London Open Mic Poetry Archive
  • Home
  • Frank Davey Blog
  • Stan Burfield Blog
    • Fred Burfield's Homestead Memoirs
  • Our Events
  • News
  • PHOTOS & SUMMARIES
    • Season 5: 2016-2017 >
      • June 7th, 2017: Summary & Photos featuring Stan Burfield
      • May 3rd, 2017, Summary & Photos featuring Jason Dickson
      • April 5th, 2017 Summary & Photos, feeaturing James Deahl & Norma West Linder
      • Mar. 1st, 2017: Photos & Summary featuring Andy Verboom
      • Feb. 1st, 2017: Photos & Summary featuring Ron Stewart
      • Dec. 7th, 2016: Photos & Summary featuring David Stones
      • Nov. 2th, 2016: Photos and Summary featuring Don Gutteridge
      • Oct. 5th, 2016: Photos and Summary featuring David Huebert
    • Season 4: 2015-2016 >
      • June 1st, 2016: Photos and summaries: featuring Lynn Tait
      • May 4th, 2016 Photos and Summary: featuring indigenous poetry
      • April 6, 2016 Photos & Summary, featuring Steven McCabe
      • Mar. 2nd, 2016 photos, summary: featuring Andreas Gripp
      • Feb. 3rd, 2016 photos: 3 Western students.
      • Dec. 2, 2015 photos: featured reader Peggy Roffey
      • Nov. 7, 2015 photos: Our Words Fest open mic
      • Nov. 4, 2015 photos: featured reader Charles Mountford
      • Oct. 7th, 2015 photos: Madeline Bassnett featured
    • Season 3, 2014-15 >
      • Aug. 16, 2015 photos: The Ontario Poetry Society's "Sultry Summer Gathering"
      • June 3rd, 2015 photos: John B. Lee featured
      • May 6th, 2015 photos: Laurie D Graham featured
      • Apr. 1st, 2015 photos: John Nyman & Penn Kemp featured
      • Mar. 4th, 2015 photos: Patricia Black featured.
      • Feb. 4th, 2015 photos: feature Gary Barwin
      • Dec. 3rd, 2014 photos: Feature Debbie Okun Hill
      • Nov. 5th, 2014 photos: feature Julie Berry
      • Oct. 1st, 2014 photos: feature Roy MacDonald
    • Season 2, Sept. 2013 to June 2014. >
      • June 4th, 20114, featuring Monika Lee
      • May 7th 2014, featuring Susan McCaslin and Lee Johnson
      • Sept. 4th, 2013 featuring Frank Beltrano
      • April 16th, 2014, featuring Penn Kemp and Laurence Hutchman
      • March 5th, 2014, featuring Jacob Scheier
      • Feb. 5th, 2014: featuring four UWO students of poetry; music by Tim Woodcock
      • Jan. 2nd, 2014: featuring Carrie Lee Connel
      • Dec. 4th, 2013, featuring M. NourbeSe Philip
      • Nov. 6, 2013 , featuring Susan Downe
      • Oct. 2nd, 2013, featuring Jan Figurski
    • Season 1: Oct. 2012 to June 2013 >
      • June 4th, 2013 featuring David J. paul and the best-ever open mic
      • May 1st, 2013, featuring Sonia Halpern
      • Apr. 24, 2013 featuring Frank Davey & Tom Cull
      • Mar. 6th, 2013, featuring Christine Thorpe
      • Feb. 6th, 2013, featuring D'vorah Elias
      • Jan. 3rd. 2013: John Tyndall featured.
      • Dec. 5, 2012: RL Raymond featured
    • Dig These Hip Cats ... The Beats
  • Poet VIDEOS (open mic & featured readers)
    • 5th Season Videos (2016-2017)
    • 4th Season Videos (2015-16)
    • 3rd Season Videos (2014-2015)
    • 2nd Season (2013-2014) videos
  • BIOGRAPHIES - Featured poets & musicians
  • INTERVIEWS & POEMS (featured poets)
    • SEASON 6 - Interviews & Poems >
      • Kevin Shaw: Poem & Interview
      • David Janzen - Interview
    • SEASON 5 INTERVIEWS & POEMS
    • SEASON 4 INTERVIEWS AND POEMS
    • SEASON 3 INTERVIEWS AND POEMS
    • SEASON 2 INTERVIEWS & POEMS (only from Dec. 4th, 2013)
    • Season 1 INTERVIEWS & POEMS (& 1st half of Season 2) >
      • INTERVIEWS of Featured Poets
      • POEMS by Featured Poets (1st Season & to Nov. 2013)
  • Couplets: Poets in Dialogue
  • Future Events
  • Past Events
    • 5th Season: 2016-2017
    • Season 4: 2015-2016
    • Season 3: 2014-2015
    • Season Two: 2013-2014
    • Season One: 2012-2013
  • Who we Are
  • Testimonial
  • Our Mission
  • Links
  • Contact us

Home sweet home with Linda. 

12/31/2015

Comments

 
Had some interesting, heavy duty conversations with her relatives over Christmas. Even my sister phoned me out of the blue. And last night I woke to a dream of warning, from myself no less, telling me to be careful, slow down.


Karen Booth, Patricia Black, Meredith Moeckel and 8 others like this.
Comments

Karen Troxler You must listen to your inner voice.
Unlike · Reply · 1 · December 31, 2015 at 3:37pm

Dave Hinkley Happy New Year, Stan!
Unlike · Reply · 1 · Yesterday at 12:28am

Patricia Black Happy New Slower Year, Stan.
Unlike · Reply · 1 · 
Yesterday at 3:17pm
​
Comments

Out of darkness...an inspiration, just in time for the holidays!

12/24/2015

Comments

 
It was one shopping week before Christmas. I was sitting at a table in the packed food court of the mall waiting for Linda to do her last gift search for the grandchildren.

I was pretty down. The previous two months had been about as stressful as any period I had ever experienced. One thing had piled in on top of another, continuously. None of them had been end-of-days horrendous but I had no time to relax between them. Even sitting in the mall was stressful, as I'm a recovering shy person who is still stressed out to some degree by the mere presence of people. And that day in the mall they were packed around me, a milling wall of bodies. Each one felt like a bar in a jail cell.

So I began looking at my feet. And then something happened I've never experienced before: I began to sink, to slowly move down through the floor into the ground. I panicked and looked around--I was still the same size and height as before. And the feeling was gone. I assumed it must have been depression imposing itself very literally on my mind. Like in a dream. That seemed a bit humourous. I sat there. I hadn't realized I was that depressed. I tried to take my mind off things. Think about myself. My body. Reality. Then I thought of the word resilience. I had read about resilience, that old people who have that mental habit, or outlook, do better than others as their bodies decline. Maybe I could dig myself out of this depression somehow. It would be good practice at the very least. So I looked up again at the swarm of people. How can I see a silver lining here? What could lead me to the opposite of the negative I'm feeling?

And I had a sudden, wonderful inspiration!

To appreciate it properly, you need to know the background from which it emerged. I grew up in a small, isolated farm family. The four of us hardly communicated at all, and we had no visitors. I did have a neighbor friend but I was shy with him and very shy with everyone else. In school and then at college in the city not only did I have to deal with more people, all from an emotional distance, but I was an outsider to the urban structure itself. Hierarchies, for instance, other than that between parents and children, do not exist in the country. Farmers do only what is necessary and practical. No one tells them what to do. But in the city I began to see hierarchies everywhere. And hierarchies within hierarchies. I saw city people spending their entire lives trying to climb to the top where they could impose themselves on those on the bottom. As an outsider, it was impossible to take part in this kind of existence with any degree of comfort. Just for starters, I didn't know the language, and even if I managed to learn it I would feel like a fake using it, and more and more I resented being expected to. I insisted on equality and the less of it I found the more disgruntled I became. Then, in an attempt simply to rid myself of my shyness, I became a social organizer, creating London Open Mic. And, irony of ironies, I found that I had created what I most disliked, another hierarchy. This one had me at the top! It was difficult to deal with emotionally, and after four seasons I still feel very conflicted. (Although the organizing did wonders for my shyness.) Also, to make the event as inclusive as possible, I brought in featured poets, along with their bios, interviews, Q&As, the whole shebang. I don't know, and don't ask, how the audience sees this setup; whether it's resented or accepted or enjoyed. And I try not to think about it myself.
Anyway, there I was in the mall looking for a way out from under my stress and depression. So I glanced up at the multitude of faces again, faces of people shopping for Christmas presents. And I had it! This was not a hierarchy of people; it was a horizontal group. A group of shoppers spread out through the mall. I suddenly realized that most people don't see themselves as members of hierarchies, but simply as members of groups! Their main impulse is to have friends, families, workmates, people they can say hello to and feel comfortable with, and be polite to. I thought that yes, it's true, they are members of hierarchies, but really they don't care who's above them or below them. Most of the time they hardly notice. It's those around them who hold the emotional place in their lives.
I glanced up at that crowd again. In that instant, all the faces seemed brighter. Why? Till that glance, I must have been seeing the shaded sides of their faces, but now the lit sides. So I looked up again, this time more carefully. And no. In the food court there are neither shaded nor lit sides. The lighting comes uniformly from above, all sides lit evenly. Neither bright nor dark. So both my impressions had been entirely due to my mind's own outlook. Or inlook. What I felt was what I saw. Just by imagining that most of the people around me wanted only to be members of a group, their faces had brightened.

On the bus on the way home I told Linda about my discovery, and saw evidence for it in the people riding with us. I was very excited. I tried to see everything more clearly than I had before, through this new lens instead of my outsider's eye. As a result I've become more at ease living inside the world of hierarchies, letting them fulfilling their functions in civilization, of holding it together, moving it forward.
​
My own creation works as a hierarchy as well, but really we're a bunch of individuals who enjoy each others' company as best we can.

LikeCommentShare

Jaime R Brenes Reyes, Judy Hicken, Lynn Davis Bertie and 15 others like this.

Comments

Jenny Getsinger Thanks, Stan, you articulate unspoken feelings for a lot of people. Sometimes, because I'm an introvert, too, when I've withdrawn for a break, and the cat comes to curl up, I'm reminded that we are mammals in a den and need to hole up for a while together.
Unlike · Reply · 3 · December 24, 2015 at 11:54am

Donald Brackett Me too. Us too.
Unlike · Reply · 2 · December 24, 2015 at 12:07pm

Robert Gregory Seaton Great insights. You're absolutely right that most of the time people are not relating based on hierarchies, but rather based on stories, laughter, needs... I'd also say that in my experience, being the organizer of something like the open mike, while...See More
Unlike · Reply · 2 · December 24, 2015 at 1:49pm

Stan Burfield Yes, that's exactly it, Robert. Well said. I do enjoy seeing others enjoying the events, listening to the poetry, but especially I enjoy seeing them enjoying socializing with each other. Which I should have been doing all my life and so admired in others. Now I can take part. That's my reward.
Like · Reply · 1 · December 26, 2015 at 11:56am
Write a reply...



Cambridge Keenan Thank you Stan 
Unlike · Reply · 2 · December 24, 2015 at 3:47pm

Linda Eva Williams Very good, Stan. heart emoticon
Unlike · Reply · 2 · December 24, 2015 at 5:08pm

Meredith Moeckel Stan, I thank you for sharing some of your deepest inner thoughts & philosophies. I haven't seen any of your short stories, for lack of better terms, for awhile....and I've missed them! Wishing you and Linda all the best in this holiday season. angel emoticon
Like · Reply · December 24, 2015 at 8:07pm

Stan Burfield I'm enjoying writing these prose pieces so they'll keep coming.
Like · Reply · 1 · December 26, 2015 at 11:58am
Write a reply...



Lynn Davis Bertie Interesting way of getting a different perspective.
Unlike · Reply · 2 · December 25, 2015 at 2:59pm
Comments

Hacker attack. Oh man...

12/23/2015

Comments

 
This was my latest big problem. Hope it's the last till after Christmas. A virus, followed by an actual hacker! I stupidly assumed that bad viruses were limited to porn sites. Stay away from them and you're okay. Nope. There was a banner that said, "10 Celebrities who lost their fortunes." (You will see the supreme irony of this in a minute.) And there was a photo of a famous actress, one whom I've never heard anything negative about (as if I would anyway). So, out of curiosity, I clicked on it. My computer immediately slowed, went wonky, and I had to exit the site. And for the next three days its wonkiness became increasingly worse, Until I could hardly use it at all.

Then I got a phone call. He said he was a technician for Microsoft Windows and they had detected this virus from my IP address. (I'm no computer whiz, obviously.) He said they were tackling it one computer at a time. And the only way he had to contact me was by phone because my computer was down. And on and on. I Know I'm a bit gullible, but really didn't think I could be taken this easily. But he had me wrapped around his little finger. He knew exactly how to talk, had the right answers for all my questions.

till finally, without even questioning it in my mind, I let him into the computer to fix it! And then he carefully showed me


Read More
Comments

    Stan Burfield's Blog

    Organizer of London Open Mic Poetry. former support worker for people with autism and developmental disabilities.  former farm boy, former adventurer, former florist.
    The 2014 Ted Plantos Memorial Award

    Interview in Your Old South Magazine
    Interview: The "My Writing Process" Blog Tour

    RSS Feed

    Going Out
    1. House Fly Dancing to Mozart

    Videos
    *Linda at the Christmas Craft Show
    *Our apartment
    *The  indigenous poetry event
    *Lake of Fear
    *The art of the slow talk
    *Our new Guerrilla Poetry series at the library
    *Stan discovers some treasure.

    Photo Albums
    *2 hours in one of Linda's days
    *How'd she get in there? 
    *Before the leaves
    *Pensive in winter mist.
    *New Year's Day, 2017.
    *Linda's Christmas decorations 
    *Linda and her Christmas display
    *Linda made whole wheat scones.
    *Seeing Linda off
    ​
    *Linda in first day of snow. ​
    *Balcony finished?
    *Linda relaxing
    *We'll see...
    ​*Linda and I in the Rose Garden. 
    *Listening to the leaves popping open. It sounds like rain, or crickets.
    *Fred, my father
    *​A perfect day to stroll in the woods. 
    ​
    Short Blurbs
    *Voting Booth
    *Screaming and shouting
    *New diary plan
    *That's just weird
    *It happens like this...
    *Kevin Heslop as an actor!
    *repair of damaged DNA (aging)!
    *Paterson: great movie about a poet 
    *I learned from Thomas Moore...
    *Linda' skills are blooming
    *Here's how my day began...
    *...or we don't.
    *An actual woman to a man...
    *On this Valentines Day... ​
    *How little I've changed!
    *A sunny dream, with no fear.
    *Little mistakes....
    *A label for the essence of something
    *​Dream of a typed poem
    *Here's what I want:
    *I like her quirks.
    *A little success
    *The course of history...
    *From "The Cat's Table" by Ondaatje
    *Happy to be a citizen again
    *I THINK IT’S LIKE THIS.
    *I'm so lucky.
    *After rollercoastering, I'm excited!!!
    *Old photos
    *Fire!
    *A memory that keeps returning.
    *What is TRUMP''S AUTHORITARIANISM all about?
    *Practising morality on Halloween
    *Hanging on to an ethic
    *LOOK OUT!!
    *Out of a harsh thing...
    *Mr. Moon comes rolling in.
    *What if...
    *Will I and the Open Mic both survive?
    *I'm now a published poet! Finally.
    *Well, the MRI is done. 
    *Yeah!!! I'm finally a published poet!
    *Medical Update, for those interested
    *Yesterday I had a mini-stroke.
    *We being ourselves.
    *Enormous relief
    *Orange-oatmeal cookies!
    *To put London Open Mic behind me
    ​
    *She sings!
    *Worried
    *While walking home from the store with cherries...
    *Science
    *Standing Still
    *Hey, get a job!
    ​
    *Linda and I are learning to trust.
    *Linda is away visiting relatives. 
    *"We halted and so knew that the quiet night was full of sounds..."
    ​
    *"We halted and so knew that the quiet night was full of sounds..."
    ​
    *Diet and health/longevity
    *Edward Hopper: Woman in Train Compartment
    *A pea and a bean in a pod
    ​*Colt!
    ​*Don't get it off your chest.
    ​*In a world that is neither Heaven nor Hell, hope drives everything.
    *Roy is 80
    *What is going on with these incredible coincidences I keep having?
    *My world of coincidences
    *Is that rumble a distant train or the city?
    *Revelations are everywhere.
    *Knowing you
    *Despite...
    ​
    *The sound of love
    ​
    *Our smile for the day
    *Hurricanes Carla and Esther
    ​*Time Warp!

    *The Pow Wow
    *The Polar Sea
    *Other people
    *Moccasin Bells
    * Stories from my life
    *Je  suis Charlie Hebdo, mais....
    *Life at a fire lookout tower
    *Dominoes
    *Grinch
    *This was my dad in 1965
    *Blue

    Personal Essays
    *Here’s my inch, for what it’s worth
    *Freedom to talk
    *I wonder
    ​*Will I and the Open Mic both survive?
    *Medical Update, for those interested
    *Fred, my father
    *THIS  IS  GETTING  TOO  WEIRD:  the nearly-impossible coincidences are rolling in en masse now.
    *After four seasons, I'm flying!
    ​
    *True North
    ​
    *Back to work on poetry, finally!!
    ​
    *Maybe it's time to see a psychiatrist.
    *66: My best birthday ever.
    *Out of darkness..
    *Hacker attack. Oh man...
    *Jean Vanier, what is this thing he's discovered?
    *Jean Vanier and L'Arche
    *But then again...
    *A Most Useful Invention
    *Building my next beater.
    *My dreams are full of people now.
    *Dear Diary: Relax. Take your boots off. 
    *Those big pictures
    *An UnSilent Night
    *Urban Legends
    *Familiar
    *I  had a glass of Landon Cabernet last night
    *The Less-educated Imagination
    *Listen, I'll tell you something that's really got me worried
    *Can't get enough


    Poems
    *The universe as a poem
    *If you don't know
    *A meander through Euston Park 
    *The Picard Card
    *To Open the Morning
    * We'll see...
    *1st published poem: On a Crate 
    *We decide
    *Standing Still
    *DRINK
    *Oblivious
    *Some Other Place
    *Tinnitus
    *It seems you just have to be still
    *In the Night
    *When I was young
    *Not for inspiration
    *Oh
    *Concerning our Glorious Future: (2nd prize winner at 2014 Poetry London Contest)
    *Yes I heard Ginsberg read once he said prepare for death
    *Amazement
    *Getting used to it
    *And now the news
    *Heart Shaped


    Archives

    July 2018
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013

    Categories

    All
    Aboriginal
    ADHD
    Aging
    Albert Katz
    Anxiety
    Barbara Green
    Basic Poetics Study Group
    Blog
    Blog Tour
    Carl Lapp
    Charmaine E. Elijah
    Childhood
    Christmas
    Coincidences
    Community
    Creativity
    Death
    Donald Trump
    Dream
    Dreams
    Ethics
    Father
    Fear
    Frank Davey
    Fred Burfield
    Guerrilla Poetry
    Health
    Henry David Thoreau
    History
    Humour
    Indigenous
    John Nyman
    Kevin Heslop
    Landon Library
    Lawrence Of Arabia
    Linda Burfield
    London Open Mic Poetry
    Love
    Martin Hayter
    Medicine
    Meredith Moeckel
    Movies
    Music
    Nature
    Outlook
    Penn Kemp
    Personal Essay
    Philosophy
    Photos
    Poem
    Poems
    Poetry
    Psychology
    Reading
    Relationships
    Religion
    Revelations
    Roy MacDonald
    Science
    Shelly Harder
    Shyness
    Sidewalk Poetry
    Soul
    Space
    Stan Burfield
    Strength
    Trust
    Understanding
    Video
    Volunteer
    Walt Whitman
    Writing Poetry
    Youth

Proudly powered by Weebly