Other ideas for messing with people’s poetic perceptions at a feature

1.
Perform behind a screen.

2.
Perform blindfolded.

3.
Claim that all your poems are written by the ghost of a dead milkman. Hand out milk to the audience.

4.
Claim that all your poems were written by someone in the audience, give them your feature money, and make them sign your books.

5.
Claim that you can’t do the feature because all the vowels in your poems were stolen by someone before the reading. Lead an angry mob into the street screaming, “WHT D W WNT? VWLS!! WHN D W WNT THM? NW!!!” After a few minutes, go back in and do the feature, thanking the audience for their support and assistance in getting the vowels back.

6.
Apologize to the audience for writing a particular poem, but don’t tell them which one it is.

7.
Create a fictional poet, write their poems, produce a limited-run chapbook of their work, and run a memorial reading for them after their death, with various artists standing up to reminisce about the deceased poet and read from their chapbook. (Actually, I once tried to do this but I couldn’t get anyone to go along with me back then — it was early in the 80’s; think I tried it again once later, but had the same problem.)

8.
Spend six months writing a set of poems to be performed once and never again; print one set of copies and delete the poems afterward; shred the poems onstage after reading them so no copies exist of them anywhere except in the minds of the audience. (I’ve done this. Highly recommended. In fact, I might do it again sometime soon, years after swearing that I wouldn’t ever repeat the trick…)

9.
Record your feature ahead of time. Play it onstage. Heckle yourself from the audience.

10.