edgar oliver: the statue @ gershwin hotel april 5, 2011

edgar oliver: ‘the statue’

a reading
tuesday april 5, 2011
8pm
$10
@
Gershwin Hotel
7 east 27th Street
NY 10016

Edgar Oliver DVD; ‘the hermit & other poems’

click to buy

Edgar Oliver DVD; ‘the hermit & other poems’

‘the hermit & other poems’ is written by & starring Edgar Oliver. It includes ‘The Hermit’, poems excerpted from ‘a portrait of new york by a wanderer there’ and ‘mother was a hit run driver’ from his play ‘Motel Blue 19′.

Join the Edgar Oliver group on facebook.

Original music composed for the film by Michal Szostalo & performed by Daniel Levin. Art by Aaron Howard.

Edgar Oliver started performing in New York at the Pyramid in the mid-1980′s alongside artists including Hapi Phace, Kembra Pfahler, Samoa and playwright Kestutis Nakas.

As a playwright, many of Oliver’s plays have been staged at La MaMa and other downtown NYC theatres, including The Seven Year Vacation, The Poetry Killer, Hands in Wartime, Motel Blue 19 and Mosquito Succulence.

As a stage actor, he has performed in countless plays including Edward II with Cliplight Theater, Marc Palmieri’s Carl the Second, Lipsynka’s Dial M for Model and numerous productions at Axis including Trinity 5:29, A Glance at New York (Edinburgh Festival Fringe & NYC), Julius Caesar, USS Frankenstein, the Hospital series, Seven in One Blow, or the Brave Little Kid and the one-man show East 10th Street: Self Portrait with Empty House (written by Edgar & directed by Randy Sharp – Edinburgh Festival Fringe & NYC).

Edgar is also one of the most beloved storytellers at The Moth.

His film roles include That’s Beautiful Frank, Henry May Long (directed by Axis’ Randy Sharp) and Gentlemen Broncos (directed by Jared Hess). His published works include A Portrait of New York by a Wanderer There and Summer (published by oilcan press – oilcanpress.com); and The Man Who Loved Plants (published by Panther Books and available at Goodie.org).

SANDYPAUL: a play starring Edgar Oliver & Sean Lewis March 11 & 12, 2011

Storefront Space at 94 Norman Avenue in Greenpoint Brooklyn (11222)
94 NORMAN AVENUE (L Train to Bedford, G Train to Nassau) steps from Nassua Stop on G train
Greenpoint, NY

work-in progress showing of new one act play
written and directed by Sean Edward Lewis
and featuring EDGAR OLIVER AND SEAN EDWARD LEWIS
$10 Donation / Beer and Wine
www.stjohnstheatre.org info@stjohnstheatre.org

The End of Summer

The end of the summer is here again.
I feel the same melancholy I have felt
since I first knew summers ended –
the melancholy of the crickets’ valiant singing
in the early coming dusk,
the melancholy of the boy who soon must return to school –
the melancholy of the summer’s end.
I wish that I could be again
eleven years old in the backyard
watching the night come early
and feeling the change in the leaves
the crickets can’t sing away.
I wish I had to go back to school –
so I could be eleven years old again and dread it.

Why must I like the crickets grow old?
Why must I like the summer end?

ALWAYS/FAR party- a new book by David Francis from oilcan press

PARTY
oilcan press presents
a limited edition of ALWAYS/FAR
a NEW book of lyrics from the first two albums illustrated with drawings by the author
in glorious black and white
followed by a jam session
recitations
for all-nighters

15 4th Street, Apt. 3 Brooklyn
Take the F or G train to Carroll St. stop exit at the front of the train (2nd Place) walk down Smith Street (against traffic) pass 2nd Place on your right 3rd Street on your left the next block is 4th Street
Thank you and hope to See you

http://oilcanpress.com/

http://davidfrancismusic.com/

Edgar Oliver reads in Greenpoint Brooklyn — Apr 23, 2010

By the Lagoon

There is a bridge in Prospect Park that is
now condemned.
But I walk over it anyway
and I go beyond the collapsed fence that
wards you off from its edges
and I peer over the bannister at the
beautiful lagoon below
with its shallow yet mysterious water
which is a world unto itself -

a world of sky and turtles -

for water and sky are one -

and turtles and birds within them.
And I remember a long time ago -
when I first looked down into this
lagoon and saw it leading away
and I was young and ready to follow roads -

as I still do.
But I used to go there and become almost

mad with being lost by the lagoon

mad with the woods -
mad with the day and its gold and my

solitude among it.

Mad with my own young murderable beauty -

like some crazy screaming bird -

yet silent – exultant -

pale and screaming with solitude beside

the water -

the silent song of solitude surrounding me -

with its splashes and flutters of wind

and strange shrieks of birds.

And then through the leaves black boys
on bicycles came crashing -

shrieking with laughter -
and I stood still, frozen with terror -

thinking
“They are going to kill me” -

feeling myself so murderable there among
the woods -
on the black side of the park -
so murderable by teenaged black boys

on bicycles -

how could they resist murdering me -

a boy trying to be a tree among trees -

but a tree who has not stopped being a boy -

a young man in love with himself as he was

at seventeen -

when he first set out on his wanderings.
This was where his wanderings had led him -

to this abandoned place.
I imagined living there by the lagoon -

that I was that boy I once was,
still living there among the trees.
When night fell, though, terror overcame me

and I left the park and went home.
But that boy stayed there among the trees.

I imagined his life -

that I had been alone all these years.
I was a man of twenty-seven who lived in a

strange rooming house with his sister

and drank and went to night clubs.

But I was that boy I once was.

I lived by the lagoon.
I had not spoken in years.

I had drifted away from humanity.
I peered out from among the leaves.
I look out of my eyes.

I am alone.

This all took place long ago -

in the summer of a book I began to write,

but a real summer as well -

the summer I first found that abandoned place.

That was years ago.

The book is written.
The book is long since finished.

The boy lives in the book.
But I think he is still there by the lagoon.
I think I must have thought that I could

be that boy again.

I still do.
If I spent one night by the lagoon

at dawn I would be gone
and that boy would be there, watching
from the leaves.
But in all the years since I first found that
place I have never dared spend one night

there.
I have always been too frightened.

left to his own devices

edgar reads at COP PIECE may 27. COP PIECE is extended MAY 26, 27, 28

COP PIECE is extended
MAY 26, 27, 28
at 94 Norman Storefront Space, Greenpoint 11222

Edgar joining with new poetry Thurs May 27!
and fine artist Chris Domenick with lecture / slides about bumble bees
thurs / fri may 27,28

best, stjohnstheatre.org

Come see new theatre in a Greenpoint Brooklyn Storefront this Fri and Sat nights …

“COP PIECE” episode one. a series about cops and and coping
by Lilac Co and St John’s Theatre.

AND

Edgar Oliver performing new poetry

in Greenpoint, April 16, 17 and continuing Fri & Sat nights in April to May 1st. Doors 8. Show 830. $10 donation. Beer and Wine. please rsvp stjohnstheatre@stjohnstheatre.org I 94 Norman Ave. Greenpoint 11222 I Nassau stop G train, 10 min to Bedford L, B62 to Norman Ave. stjohnstheatre.org

Boy in the Rain

There is a boy out there in the rain.
I see him sometimes out there behind the trees.
I look and there he is.
It seems he has been standing there for some time.
He looks up into the rain
and I see dark birds wheeling up there.
Their cry comes to me
and I look back and he is gone.
I feel the rain on the nape of my neck
and I realize that I am crouching there among the roots
staring at the sky in a puddle -
the sky deep in the splashing rain.