Yes Poetry (and Prose)

 A poem that I wrote while in New Orleans a month ago is online in the latest issue of Yes, Poetry. Based out of New York, this collection has poets from all over the world, and is my first publication.

In the meanwhile, I’ve been working fiendishly on my book, Hot Love on the Wing. Its dualities are continually expanding and concretizing, and I’ve had some important revelations recently.  Remember that it is a kunstleroman, so this excerpt involves the narrator dealing with his critics:

If I weren’t a writer, then I would write a book later. But ever since that day in first grade when I realized that being a reader is only half of the equation, that if you can’t write you’re just as powerless as not knowing how to read, I knew what I had to do; even if it was an unconscious stirring in my soul, it was there.

And then when I was eight, finding an old journal entry, my first, and being delighted at my ability to record the past accurately. I remember sitting on the floor cross legged, holding a single sheet of looseleaf paper that was wrinkled and scrawled over in pencil, and being ensnared in the power of my history, standing up and being inspired to write again, and eventually come back to it in another few years and have a repetition of that delightful feeling we recognize as aging, learning.

 In actuality, I could have been disgusted at how poor my writing style was, how inaccurate were the events, and how naïve I was as a mere six year old to attempt to write. You see, I don’t really know. The first way was nicer, it could have been true. But then again, it was so long ago that to remember exactly how I felt at the time is impossible. To try to give it to you, I glorified it the way I would glorify my youth if I wrote a coming of age story as an old man. It’s nice and sweet, sure, makes for good reading, but when you come down to it, it’s the dualities that are worth exploring. My feelings of how I wrote it or read it are untenable, and honestly isn’t it more fun to wonder? To make your own decision based on how well you know me, or rather how well you don’t know me? So my true goal is to allow you to understand my psychology, so that you can see how I might have interpreted my history, whether it was 20 years ago, or last night. We’re in it together, trying to find our way through the recesses of my memory, and interpret the light shining through the corridors as an exit, or maybe as a way to get lost deeper in the labyrinth. And who knows? Maybe we want to get lost. As long as we’re not alone, right?