“How did it all start?” You may ask yourself. “When did it all begin?” Well, we know where it began:

Brooklyn—Bensonhurst to be exact. It began when a group of friends who had been writing poetry since before they knew each other, met, came together, exposed their words, but realized that they didn’t fit in anywhere. They wrote poetry, but they didn’t belong on the stage of The Nuyorican Poets Café, shouting and performing (although they liked to shout, but not always when they read), and they didn’t belong among the stuffy lecture halls of dried up pseudo-crusty-white-intellectuals (even though they were more than smart). So what did they do? The only thing they could—create a place where eclectic poets could gather without judgment or hesitation and rant, rave, philosophize, bitch, get their freak on, and whatever-the-hell else.

The founding poets started as far back as high school—New Utrecht or ‘New Useless’ to be exact, with Jennifer Barone and Christine LaRubio who headed up their high school art literary magazine much to the giant protest of the student body. They featured poems that dared to express opinions about masturbation, sexuality, love, and religious differences. It wasn’t the first time Christine and Jennifer would be met with confrontation about their choice of words—soon after they self-published their respective fanzines: Bitch on Wheels and FierceVagina, which was displayed at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in an exhibit on fanzines and their cultural significance. They began reading their poetry for the first time in coffee houses in New York City’s Lower East Side, including the Nuyorican Poets Café, as well as neighborhood readings in Bay Ridge cafes. They graduated from high school in 1993 with honors and unbeknownst public dishonors that would be scribbled about in the yearbook.
Christine and Jennifer parted ways for their college careers, and Christine went on to study English at Brooklyn College, famous academic residence of Beat poet Allen Ginsberg. It was there that she met Steven Baker and Douglas Duncan and worked with them on a group project for an English class (an unusual interpretation of Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken,”—complete with a hysterical rendition of the poem from the author, and a couple of dental dams thrown in for good measure), which brought their unusual creativity and humor together. Steven, Douglas, and Christine headed the college literary publication RiverRun. Christine went on to meet Ingrid Keir during their shared angst in BC’s MA English program—where they felt very cut off from the ‘poets’ in the MFA program; neither of them ever felt that they needed to earn a degree or be immersed in a purely academic setting to justify their creative writing. Jennifer went on to meet musician Pasquale Cangiano in Dyker Heights and artist Marco Morsella at The School of Visual Arts. SVA published Jennifer’s work in the literary magazine Words. The circle grew wider and the poets were written up in a local newspaper for a reading at a café in Brooklyn. The gathering of The Word Party began…

Jennifer finally moved into her first large, one bedroom apartment in Bay Ridge and in a desperate attempt to create a cheap place to party and be entertained constantly by her talented group of friends, she began to have poetry readings there. Soon they began to bring microphones, amplifiers, artwork, performance/installation pieces, guitars, stand-up bass, organs, wigs, beer, wine, cheese and crackers, chocolate fondue!! It got out of control, and took hours to clean after they left, but it was worth it for the amount of insanity that took place on her living room floor; luckily she had a video camera to document it.

Simultaneously Marco Morsella was building a house in Otisville, New York and began to have largen weekend-long parties called “The Miracle of Zero,” including camping, bon fires, short films projected on the side of the house by Marco, Jennifer and Pasquale, live music and poetry hosted by the group once a year. They met Buzz Heavy whom Christine and Jennifer had seen perform years back at the Apple Rock Festival. The group became wider—encompassing people from all walks of life, all ages and backgrounds, all neighborhoods and styles.

One night while getting her palm read at Via Della Pace on 6th street in NYC, Jennifer met Kerry Brown, a tenor saxophonist who sat and spoke with her until the café closed. It was destiny. What began soon after was "Live Thursdays" over a year of performing every week with the Kerry Brown Trio. The poets called themselves "Brokeland", a name founded by Steven Baker—a tongue-in-cheek way of paying homage to Brooklyn, where they came from, and their sad financial status as artists. Steven honed his craft with quick-witted poems—Christine penned him as a “word-smith.” Jennifer continued to write poems about love and life, Christine shared her pain, sensuality, and witty, bitchy rants, Douglas hosted the night with quick remarks and long prose that got better every time. Marietta lulled us with her belly dancing and soulful spoken word. Kerry blew his sax loud! And the band went off every time till we ended up exhausted or heading over to Baraza where Kelvyn DJed, to salsa the night away or go for indian food on 6th street.

It went on for a long time and inspired the group to begin writing more each week and getting their work down—both as performances and on paper. Jennifer finally penned her first book, Simple Language a collection of 7 years of poetry, edited by Christine, which went on display at an exhibit at Poet’s House.

Which brings us to the present so far... The poets lost their space and went a few months without an outlet. They became frustrated until savior Ingrid Keir found a new home for the poets at Raga on 6th street. Although the jazz band was missing, the night took on a totally different vibe in the new space with Jennifer and Ingrid hosting. The shape of the room and the underground nature nurtured a more intensified and focused gathering. The notorious BH—Buzz Heavy, leant his microphone and ended the nights with raucous performance pieces always built to shock or confuse. Opening and closing music acts are now a First Friday staple, our favorite discovery being Luck Be A Lady, who grace us with sweet acoustic love songs that make the girls cry. Even the music at Raga has been unpredictable, from poppy punk to classical Indian music, and even the first ever performance of Jennifer and Pasquale singing and playing acoustic guitar. Old friends from high school—James from Next Tribe and Nick began to take a regular part in the readings. Ingrid (The Secrets of Like) and Christine (Love , Rage, Family) penned their first collections of poetry. And the group went on to include Zia, Ernest and Bradley as their newest poets.

Many things have happened at the readings…countless nights of imagination, wit, shock, awe, tears, a home created to let all the misfits of poetry, art and music come together to express themselves, and always, always laughter, inspiration and good friends to be found. The saga continues…

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