On Friday, February 25th Stain of Poetry held another edition of their monthly reading series in Bushwick, Brooklyn at Goodbye Blue Monday.  However, the curators turned the reading series over to Leigh Stein, who curated and hosted her third installment of Poets & Puppets.

Stein gathers an eclectic mix of writers and has them perform or read their poems with the enhancement of puppets. The line-up for “Poets & Puppets III – Don’t Go Breaking My Heart,” included the essayist Elissa Bassist, poets Marisa Crawford, Luke Bloomfield, Lauren Ireland and Lily Ladewig.  Claire Dunnington played three songs on harp. On the second song, Stein accompanied on vocals.

Lily Ladewig, author of I am a Natural Wonder (along with Anne Cecelia Holmes), read poems with the aid of a puppet while having Stein and Ireland utilize shadow puppets.  Ladewig read primarily from a series titled “Shadow Boxes,” which included nine untitled poems (six of them forthcoming in Word For/ Word). The poems are inspired by the artist Joseph Cornell.

Here’s Ladewig’s set-list:

“Dispatch from the Future (For Leigh Stein)”

“Shadow Boxes”
first lines, they are as follows:
1. “[Let’s build a fire. A shifting location.]”
2. “[I don’t remember you putting even one finger inside]”
3. “[Have you ever seen a pecan grove?]”
4. “[Let’s scare you up some drama.]”
5. “[Our poems will never be as good as pop songs.]”
6. “[For years I made a living. Making sweaters and cakes.]”
7. “[This is a routine that I made up myself]”
8. “[There are always ways for me to assemble,]”
9. “[This one is coming to you on its belly.]”

-steven karl