The first time anyone
said my name and used
the word poet next to it
was in the early nineties.
I was part of William Packard’s
workshop and after class
he told me about this reading
celebrating New York Quarterly’s
30th anniversary. He declared
in his booming Orson Wells voice
that I would read one poem
and even if he badly needed
a shower with seven vestal
virgins scrubbing away, I knew
I couldn’t, wouldn’t say no.

I dressed in my best black jeans
and faded denim shirt, found
the room in the NYU library
and pointed at my name
on the flyer when the pristine
woman at the door asked me
for 10 dollars. I would read
somewhere in the middle,
between Michael Moriarty
and Amari Baraka and already
I was nervous, trying to sneak
glances at the spiral notepaper
my poem was printed on.

Moriarity read in the voice
he saved for Shakespaere
or the sermon on the mount
and I expected the cheese
and crackers to turn into steak
and lobster. No, I can’t say
I understood what his poem
was trying to be about, but back
home I started watching Law
and Order religiously. Baraka’s
spit flew through his fifteen
minute rant and he grew
blacker and angrier by the line
and I was hoping not to run
into him on the street
anytime soon. An elegant
woman pronounced my name
wrong and described me
as the kind of young, promising
poet who would help NYQ move
its future in the right direction

My poem was twenty-five
bare boned lines, without a rhyme
or metaphor in sight, spoken
in plain every day language
about my father. Dinner
was winding down, him
and me were the only ones
left at the table. He changed
chairs, hunched closer to me
and told me they were cutting
back at the factory. He was fifty
years old and if he lost his job
he wouldn’t know what to do.

My father would never say
anything like that to anyone
and I just looked at him
until he got up and went
into the living room. I read
in a too low voice that seemed
to be hoping to crack and act
like some kind of man. After,
I thought some girls would talk
to me, tell me how deeply
my poem moved them
as they touched my arm
and said they’d love
to see all of my work,
but their fathers’ were not
like mine and no I’d never
be the kind of guy
they’d either take home
for one regrettable night
or to meet their mom.
Instead, I drank a little
more wine, thanked Packard
for including me and took
the subway back to Flushing,
the place where I belonged.

I tried to read my book, but kept
thinking about what it meant
being a poet. Mostly I was glad
no one I hung out with or knew
suspected I could spend hours
in my room writing and cutting
my poems down to size. No one
would call me an artist, or a faggot,
ask me to stand on a car hood
and start rhyming when the night
got long and everyone grew
bored with everything and still
were too scared to head home
to our ever shrinking lives.
But deep down, I felt sure,
if I ever met Moriarty and Baraka
in a late night alley, my poem
would kick both of their poems’ asses
with my hands tied behind my back.