GABRIELLE BOULIANE - POET
Thirty years after my tours in Vietnam, I was a tech writer at Microsoft, working long hours preparing for our imminent release of Windows 2000. One night I drove to Seattle for a break from the coding and stopped by a café where Gabrielle Bouliane was performing poetry to the crowd. Gabrielle was a member of the Seattle Slam Team and organized poetry events throughout the city.
I began writing performance pieces and joined her troupe of “Slammers” at several cafes, the OK Hotel, and “Sit and Spin” – Seattle’s only combination Bar/Performance Venue/Laundromat. Gabrielle and I became good friends, and her thoughtful guidance so clearly expressed this mutual love that I wrote to please her, trusting the audience to “get it.”
Twenty years earlier, I was a stand-up comedian in the tribe of Bay Area comics who delighted audiences with wit and repartee. I understand the joke dynamic; Set up, then punchline - because people like a beginning, an end, and occasionally, self-revelatory laughter.
The healing power of such gatherings, such communitas, is a blessing of every art form; be it poetry, comedy, drama, art, or music. We seek to be a part of rather than apart from.
While in the Seattle scene, I met many imaginative and expressive poets who used language and performance artistry to speak from their hearts to the listener’s hearts.
I may have done that myself – on occasion.
Gabrielle succumbed to cancer, but a part of her spirit and style is in all I create. This is a piece I wrote and frequently performed to honor her:
I began writing performance pieces and joined her troupe of “Slammers” at several cafes, the OK Hotel, and “Sit and Spin” – Seattle’s only combination Bar/Performance Venue/Laundromat. Gabrielle and I became good friends, and her thoughtful guidance so clearly expressed this mutual love that I wrote to please her, trusting the audience to “get it.”
Twenty years earlier, I was a stand-up comedian in the tribe of Bay Area comics who delighted audiences with wit and repartee. I understand the joke dynamic; Set up, then punchline - because people like a beginning, an end, and occasionally, self-revelatory laughter.
The healing power of such gatherings, such communitas, is a blessing of every art form; be it poetry, comedy, drama, art, or music. We seek to be a part of rather than apart from.
While in the Seattle scene, I met many imaginative and expressive poets who used language and performance artistry to speak from their hearts to the listener’s hearts.
I may have done that myself – on occasion.
Gabrielle succumbed to cancer, but a part of her spirit and style is in all I create. This is a piece I wrote and frequently performed to honor her: