I attended a memorial for poet Tom Roby at The Outdoor Cafe on Tuesday, May 17, 2023. The event was very well attended and was a good memorial for a influential poet.
The Outdoor Cafe is located at 3257 W Bryn Mawr Ave. in Chicago. Tom Roby and his wife, Jenene Ravesloot hosted a popular open mic at this location for several year. It was not as long running as other venues due to closure during the pandemic. However, it was very influential to many poets and gave them a great place to read and hone their craft.
Poets, Jerry Pendergast and artist, Debra Gregory Voss, hosted and organized the event. They hope to bring a regular reading back to The Outdoor Cafe sometime soon.
Highlights
There was an open mic reading with some great performances including:
Daniel Cleary opening the reading with a song. In addition he read “Bonjour M. Gauguin” by Tom Roby. It was published in “A Taste of Poetry Chicago Style” in 1996. Daniel is the author of The Green Ribbon.
Bob Rashkow read a poem from Shape Shifter Tom’s book from 2008. He read: “Posting Graveyards” about someone who delivers a letter to a graveyard.
Annabello Echo discussing some memories of Tom Roby and reading several short poems.
Lem Roby, Tom Roby’s son, discussed his father and read a poem about Tom’s family saying goodbye to an uncle and spreading his ashes in the ocean where he lobster fished. The ashes initially floated on the water. As a result Tom was horrified until they sank.
Tinker Green discussed memories of Tom and read some poems about his home state of Vermont.
Kari Jo, who had recently moved to Vermont, was back in Chicago and read some new poems.
Robin Fine, poet and performer in the “Beast Woman” series, read poems and gave us some memories of Tom.
Susan Moss made her first appearance at the Outdoor Cafe and talk about Tom’s involvement as president of “The Poets’ Club of Chicago”.
Carma Lynn Post read a poem with a great line in a poem talking about the Disney movie Bambi: “all the deer had names”.
Dave Gecic read three poems by Tom: “Stop worrying…” from the “Distilled Lives Anthology” and “Death Waits” and “Morning Song” from his book “Griever’s Circuit” from 2004.
Elizabeth Harper discussed when Tom featured at her “Elizabeth’s Crazy Little Thing” reading at Phyllis’ Musical Inn and read several poems.
Gari Lait talked about how Tom and Jenene inspired him to write more and gave him the confidence to read English translations of his poems. He read one of Tom’s poems along with his translation of Tom’s poem into Ukrainian.
Lynn West sang a song in Latin that was joined in by several members of the audience including Daniel Cleary.
Tina Kineller told a story about her father and how fathers inspire their children.
Lynn Fitzgerald talked about her early memories of Tom mostly from the poetry reading at “Weeds”. She said that when she first met him she only knew him by the nickname Gregorio Gomez gave him – “The Professor”.
Cathleen Shandelmeier author of Chicago Phoenix talked about when Tom was featured at her poetry on the beach reading. She mentioned his humor and kindness. She ending the reading with a rendition of “The Beach is Closed”.
Poetry notables in the audience
Poet Cynthia Gallaher author of Earth Elegance and her husband poet and publisher Carlos Cumpian attended. Playwright, Jeff Helgeson, author of Sign Of The Times and Fall From Grace. Actor, Barbara Button, who performs in our annual “Bloomsday in Chicago. And Elizabeth Marino, author of Debris: Poems and Memoir and several other books.
I almost forget poetry superfan, Avrom Litin!
Outdoor Cafe
The Outdoor Cafe has been very supportive of poetry in Chicago. I look forward to more events there.
Good article overall.