were bored with my peace at
heart, knocks began upon my door: ladies
the gods had sent the ladies to the
fool

and the ladies arrived one at a time and when it ended with
one
the gods immediately–without allowing me any respite–sent
another

and each began as a flash of miracle–even the bed–and the
good ended up
bad

my fault, of course, yes, that’s what they told
me

but I remembered the 7 years in the bar, I hardly ever bedded
down with anybody

the gods just won’t let a man drink alone, they are jealous of
his simple strength and salvation, they will send the lady
knocking upon that door
I remember all those cheap hotels, it were as if the women
were one: the delicate little rap on the wood and then:
“oh, I heard you playing that music on your radio…we’re
neighbors, I’m down at 603 but I’ve never even seen you in
the hall…”

“come on in…”

and there go your balls and your sanctity, Men’s Liberation,
they say, is not needed
and then you remember the bar
when you walked up behind the 7 foot giant and knocked his
cowboy hat off his head, yelling:
“I’ll bet you sucked your mother’s nipples until you were
12 years old!”

somebody in the bar saying: “hey, sir, forget it, he’s a mental
case, he’s an asshole, he doesn’t know what he is
saying!”

“I know EXACTLY what I am saying and I’ll say it again:
I’ll bet you sucked…”

he won but you didn’t die, not at all the way you died when the
gods arranged to get all those ladies knocking and you went for
the first flash of miracle

the other fight was more fair: he was slow, stupid and even a
little bit frightened and it went well for quite a good while,
just like with the ladies those gods
sent

the difference being, I thought I had a chance with the
ladies

Image:

Sound:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzc4jBqh90w

and an ocean tumbled by with a private boat for Max
and he sailed off through night and day

and in and out of weeks
and almost over a year
to where the wild things are.

And when he came to the place where the wild things are
they roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth
and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws

till Max said “BE STILL!”
and tamed with the magic trick

of staring into all their yellow eyes without blinking once
and they were frightened and called him the most wild thing of all

and made him king of all wild things.

“And now,” cried Max, “let the wild rumpus start!”

“Now stop!” Max said and sent the wild things off to bed without their supper.

And Max the king of all wild things was lonely and wanted to be where someone loved him best of all.

~ Where The Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak

Image:

Sound:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRajZappq8c

FeverGraph Theatre Company

Image:

Sound:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sngtc5jn7w

www.animalparts.org www.videofag.com

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Sound:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dqd83kAQzlg

Haley McGee is taking OH MY IRMA to the Edinburgh Fringe this August, but before she goes, she’s doing THREE PERFORMANCES IN TORONTO.

Four days will quickly steep themselves in nights;
Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
New bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities.
-William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

IMAGE:

SOUND:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=XH2hxAgnCJ0

Nina Kaye is the Artistic Director of Unspoken Theatre Company. She is a Jill-of-all-trades, with experience as a playwright, director, producer, costumer, dramaturg, and actor.

Unspoken Theatre presents Let’s Misbehave: A 1920’s theme night of music, theatre, dance, and film!

Join them on Friday June 28 as they celebrate the Roaring Twenties in honour of their new play in development, Walking Around in a Dream by Natalie Kaye.

More info here & Facebook Event here.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O, no! It is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand’ring bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his ending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
– William Shakespeare, Sonnet 116 –

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Sound:

AJ Laflamme is the writer of Empty Boxes

May 30 – June 9
Presented by Homestead Theatre Project at the Red Sandcastle Theatre
922 Queen St. E. (at Logan Ave.)

When you move out, how do you decide what to take and what to leave behind?

Tickets $15
Online at Eventrbrite
Phone Reservations: 416-845-9411

“Women don’t have penis envy; men have pussy envy.”

~ S.C.U.M Manifesto, Valerie Solanas

Image:

Sound:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UqQl0CNNCY

Nina Gilmour stars in Death Married My Daughter alongside Danya Buonastella, written in collaboration with Michele Smith and Dean Gilmour.

Death Married My Daughter is the story of two Bouffons who come back to settle an old score. Tonight it’s the Revenge of Ophelia and Desdemona: Poetic and grotesque; Charming and disturbing.

Toronto Festival of Clowns 2013 – May 29-June 2 @ The Pia Baumen Studio Theatre (6 Noble st) Tickets are $15 here.  

Toronto Fringe Festival 2013 – July 3-14 @ The Tarragona Mainspace (30 Bridgman ave)

Hamilton Fringe Festival 2013 – July 18-28

Death Married My Daughter — Official Trailer

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Sound:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOT2-OTebx0

The Accidental Mechanics Group presents

But I can tell you the truth now

Because this space is a space where we pretend we are pretending

But really we are telling the truth

Our subjective truths

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Sound:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIuaEFm_EKc

Chad Dembski performs ok/ok/ok which plays with Cathy Gordon’s HAMMER for 2 SHOWS ONLY Friday May 3 & Sunday May 8PM @ hub14.

These are shows built for studio audiences.

Intimate. Simple. A bit messy. Not quite casual enough for a bar. Not quite big enough for a stage. Good for the studio, a place where we can work things through…

Advance tickets ($12) and more info available here.

“What you seek is seeking you.”

― Rumi

Image:

Sound

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2jLMWGw_C4

Suburban Beast cordially invites you to rihannaboi95 

A viral performance by Jordan Tannahill

Attend by visiting www.ustream.tv/channel/rihannaboi95 or visit www.suburbanbeast.ca for more info

Sunny needs to talk about what’s happening, but he has to do it where no one will find him. Because Sunny, aka rihannaboi95, made some videos and while yeah, they’re getting lots of hits, some people at school found them too and now the eggshell world he so carefully treads is threatening to collapse beneath him.

Cloistered within the bedroom of his friend Keira, a Shopper’s makeup queen, Sunny records a video for his loyal viewers, invoking his YouTube namesake when he needs her most.

Dealing candidly with bullying, queer identity, and the pain of self-invention, Jordan Tannahill’s rihannaboi95 invites viewers to watch a live performance from the privacy of their own computers. Directed by Zack Russell and featuring Owais Lightwala as Sunny, rihannaboi95 will be dispatched nightly from a Toronto bedroom at 8pm from April 23rd – April 28th 2013.