A night at the Opera

Capped off a wonderful weekend with, but of course, a night at the Opera. No, no, not at Davies Symphony Hall, but at the abode of Kari Edwards and Fran in a live/work space that was an old Sears building 30 years ago.

Good to see the Well-Nourished Moon, Stephanie Young again. We only seem to run into each other when Eileen is around. Stephanie flipped through the pages of Kari's new book "iduna" just out from O Books. Can I tell you? It's a feast for the eyes with an aspect of mystery novel to boot. The text literally bounces around the page forcing you to flip and turn the pages up, down, upside down and around. There is text literally everywhere as if she's hidden messages and clues throughout the book.

Soon the crowd settled down as Kari took the podium and introduced Eileen who did a 15 minute piece, which was breathtaking, both for her and for us about entering one's skin. The speed and repetitiveness felt like a rollercoaster ride on the downslope. It left everyone dizzy, in that good, let's ride it again way. Or maybe it was the wine. It caused one attendee, a painter from Atlanta who was with one of the Chris' (I obviously painstakingly can't recall her name), to say, "Eileen's writing is like ballet, we fall in line accordingly."

Next up, debuting his new book from Meritage Press was Barry Schwabsky. Rhett would comment later it was like getting hit by cannon fire, til he realized he should just sit back and relax to let the words enter him.

Afterwards we chatted a bit more over the ube bread (which you can get at Valerio's bakery in Union City, Vallejo, and Daly City) and the heavenly brie, while Barry signed his wonderful collection.

We drove home still humming its melodic arias.