// just returned from watching downtown fireworks from beaucatcher mountain somewhere on college st & mountain st. ice cream & fireworks ftw
Tag: Asheville
fiddlin pig: thursday $5 lunch special includes a big boneless rib sandwich, side & drink… except i’m broke today…
// of course, i’ll catch the bus tonight. there’s no buses running today because it’s a holiday….. so much for the working class.
Downtown Asheville, Early Autumn
Day in the Life of Asheville
I’m surprised that one of the photos I submitted to the DITLO project was chosen as the jugde’s pick. The Day in the Life of Asheville photo project took place between 12:00 noon April 18 through midnight April 19 in Asheville, NC city limits.
Izzy’s
Beanstreets open mic
Most Thursday nights a few years ago you would find me haunting the Beanstreets open mic. Then Beanstreets closed and there was an open mic vacuum.
The Dripolator used to offer an open mic event every Thursday, but that has changed to the first Thursday of the month. And it’s a different atmosphere from the Beanstreets days.
Courtyard Gallery has an open mic every Thursday. But last night it was canceled due to lack of host and attendees.
I sat on a bench beneath the Vance monument drinking coffee from a paper cup and wondered where to soak up some poetry vibes. Plenty of singer/songwriter open mics. But where’s a poet to go to squander a few verses on a polite crowd?
for real?
Holy Shoot! Is this for real? From the Asheville Citizen-Times:
Two new high-rises planned for downtown
“…plans to renovate the Haywood Park Hotel and adjacent properties between Page and Haywood avenues downtown call for adding a 25-story tower…. The new hotel… would stand alongside a more modern residential high-rise of 21 floors overlooking Haywood Avenue…. Fraga plans to add an additional 500 parking spaces underground, as well as convert the existing Haywood Park hotel space to office and retail space.”
and
Fraga unveils plans for 25-floor hotel tower
“Tony Fraga…. said…. ‘I believe that cities have to grow vertically. Instead of developing subdivisions and increasing our dependency on foreign oil, we have to go up in downtown, not up into the mountains. And in this area, we have a tower that was already planned….’”
For out-of-towners, the downtown Asheville area is so congested it is almost insane to consider high rises and the relative human element to fill those residential and commercial outlets. Asheville might as well rename the city—New York South.
For local Ashevegas residents, might as well get ready to change your colloquial expression of “Hi, ya’ll” to “Hey, yous.”
Biltmore Village – The Bohemian Hotel
The new Bohemian Hotel creates a concrete canyon in the Biltmore Village and dwarfs almost everything around it.
Biltmore Village new construction
Chico’s and Talbot’s extends their reach into the Biltmore Village area—physically imposing their presence in this new commercial development.
Asehville’s Lexington Avenue street threads.
Biltmore Village Under Construction
(photo by Coffeehouse Junkie)
Is Asheville the wrong place to try to make it as a poet?
A call from an acquaintance in NYC prompted me to ask the question: Is Asheville the wrong place to try to make it as a poet? The Check out the D.C. scene and the Baltimore scene.
Jaye Bartell poetry reading at The New French Bar
Here’s some images from last week’s farewell poetry reading at The New French Bar. Sorry I didn’t post these sooner. I have been cur-AY-zee BIZ-ee (that’s listless lingo for “crazy busy”).
If you missed it… too, bad. The place was packed–standing room only! The entire Asheville literary scene was there… OK, maybe not the entire literary scene. Jeff Davis, Keith Flynn, Sebastian Matthews (BTW, congrats on your Pushcart nomination), Chall Gray and many more came to enjoy a night of poetry and say good-bye to poet Jaye Bartell.
Jaye invited several local poets to read and then he closed out the evening by reading from his chapbooks and yes–his beer coaster poems. His beer coaster poems are scheduled to be published in April 2008 by someone who I can’t remember. Anyone remember?
Edgy design, edgy gear
Awhile back Edgy Mama put out a request for some edgy gear and I couldn’t resist an edgy design project. So I submitted design and it was voted on and won thanks Edgy readers like Ptaak, fringes, naughty drawdy, Lightning Bug’s Butt and Autumn. Check out Edgy Mama’s blog and find out when the enviro-friendly Edgy T-shirts are available.
Liquefaction afterglow
Those who missed Liquefaction: A Geek and Artist Mixer last night at The New French Bar Courtyard Cafe, sponsored by The Media Arts Project, missed a big event. The place packed in as much creative energy as the bar could hold. For the first 30 minutes I nibbled free food, drank draft ale and watched in amazement the many geeks and artists connecting. Much networking transpired and much craft discussed and much adult beverages consumed.
Now, back to work.
Lunch time update: I left Liquefaction with a handful of cards, brochures and flyers from the following places: Tolleson Design, Creative Inc., The Map, Bid Bridge Advertising and TopFloorStudio.
Last night’s blind date
It’s been awhile since I’ve been downtown to soak up the poetry scene. Not that I’ve been slacking off, but I’ve been spending some long hours preparing manuscripts for press and that cuts into writing, reading and listening to poetry.
When my wife and I entered the café we were pleasantly surprised to find the publisher and editor of The Indie reading at Blind Date with Poetry. THE INDIE October issue hit the streets this week and features banner stories by Michael Hopping and Gaither Stewart. I contributed a small, no pun intended, chapbook review of RedLine Blues.
The featured poet last night was Jaye Bartell, author of Makes a Bird and contributor to As/Is and Malaprop’s employee. Last time I heard Jaye read was at Bobo’s. It was the first time my wife heard him read and she was impressed.
We had previously attended a poetry reading a couple months ago that featured two poets with multiple books and academic degrees between them and, well, it was a tepid reading. Actually, “tepid” is far too polite . . . I will not repeat the comments I made to my wife after the reading, but I do not think it is too much to expect celebrated poets with such credentials to read with authority and authenticity. However, the tepid reading was mere sloganeering and sophomoric. My wife thought the two poets were pandering to the Asheville crowd, or what they thought the Asheville audience would enjoy. As someone from Asheville, I felt insulted.
But last night, Jaye read his poems with self-conscious authenticity. It is my impression he wasn’t expecting to read. I don’t know if there was a cancellation, but he stepped in and he did a fine job. There is a quick wit and nice precision to his short poems. One can tell he enjoys playing with words, both how they look on the page and how they sound on the lips. I remembered his poem about Vermont from Bobo’s and my wife and I both enjoyed his final poem about cardinals.
Hearing Jaye read last night encouraged me to return to my stack of neglected poems and reconsider submitting them to pulishers. Recently, I have felt I should give up on poetry, but it seems it hasn’t given up on me. Still, later last night when asked to read some of my poems, I couldn’t do it. I can’t explain it, but I just couldn’t.
Courtyard Gallery Open Mic
Courtyard Gallery & Studio Open Mike
Thursday nights
9 PM-12 midnight
Downtown Asheville
Thursday nights
9 PM-12 midnight
Downtown Asheville
Free to Public
Okay, is it “open mic” or “open mike”? I’ve seen the term represented both ways.
If you’ve missed the Beanstreet open mic events of previous years, then head on down to Walnut Street for a free-for-all of lyrics and poetry and eclectic vibes at Courtyard Gallery & Studio. Can’t find the gallery? Find your way to Scully’s and follow the steps downstairs or take a walk down Carolina Lane and look for the sign pointing you to a weekly event featuring singer/songwriters, poets and writers. The open mic is hosted by Jarrett Leone (pictured playing the didge). Also, check out their podcasts, “True Home,” on Apple iTunes.
Hot off the press!
They arrived yesterday–thousands of them. Last night I received copies of the debut issue of D’licious Magazine. There’s something special–magical–about holding months of hard work, long hours and gallons of coffee in the final form of the printed product. Join me Saturday night for the d’licious magazine release party!
Here’s the details:
Saturday, August 5, 2006 from 7:00pm– until
Contact: D’licious Magazine at info@dliciousmag.com
D’licious Magazine will debut its premier issue. Come experience a taste of Asheville’s cuisine, entertainment, breweries and wineries at the Haywood Park Ballroom (1 Battery Park Ave., Asheville, NC 28801) underneath the Haywood Park Hotel in the heart of downtown Asheville.
Food and beverages provided by: Belly of Buddha Catering, the Flying Frog Cafe, the Frog Bar and Deli, Biltmore Estate Stable Café, Thai Basil, Hannah Flannigans, Skully’s Signature Dine & Drink, Digable Pizza, Greenlife Grocery, Sweet Monkey Bakery & Catering, Clingman Ave. Coffee and Catering, Zuma Too: Chef Oso’s Culinary Passport, Haywood Road Market, Sclafani Distributors, the Biltmore Estate Winery, Hanover Park Winery, the French Broad Brewing Company, Highlands Brewery and the Pisgah Brewery.
Additional sponsors: The Westville Pub, Kabloom, 96.5 WOXL, and the Art of Microbrewing by Stephen Patrick Boland and Kevin Marino.
Entertainment by: David Stevenson, Cabo Verde, Free Planet Radio and Jen and the Juice.
Purchase tickets today: The Haywood Park Hotel, The French Broad Brewery, Greenlife, Hannah Flannigans, Clingman Ave. Coffee and Catering, Skully’s Signature Dine & Drink, The Haywood Road Market, Orbit DVD and Diggin Art.
Tickets are $25 in advance and $35 at the door.
Write Stuff: ‘Cause that’s what poets do
Proof positive that I can write under pressure with many children under the age of six (no, they are not all mine). Before you click the link and read this week’s Write Stuff1 post, here is the backstory.
My wife and I invited a friend and her children to join us for a Bele Chere2 excursion. My children were very excited to have guests and were acting accordingly by running from one end of our small cottage to the other end while loudly proclaiming their enthusiasm. I started writing the piece around 11 AM amid the din of my progeny, and guests arrived around 11:30 AM for an early lunch before we headed to Bele Chere. With double the children the beautiful chaos did increase. By 12:30 PM I had posted this week’s column while everyone else ate lunch.
For more than I month I had been reading and pondering the essence of this piece but had not committed it to paper. Inspired by the lyrics from the Steve Brooks’3 song Dead Poets Society (from his Purgatory Road album), I chose the title — “‘Cause that’s what poets do.”4 My outline for the piece was simple and I offered the question, “Why should I write poems if people are more interested in my activism?” Realizing the piece ended darker than I anticipated I added a sarcastic spin at the end àl a George Thorogood’s “One bourbon, one scotch, one beer.”
So here’s this week’s, “‘Cause that’s what poets do.”
By the way, Bele Chere was a hoot! The kids enjoyed it because they all received balloons that they could fight over and the parents enjoyed it because the children were very tired from all the walking and went to bed early. And that is what parents do.
NOTES:
1) Write Stuff, accessed April 9, 2009, http://www.take2max.com/writing/ (page no longer available, web site deactivated. Write Stuff published blog posts from 2006 to 2008. Write Stuff moved to Write Anything, https://writeanything.wordpress.com/)
2) Bele Chere, was the largest free festival in the Southeastern United States until 2013, accessed April 27, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bele_Chere
3) Steve Brooks, accessed April 27, 2026, https://stevebrooks.net/
4) Matthew Mulder, “‘Cause that’s what poets do”, July 30, 2006, Write Anything, accessed April 27, 2026, https://writeanything.wordpress.com/2006/07/30/cause-thats-what-poets-do/
Notes from last night’s poetry reading
Instead of writing an eloquent report of last night’s reading, I will just post the notes I scribbled into my notebook. Yeah, if you were there, I was the one with my head buried in a notebook frantically writing. Blame it on my ADD tendencies. Apart from running spell check these notes are as they generally appear in my notebook–complete with poor punctuation, abbreviated thoughts and for some odd reason attention poets’ fashion. Right on … here I go …
Chall Gray
Breaks the ice nicely with a humorous poem about furniture and contrasts it with a poem about a brother and a sister who observe but do not talk about things. He wears a black long-sleeved button down shirt rolled up to the elbow–blue jeans–hair dark, pulled back into tight short ponytail. He ends with a moving homage to his departed father by asking “why.”
Ingrid Carson
Begins with a poem asking what color is the American dream. “What Now” is read second. She wears a black top, wavy brown hair pulled back, framing her face. “What am I going to do now?” she asks and ends; “What am I going to do now?” Her last poem is in two parts; “Still Life” and “My Hands.” She reads, “a violence of flowers…” She reads with purpose and poise and through delicate lips and intense blue eyes as if to say, I know something you don’t know and I have the floor for a few more lines. “You have pushed the mind to the limits…” She concludes that beauty is found in the ugliest of things.
Thomas Rain Crowe
Wearing all black–he tunes up a wooden flute–poet is participant–reads a letter to the editor of a local newspaper in Jackson county–admits he spent a lot of time writing editors. He reads of beauty and uses metaphor–King Kong movie cements his argument to turn corporate development back to nature’s beauty. He next reads an extended haiku written for Steve Earl for some event last year. “What profit? What Price?” he asks. “We can do better than this,” he concludes the poem powerfully. His poem “Peace Will Come” is accompanied by the evening’s featured keyboardist, Steve Davidowski. “Peace will come one day” is lifted over the ambient keyboard harmonics–his reading intensifies. “When peace comes to stay” ends his poem. He steps back, places the flute to his lips and plays–the keyboardist joins the melody which concludes that session.
Emoke B’Racz
First poem is recited in Hungarian. “Fragmented Life” is about her father who she says is bigger than life–sometimes everyday. “Try not to talk about the time,” she reads. She reads about her father’s internment camp experience: “Now take that.” She shares of the hard life of the punished young men in those camps. “Silently he left.. to give your youth for democracy…taken…” She wears a white blouse, gold necklace with pendant, black suit jacket–1965–“Poets Among Each Other” translated and published in 1970-something (’76?). “This is how we stand my brothers,” she reads her translation. It’s a short work. She rolls her tongue across her lower lip from right to left frequently before saying “I could use some water” then reads her last poem of the evening.
15-minute intermission
Will Hubbard
Reads several poems–long brown hair wrapped behind his ears–as he gazes down upon his papers it rests on his shoulders like a hood–he reads a poem called “Porn” with cynical tones of humor and wry sensibility. “5 for 5 for 3 Straight” is his last poem “and one learns where to leave off” he reads. His left hand casually in his pants pocket, his right hand holds his loose-leaf manuscript. “Saying it how it was originally said…” He reads as one might read a tele marketer’s script.
Rose McLarney
She reads a collection of poems concerning the over development of Madison county–lose of land to corporate contractors–overgrowth of urban/suburban sprawl. “Shouldn’t fight … farms let them go,” she reads. Her thin lips clip her words nervously as if she is unaccustomed to public reading. She wears a black sleeveless top with flowing flowery patterned skirt–hair pulled back, leaving dark curls to cascade down the back of her neck. Her last poem: “… the peace of the American South.”
Laura Hope Gill
She tells of her BMC connections–reads “Ponco” with an eruption of words and demands social justice “when she was the question” referring to the dead old woman under a poncho many Americans saw after Hurricane Katrina–The image of a woman who died waiting for medical assistance in the aftermath of the hurricane that destroyed New Orleans. She wears hoop earrings, thin gold necklace upon her chest, low-cut white blouse and black sweater. She reads several poems of childhood witness “we slept in our bunk beds … spelled out in silk.” She reads about a stallion. She reads with proficiency and like Ingrid has a smile and sparkle in her eyes suggesting a joke that only she knows the punch line. Her speech skills draw several people forward in their seats. Or maybe its the hard wooden seats we all endure. “The wind of their grandfather’s song… ” she reads.
Glenis Redmond
“Enter through the door of war…” she begins after adjusting the microphone. “Grief is an uttering tongue.” She begins with a powerful recitation. She is a performer–practiced in public settings. Her second poem is “Lifting” about the Kenilworth slave cemetery near her neighborhood. “Bid us ride,” she reads. By far she is the most charismatic poet of the evening. “Looking back to the land where courage was born.” Due to the lateness of the evening she says she’ll only read three poems. Her next poem is about Nina Simone: “bitter aint born black.” Her final poem is a recitation: “Every time I hear King speak I feel a rumble…” she starts and concludes, “We shall.”
Flasheville
Flash fiction + Asheville = Flasheville.com
Flasheville published “Another Empty Glass” over the weekend.
Bonfires at Pritchard Park
I designed for The Traveling Bonfires.
Bonfires for Peace at Pritchard Park
Saturday, Aug 6, 2005
3pm to 10pm
Downtown Asheville, NC
Featuring:
Dashvara, Large Lewis, Phuncle Sam, Sunshine
Interview: EVA SCRUGGS
It was early February when I visited Eva Scruggs at her River Arts District studio. The recent winter storms had swelled the French Broad River above normal levels and I watched the ominous river on that cloudy afternoon as I drove to meet her.
Eva Scruggs welcomed me into her studio and we exchanged pleasantries. She offered me beer, tea or chai. “Chai would be great.” I said as I retrieved some recording equipment from my canvas messenger bag. She prepared a cup of chai and sweetened it with honey and added soy milk. She offered me the warm drink then sat down in her white floor chair and sipped her beer from an old mason jar. I pressed the red “record” button and began, “Tell me a little about yourself…”
“I guess,” she said. “I started oil painting at the age of six.”
There followed a brief discussion about art school. Eva told me that she had majored in art at the College of Charleston and later received a masters in art education in Tennessee. After that, she took some time off. I asked her if she thought it was important, as an artist, to unplug from art-making.
“Yeah, well, I had to for financial reasons. So, I mean, it isn’t that I ever really wanted to just focus on teaching art. It’s that I had to teach art to make money to feed my habit which is doing art.”
It seems that most of the artists that I know work a day job to fuel their creative passions. Maybe it’s not possible to be a full-time artist. Maybe juggling between art-making and waiting tables is necessary for artists.
“If all I had to do was be here in the studio and paint,” she said. “I would probably go crazy. I would probably get a little too self absorbed. You know how you can really drift into your own world. I need that world and at the same time it helps to keep… balance. So, I teach and I do organic farming during the summer time. And I’m a mom.”
“I really like to teach. I teach at AB Tech and I really, really feed off the new energy of new students… fresh ideas… There is something about the farming thing, too. I have to have at least a certain amount of it, you know. So, no, I wouldn’t want to paint full-time. I think I would go crazy.”
Our conversation weaved into an unsuspected path of artists being the true scientists and modern prophets. But I’ll save that for another time. I wanted to know what direction she thought art education is heading. She suggested that there are two branches of thought. “One is more academic, more exclusive amongst artists. Lots of MFA programs are focusing on what’s relevant to this century or even this half of century. But to me it seems kind of elitist. It seems like that’s going to be a view of art that only a certain amount of people can understand. It’s art for artists.”
“The other, which is sort of my path… is art to the people. Part of the reason I am a figurative painter is because I know that people relate and understand figurative painting. Common, average people understand basic symbolism. Part of my thing… is being able to communicate with people, everyday people. Not just artists who are going to understand the breakdown of elements and principles. So I paint… paintings that… have messages. I don’t paint them for someone to buy. I paint them to express this.” She gestures at the paintings around her. “I’d like people to see and understand and relate. That’s what all those biblical paintings are kind of about, too. Let’s rethink this story. You know, turn it around in a different point of view and modernize it to some extent.”
At the mention of the biblical series, Eva appeared more relaxed, more confident as if she had arrived in her sanctuary. She took a drink from her mason jar. It appeared she was ready to discuss her biblical series.
“Well,” she paused and looked at her hands which were covered in dark fingerless gloves. “It seems like when I started with the biblical theme… I was working on a different series. I was working on the states of human emotion. Trying to capture different emotions… through expression.
“Anyway, so the last one I did, of that series, was a self portrait with my child. After I painted it, I recognized it as a madonna, and I painted in the background a scene from the WTO protests in Seattle. That’s where it all got started. It’s called ‘The Jaded Madonna.’ The madonna is holding this child and she’s obviously concerned, and the child is open, wide open. But behind the mother… the police, decked out in riot gear… smog in the background from the gas that they’re releasing. So, it was kind of a statement.”
“And then it just sort of clicked in my mind,” said Eva as she motioned with her hands. She seemed focused on some point on the floor. “This is something a lot of people will relate to. It’s a biblical theme. It’s a classical theme. People look at it because of that and then… if you can get them in that far then throw something else in there that talks about modern culture. You know, it’s just the juxtaposition that makes a strange commentary. So, I feel I could run wild with that theme.”
I sipped the chai then asked her to tell me about her recent painting series.
“I’ve been working on a dream series just because I’ve had these reoccurring dreams throughout my life. I’m not exactly sure where they come from. But I figured that’s a way to address them, and maybe make them go away.”
“It’s not that they are really bad dreams,” she continued. “I usually have these water dreams where I’m swimming. I can see the top of the water and I know I’m almost out of air. So, I just keep swimming and swimming. But I can never quite make it to the top and I start somehow recirculating my air and… breathing in the water. It feels really good. Anyway, that’s what that one is about…” she said as she pointed to the painting over her right shoulder.
“And that one” she pointed to another painting across the studio resting on an easel. “An image I’ve had in my head for a long time.”
We spent more time discussing ideas, life and art (which I may write about later). But I knew she wanted to do some painting that afternoon. So, I thanked her for the chai (complimenting her on the way she prepared it), packed up my recording equipment, and left Eva Scruggs in her studio with the visions in her head that desired to be translated into pigment on canvas.
(Originally published in The Indie, March 2004 issue.)
Coffeehouse Junkie 