Poetry cafés: Mihkel Kaevats

According to festival tradition, you can get into the festival mood on Wednesday (which happens to be 25 may this year) by walking between various cafés of central Tallinn and listening to fresh work by Estonian poets. This year, the programme is very varied, so the audience can choose not only between different locations but also moods. At 4 pm, Igor Kotjuh will kick off the programme, and his most recent observations on literature, culture and life can be found in his collection of poems Kuidas kujutada päeva? (2015) and in the Caffeine café (Vana-Posti 2). He will be accompanied by the clarinetist Marten Altrov. At 5 pm, Kehrwieder Chocolaterie (Saiakang 1) will host Silvia Urgas, whose debut Siht/koht (2015) was one of the brightest debuts of the previous literary year. Urgas will be accompanied by the well-known saxophonist Siim Aimla. At 6 pm, Maiasmokk (Pikk 16) will treat everyone to Jaan Pehk, who needs no introduction as a musician, but who also recently published his collection Kohtumine tervisega (2015), without doubt Pehk’s best yet and the funniest in last year’s poetry output. From there, you can head to Chocolaterie Pierre (Vene 6) at 7 pm to witness the power of Võro landscapes and traditions as performed by Ursula Zimmermann, who made her debut last year with the collection Kiripuu (2015), accompanied by musical instrument maker and musician Tarmo Kivisilla. The poetry café programme will be concluded at 8 pm at the Drink Bar (Väike-Karja 8) by Mihkel Kaevats, who is equally at home with irony and sentimentality and whose newer work is so fresh that it has not even been published yet. After Kaevats and Ivar Karm, who will accompany him on a steel drum, the long festival weekend awaits.

The event is in Estonian.