My September 11 was spent in Winston Salem - the Old Salem Village, to be more exact - where I listened to readings and wandered around at the Bookmarks Book Festival, sponsored by Krispy Kreme. Overall, it was a good day. The weather was nice, although a tad hot, and it seemed like everyone was having fun.

I spent most all of my time in the "Creative Cafe" booth, where Pam Uschuck from Salem College had organized a line-up of readers. It was a die hard group that managed to weather the heat of the tent, plus the withering barrage of music and other entertainment from the so so close, "Main Stage." We were like a happy bunch of refugees in there, only we couldn't hear ourselves think, water cost two dollars a liter, and there was no food worth eating in sight. (Unless you wanted a dozen glazed.)

I was really there to see my mentor from Chattanooga, Richard Jackson, read some of his new poems, but I ended up getting to hear lots of great readers. (Despite missing some of the ones I wanted to see - Bill Pitt Root and Richard Katrovas)
Some of the highlights included Ann Fisher Wirth being drowned out by the Star Spangled Banner, (before blowing me away with some of her poems from the book, Blue Room) and Galway Kinnell using his new computer to great effect. He'd just gotten a G4 powerbook, evidently, and hadn't managed to figure out how to print a new poem off at the festival. So Pam held the computer while Galway read, and a stalwart Richard Katrovas scrolled down. Turned out to be a pretty good poem, a take off of our favorite Orpheus and Euridice Myth.




Click on the pics to get a larger image. Sorry that I don't have more to say, save for Moravian Sugar Cake can give you quite a stomachache if ingested too quickly. More write-up of the Festival can be seen here.