COVER STORY
What She Wanted CARA FLEMING What she wanted What she really needed Was not, in fact, a trust fund Thinner thighs, Adoring sycophants Or other improbable things What she secretly longed for Above all else Was an omniscient narrator To speak for her Caution her Defend her In those lonely moments between better days A voice that could guide her Comfort her Speak for her In times when her own voice failed And honesty did not come easily Or soon enough To be effective
Why Is My Scalp On Fire? MICHEL DUNCAN MERLE I feel watched — that amorphous malaise, reeling in memorabilia, albums of self-incrimination I raise my eyes enough to see It’s a thing, it’s visible, the head prickly with garlands of empty semi-abstract strands of foreboding The lightbulb shining behind glycerin tears My armpits hurt as I go drifting through the house Between sacred and secular windows of opportunity On the ragged edge of disaster I realized that I’d been bitten by oddly memorable explosions and hails of bullets of silvered glass — Some would call it “A Hilarious Homage To Cyrano de Kerouac.”
Bill O’Connell reads poetry. DENISE CAMPIGLIO
ing novice or collaboration of both. From the get-go, Noh Place had a bi-weekly poetry series, a Sunday jazz series, performances on Friday and Saturdays, wall space for artists on a rotating schedule and a variety of special events as well. “We purposely set up to welcome people,” Juarez said. “We set up to be an open stage and not to be critical. We purposely set up to make sure we had a place for artistic expression. We wanted folks to do their best.” In the beginning, Noh Place was certainly a labor of love, with emphasis on labor. The board members constructed all the tables and benches out of donated lumber and put a fresh coat of paint on the walls. They also paid the rent out of their collective pockets. Then again, making money was never a big concern for the Noh Place crew.
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bers Noh Place well, and takes the historical trash talk in stride, saying there’s always a tension between established arts organizations and new groups, but that he admired how Noh Place pushed the envelope. “I enjoyed what they did,” said Martin, adding that many Noh Place regulars eventually were published by the Worcester Review and featured in WCPA-sponsored readings. “I think it was an interesting organization, and I enjoyed that they did different things.” With a board made up of visual artists, musicians, performers and poets, Noh Place epitomized an open-door policy. It was a welcoming, inviting stage where poetry, music, performance, theater and gallery hung art could find a home together, whether it came from an accomplished creative voice, aspir-
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and poets,” Campiglio said. “Then it was a natural progression to be thinking about let’s pool all of our energies while we’re all together.” Lukaszevicz, who also attended Worcester State College at the same time as Juarez and Campiglio, was a Noh Place board member since the beginning. Lukaszevicz was a guitarist for The Ghost Shadows, alongside Noh Place core members Juarez, who sang, and Charles Majka and Brian Jyringi, who played bass and drums, respectively. Lukaszevicz also booked most of the musical acts at Noh Place. “Noh Place was a place where you could practice art with no fear,” Lukaszevicz said. “The spectrum of performance there was astonishing. There was, obviously, the poets and Andres was just connected in such a deep community of poets, guys like Stephen Campiglio and Jonathan Blake but also guys like Etheridge Knight, Jean Lozoraitis
“They were always trying to be some sort of counter-revolutionaries. Well, they’re (the WCPA are) all stuck up and they have big names. We’re just going to have everyone do what they can do and that was the whole idea, to create a space.” “The Worcester County Poetry Association was the establishment. They were officious. They had the funding and the big contests. And we were thought of as rebels and renegades,” Campiglio said. “The Worcester Review really wasn’t interested in publishing us. The WCPA didn’t really try to reach out to Noh Place to partner with us for events.” “The WCPA was not being representative of all the people around in the city and they saw us as a bunch of hooligans,” Blake said. “I think they came to see later that even though we were a bunch of hooligans that we were still serious and that it meant something to us, instead of us just saying, ‘Hey kids, let’s put on a show!’ We’re not Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland.” “The poetry association, after all, was really inspired by professors who were scholars. They taught poetry and I’m sure some of them wrote poetry but, basically, they were academics and that was their approach,” said Merle, who served as the WCPA president for two years. “As far as they were concerned, I was some sort of abomination. But that was back then. They were straight-laced back then. They’re probably a little better now.” Rodger Martin, the current president of the WCPA, remem-
S E P T E M B E R 10 - 16, 2020
What she needed Was a giant Booming Orator To scream “NO” In all the moments When she sat on her hands And let her heart break Very quietly So as not to be heard
and other folks that he would bring in. But the music went from jazz to folk to new age to classical.” Although she wasn’t a WSC student, Lozoraitis was also on the Noh Place board. She did poetry readings, a painting show, and musical performances there. She also shared the stage with celebrated folk artist Jacob Knight of West Brookfield, who, turns out, was also a poet. “I was a fiery feminist and to be able to talk about politics under the guise of poetry was a good way to express my feelings and let people know what was going on, in terms of things happening in Great Brook Valley and Main South,” Lozoraitis said. “Noh Place was a real social and cultural outlet. And Noh Place was a place to exchange political ideas and work together, to write new material in workshops. It was really a center of alternative culture in the City of Worcester, for a while, anyways.” Another key player later on, Bill O’Connell, did a lot of the promotional flyers, did his share of poetry readings and alternated Sundays with Jyringi running the Sunday jazz series. Although he didn’t go to Worcester State, O’Connell sat in and read poetry for the first time at Campiglio’s Tuesday Night Workshop. “The original idea of Noh Place was to give artistic voice to community artists, i.e., us, but also others that were countered to what the Worcester Poetry County Association was doing, and that wasn’t my thing as much as Stephen and Andres’ thing,” O’Connell said.
