Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: This is called blackbird.
[00:00:07] Speaker B: I followed you past five window screens, then watched you land and dive and went out of something to watch you through. I closed my eyes to see you fly we move in tubes and your lonely cry woke new the day so it had no choice but to break away and find another not merely an echo but a lover hoping to go where your wings know no other home.
Like you, my road lies ceaselessly blue and I question a sky unable to hide the way we are born, this ache for more than just ourselves to waken to and someone in our final hour who knows the total of our lives how high we flew and how we wept when we met our other and we knew.
[00:00:57] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:01:01] Speaker C: So how does the greatest duo in poetry history, how does that get formed? And how is that Betty's mouth.
[00:01:08] Speaker A: Betty's mouth. So we did Bob's Shakespeare band for a while, and I'm not sure. I think Doug Rand dropped out. And it was three of us. It was Sheila and I and Kendall for a few.
[00:01:19] Speaker C: A few, however long, with Sheila in the Bob Shakespeare.
[00:01:22] Speaker A: Yes, she was. She was. And that's when Sheila and I found out by accident that we were, like, in sync.
[00:01:29] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:01:29] Speaker A: We didn't even have to try. We would read a poem out loud. It would just be like, oh, we're supposed to be doing this. Yeah. It was easy.
[00:01:40] Speaker C: And was she coming to the mill?
[00:01:43] Speaker A: Same thing.
[00:01:43] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:01:44] Speaker A: Every Sunday, you know? And so I. I don't know if Kendall dropped out or if you wanted to move into a different direction.
[00:01:52] Speaker D: No, Kendall moved. Kendall moved out of Mississippi.
[00:01:56] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:01:56] Speaker D: I think Mississippi. And got a position.
Poetry.
[00:02:01] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:01] Speaker D: He teaches.
[00:02:03] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:03] Speaker D: Yeah. So that was it. And Betty's mouth we had worked on with the Bob Shakespeare band. Right.
[00:02:10] Speaker A: I feel like. No, Betty's mouth happened because it was. Ended up being just me and Sheila left. And the Bob Shakespeare band. We needed a new name. And then Sheila and I just. Yeah.
[00:02:21] Speaker D: But I think. I seem to remember putting that into a piece where I had.
The guys were. It was a bass section.
[00:02:31] Speaker C: Ah.
[00:02:32] Speaker D: And they went real slow, and then you were the fast, so I think we might have done. That piece is part of the Bob.
[00:02:41] Speaker A: Shakespeare band, the actual piece named Betty's mouth. Yes, I think you're right.
[00:02:46] Speaker D: Yeah, we did it for that thing. And then they. Sheila and sin went off by themselves.
[00:02:54] Speaker A: We were like, we don't need Mark.
[00:02:55] Speaker D: You don't need me anymore.
You don't need me anymore.
[00:03:00] Speaker A: Thanks, Mark.
Because we could just get these pieces and just, like, split them up into the tiniest you know, and he had taught us everything. He taught us how to do it. You know, you gave us permission, and so we just went off and we had a blast.
[00:03:14] Speaker C: And you're not slamming, though, like, the numbers on the. And that whole thing. Okay.
[00:03:18] Speaker A: No, I mean, I would go and have fun, but honestly, the truth is, I was never the best slammer because my pieces were not as funny or as they were always a little bit softer or a little bit too creative or they were out there.
[00:03:34] Speaker D: You are very, very rarely were you in a competition.
[00:03:37] Speaker A: Yeah, so I didn't.
[00:03:38] Speaker D: I don't think Sheila would. Sheila might have been in more competition.
[00:03:40] Speaker A: I'm sure she was.
[00:03:41] Speaker D: But you were very rarely, you know, and as we've said so many times on the. On the podcast, that, you know, the competition wasn't the important part.
[00:03:51] Speaker A: I'm so glad you're saying that. Yes.
[00:03:53] Speaker D: It was like you walking in, seeing Ika Lasheday on stage. It wasn't a competition. She was featured guests.
[00:04:01] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:04:02] Speaker D: That was the inspiring thing for people.
[00:04:05] Speaker C: And are you going cross country with Betty's? What is Betty's mouth? Describe what Betty's mouth is.
[00:04:09] Speaker D: Well, his first starter was a pole.
[00:04:12] Speaker C: Mark was right once again. He's got two points now.
[00:04:16] Speaker A: You are. Yeah, he's got two points. All credit.
I think we. I mean, I feel like we. Mark was always setting up really interesting gigs that he would. One of them being at a mental hospital. Do you remember that? Where we walked in and they were locking doors behind us as we went further in and we performed for some patients? I do remember that. And there were. I mean, we just went wherever anyone asked us. Really?
[00:04:46] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:04:46] Speaker A: Okay. At that point, then, curious theater was also this beautiful, creative, artistic presence in Chicago, and they were doing shows, and Sheila and I often would be a feature in one of their shows. Bo O'Reilly. Bo O'Reilly had a great appreciation. And Jenny Magnus.
[00:05:02] Speaker D: Jenny Magnus, the curious theater group, very experimental and really heady and arty stuff out there.
[00:05:12] Speaker A: Just brilliant and ahead of their time and amazing performers and had a real appreciation for the voices, the two voices that Sheil and I would do. So they actually had us a lot. They featured us a lot.
[00:05:22] Speaker C: And how would you write that? How does one write?
[00:05:26] Speaker A: That's great. So we didn't write poems together. We would each come with poems that we were like, hey, I think this would be really fun to do together. And then we would just say them out loud, and then we would just start like, okay, well, let's just try this line together. Okay. No, let's split it up and let's do that. It was very live process that we would do it, but we never wrote together.
[00:05:45] Speaker C: And this is the nsync that you were talking about.
[00:05:47] Speaker A: This was the. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
[00:05:49] Speaker C: Do you feel like you cut your teeth then at the mill early enough that when you sat down to create this, it was. I don't know if second nature is.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: The right word, but I think definitely, I mean, hearing poems out loud, hearing yourself out loud, and then working with Bob Shakespeare band. Yeah, great name, Bob Shakespeare, but. Right.
[00:06:08] Speaker D: Yeah, that's what everybody said.
[00:06:12] Speaker A: But I also think there was just that bit of magic, like, it isn't anything that you can learn or practice. It just has to be there. Yeah, it just has to be there. Like that first time at the green mill, it was like I didn't show up, practiced. I had only been there one week before. I just. It's instinct. It's this desire. It's the rhythm of the poem in your body.
[00:06:34] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:06:34] Speaker A: Is there, like, no one can show you how to feel the rhythm of a poem in your body? You feel it or you don't feel it.
[00:06:41] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:06:41] Speaker A: And I think that that's always what I just was drawn to.
[00:06:46] Speaker C: Right.
[00:06:47] Speaker A: Language alive.
[00:06:48] Speaker D: The blend of their voices was good, too. I mean, when I. When I chose the people, I was thinking about the different tenor of the voices there. Yeah, but you were very. What was really great about that time, because now we're into the early nineties, 1992, 93, and that's when things are super thriving in Chicago. You get the goal for me, although we never got there, but especially for the Bob Shakespeare ban, I wanted that to become like a nightclub act that we went everywhere.
[00:07:22] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:07:23] Speaker D: Before Bob, you know, Bob Holman in New York finally got the idea a poetry club.
[00:07:28] Speaker A: Right.
[00:07:29] Speaker D: It didn't really make it like, you know, he probably hoped it to.
[00:07:35] Speaker C: But talking about the Bowery Poetry Club.
[00:07:37] Speaker D: The Bowery Poetry Club, it was a club dedicated, just like an improv club, dedicated to poetry. And that's what I was hoping for. Four to half. And I didn't have the chops to figure out how to do that. But at that time, there was all kinds of shows around town. So you got Betty's mouth act. You could go five or six different places to present it.
[00:08:02] Speaker A: Exactly. There was another. Another creative scene happening called the big goddess pow wow. There was a woman, Paula Killen and Marsha Wilkie. They're both in California now, but they would produce these shows of just women. There'd be like five or six of us, and we'd do at the Metro. Chicago Metro. And.
And then we'd have some famous, like, some headliner, right. To really get people to show up and fill the metro. So we would have Nora Dunn or Liz Phair or some sort of. But then we all. Cheryl Trick and Marsha Wilkie and Paula Killen and just these brilliant women, Lisa Moscani and Sheila and I, and would do stuff together. And so there were just opportunity after opportunity. And because I had this band, I also had access to these, you know, musicians.
[00:08:50] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:08:50] Speaker A: You know, Mark messing was playing in all these gigs around town, and so. Yeah, it's just incredible.
[00:08:55] Speaker D: So it was a super thriving time. Yeah.
[00:08:59] Speaker A: So I never moved to Hawaii or New York.
I stayed in Chicago.
[00:09:03] Speaker C: Did you ever temper off the live scene or.
[00:09:08] Speaker A: When my son was born, yeah.
[00:09:09] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:09:10] Speaker A: That was it. Because up until then, there was like, let's go out. Let's do what we can. At that point, Luffa method then transitioned. The tech was. I couldn't duct tape down another chord before show. I was like, I'm done with tech. And my first book came out, and I really. Then we performed a percussion, an all percussion, so Luffa. We went, you know, completely opposite directions, and we had a band called ten tongues. Yeah, no, Michael wasn't ever. He did a guest, a couple guest things, and it was all nothing. Instruments you couldn't plug in. Okay. So we did make a lot of our own instruments, and it was much easier to set up. So we were doing that and collaborating and making music and poems, and then a couple of the marks moved, and. And then I became a mom at some point, and then I was. That was just everything.
[00:10:00] Speaker C: We talk on the podcast about families and arts a little bit. Is your son receptive to what does he think of your.
[00:10:07] Speaker A: Very much? Well, you know, the. When they're young.
[00:10:09] Speaker C: What's his name?
[00:10:10] Speaker A: Leo. Leo. He was my best collaborator because the things that they say are just so brilliant, you know, so half of my second book.
Your second book is titled when I am. Yes. And the second half of that book is poems about him and the early, early days of motherhood and just the genius of that time. And I listening to him and being present. And because I was an older mom, I had done all the other stuff. I didn't need to go out and party. I'd stayed up all night making art. I was ready now to just, like, be with this little human and be just like. It was amazing. So I wrote a lot about him, but I didn't go out and perform because I was also a single mom at bedtime, you know, I was like, bed, bath book. Like, that was it. Yeah.
[00:10:58] Speaker D: But you stayed.
[00:11:00] Speaker A: I was writing. I stayed as a poet. I was writing. I started a business called Poem Grown, where I was writing commission poems for people, certainly. And then I started doing a salon with Chris Green, a lot of DePaul and Columbia people, and called Tiger Room Salon, tiger slam.
So there were things, you know, that kept me connected. And again, I feel like the universe, whenever I would get too far away from poetry, the universe would just step in and, like, you know, if I was doing a little too much freelancing, you know, the client would go away and I head back over to poetry, but it was always there.
[00:11:37] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:11:37] Speaker A: So, yeah. And now he's 16, and now I'm like, all right, time to go again. Let's go. Yeah.
[00:11:43] Speaker C: Yeah. We kind of end by asking. I asked, you know, you guys survived in a very happy way. What does it mean to be able to do this together and have this discussion at this, at this time in your lives and experiencing all the poetry and all the art that you have?
[00:12:00] Speaker A: I think I love the timing of this question because I got to do a gig at the Green Mill last Sunday. I got to be the feature, and it had been a little bit of time since I was on that green mill stage, and it had been a long time since I was on that stage with brand new work.
[00:12:16] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:12:16] Speaker A: And it just, I was like, I have to do all new work.
[00:12:19] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:12:20] Speaker A: Like, it has to start. It was almost like a beginning again where I got on that stage and I didn't know how the piece was going to feel. I didn't know how the audience was going to receive it. But I was 22 then, and now I'm 62.
[00:12:31] Speaker C: Were you scared at 62?
[00:12:33] Speaker A: Oh, my God. I was. I mean, I worked. I worked the set. I was rehearsing in the car. I was memorizing lines, and I got to the mill and I was excited. But those five minutes when the open mic set ends and, you know, you're next and you've got, like, that 510 minutes of music. I am back, you know, with Dave Gemolo and the jukebox, just the owner.
[00:12:51] Speaker C: Of the Greenville just.
[00:12:53] Speaker A: Yeah, Dave is just an awesome person. Before you get on stage, he was just giving me a little pep talk, and I'm just, like, running the pieces and being like, oh, my God, I forgot everything. I forgot everything.
Sick to my stomach, you know, just nervous. But I like that because the green mill. The Green mill is just. It's such a privilege to be on the stage for me. And it is where I want to bring my best self. And the audience deserves my best self. And so it's a higher standard. Not that every gig isn't important, but that space, that space changed my life. So I want to go in there with my highest, highest.
[00:13:30] Speaker C: That sounds like a book. 40 years of the green mill by Steve.
[00:13:33] Speaker A: Right.
[00:13:33] Speaker C: 22 to 62.
[00:13:35] Speaker D: You know, an important thing. We are such good friends, and I don't know if you remember, but, you know, part of the podcast has talked about where I never talked about my drinking and that, but when I sobered up, I would be talking to you every, every day after that. And it was such a grounding for me that 1st, 1st year.
It was just incredible. And then. And that made us very, very close. And then throughout the years, we would get together. I remember sitting on a bench in Wicker park. We would talk about the horrible gigs we had. Oh, they just did the heartland. And all they did was they're eating in front of me. And I did the Heartland cafe, too. It's just. It's a horror.
[00:14:29] Speaker A: You know, we had a library gig and no one came.
[00:14:32] Speaker D: We process all the Ydev horrible gigs we had together, but our friendship and relationships.
[00:14:38] Speaker A: And also the relationships.
[00:14:41] Speaker D: Oh, God.
[00:14:42] Speaker C: But that sounds like podcast number two and three.
[00:14:46] Speaker D: But that friendship was, was, you know, born. Just. I can't. I don't know how that became that. But I. Every day I would be talking to you, and it was a grounding for.
[00:15:00] Speaker A: Me, you were just the person. For me, you were just the person you were. Can I tell the story that I told Sunday at the Green Mill at the very end of my set?
[00:15:08] Speaker C: Yes, please.
[00:15:09] Speaker A: About emailing you.
[00:15:10] Speaker D: Oh, yes.
[00:15:11] Speaker A: Okay, so sometime this July, this summer, before we're gonna get a little political. Is that okay? Before Biden dropped out, yeah. But project 2025, the details were starting to reveal themselves. And I'm reading them and, you know, they're talking about what an acceptable family is. And, you know, I'm a single mom. I'm bisexual. My son is adopted. Adopted. He's mexican. Like, I'm like, we are, huh. Now, again, I'm 62. They're probably not gonna come for me, but I like to have a plan B. So I emailed Mark, and I said, okay, mark, if the shit hits the fan in November, will you marry me?
He emailed me back so fast. He's like, I do, I do, I do. And, you know, I mean, I'm like, there's no one else in my life I could email that. And I was serious. I was actually serious.
[00:16:02] Speaker C: Like, I think our director's a certified guy. Get you married if you want. We can.
[00:16:08] Speaker D: I was serious, too. And I said, I do.
[00:16:10] Speaker A: I knew he would be like, hey, if I need help, like, this would be like, would you be there for me?
[00:16:16] Speaker C: These podcasts have become like one big love, like, poetry show. Yeah, yeah.
Thanks so much.
[00:16:23] Speaker A: Thank you so much.
Thanks for the rest of my life beyond.
[00:16:28] Speaker D: Hey, we gotta mention that our parents always come to her shows.
[00:16:33] Speaker C: Your parents always come to the grandmother's?
[00:16:35] Speaker A: They did, and they came to this last one, too.
[00:16:36] Speaker C: Wonderful.
[00:16:37] Speaker A: My dad was freaked out when I quit my job. You know, my heart earned went to U of. I got the job. And he's like, what do you mean you quit? And then he came and saw me at the green mill, and he came up to me and the first thing he said was, I get it. I get it. And he never wavered after that.
[00:16:54] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: So thanks. Thank you.
[00:16:57] Speaker D: Thanks, Mark.
[00:17:00] Speaker C: You've been listening to through the mill, our podcast about the poetry slam. My name is Mark Elleveld. I'm the editor of the spoken word revolution books. Emily Kalvo is here with us. She named the podcast. It's an anthology she's been working on since the early nineties. And we're here with Mark Kelly Smith, the founder of Poetry Slam. We're going to be bringing some podcasts and shows to you to hear the origin stories from a bunch of different poets and a bunch of different organizers. Our director Hughes over there in the corner. I hope you had a good time and we'll talk to you soon.
