In thinking about this subject for the umpteenth time, I’ve decided to issue this official warning to all who read or hear my poetry:

I make some of it up.

I try to use my imagination, my knowledge, and my skill to create believable worlds with strong imagery and good use of sound dynamics.

Sometimes I write directly about my own experience, sometimes I take the voice of someone else in an experience I’ve been involved in, sometimes I change facts to make a better poem, sometimes I make the whole damn thing up.

Regardless of the facts given in the piece, I trust that my underlying intent — to express some human truth or bit of observation, maybe even offer some insight — carries me through.

The difference is this: I admit it when I do this. So if I tell you a poem is a true story, it’s a true story.

If I don’t, assume NOTHING — the voice of the poem is frequently not the voice of the poet.

At least, not in my case.

If your heart moves too fast
for your self to keep up, your self
may be scared and fall farther
behind for a time.

This doesn’t mean
that your heart
was on the wrong path. It may mean
your heart is fleeter, stronger,

than you want to admit.
And look at all the people
cheering you on! There are races
that end, races that don’t,

races you can only win if you
follow the leader,
trusting (as we do) that you’ll catch up
some day.

Now then — cut it out. I think you’re allowed some personal venting. We’ll let it go this time, but if it happens again…

we’ll be right here.

What if, instead of starting our own organization, we built a union within PSI — a voting bloc, a pressure group, call it what you will, that could simultaneously work on improving the quality of the poetry and shifting the emphasis from NPS as an end result to NPS as a process for delivery of the poetry?

I’m not really sure what I am driving at here. I’m not good with details this late at night — or during the day, for that matter. I’m a better big picture guy.

What I am trying to suggest is that those looking for change organize as a group first, then take the necessary steps — if that’s a new organization, fine; if it’s a revamped PSI, fine too.

After all — it’s a hell of a lot more fun to take over an existing organization than build a new one.

and there’s no reason to assume it’s not…

we ought to either trash it, trash PSI, or get serious about reform.

A little revolt by some established venues might help.

Goddamnit, when will people grow a spine and realize not being a certified slam venue is not the end of poetry as we know it?

first day on the new drug —
sucked.

i was agitated all day and i’m completely demoralized.

i know i have to give it time — but the additional side effects i felt today were barely tolerable.

at times it was all i could do to keep from screaming and running away.

it had better get better, and soon.

The new daily medication load is:

750 mg of Lithium
40 mg of Prozac
50 mg of Seroquel
25 mg of Lamictal, going up to 50 mg in two weeks

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lamictal has some minor side effects — mild headaches, a tendency to produce mild mania — and one rare but potentially fatal side effect: Stevens-Johnson syndrome, in which the first layer of your skin detaches from your body. Kinda like a massive, 100% coverage 3rd degree burn, with similar consequences, i.e., permanent scarring or death, whichever comes first.

It’s really rare, but that’s why you build up to it to ensure it won’t happen.

On the other hand, it’s allegedly a wonder drug, and the first thing they’ve got that does a good job with my bipolar II pattern of being more down than up. Lithium actually isn’t as useful for that, but it’s a decent mood leveler.

The eventual plan: reduced Lithium and whatever the working dose of Lamictal turns out to be for me; no more Prozac or Seroquel.

Unless, of course, I die first.

_____________________________________________________________________

We have HBO on Demand now, which means I finally got to watch Def Poetry Jam for this week.

Go Dawn! You were lovely and sensational. Go Morris! Laughed my ass off, and I knew the piece. Go Bassey, KRS-One, Kelly Tsai!

I think this one was pretty good.

______________________________________________________________________

I am feeling better, if a bit drained right now. I start the new drug in the AM. We’ll see.

I’m such a skeptic. I’m so sure I’m doomed.

I had a bit of a meltdown last night.

Sorry to those of you who read it. It’s been deleted.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The news from NPS is ugly. And there’s no joy for me in hearing it.

Maybe it’s time we stopped fucking around and took care of some of this shit.

If it looks like things might be changing, I’ll come back in.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Does anybody know anything about dealing with people? Some good, simple rules to make it easier?

I recently seem to have forgotten everything I ever knew.

was fine, nothing special. I did a fairly standard set, pleased myself, felt ok, blah, blah, blah.

Most notable for the fact that in the presence of my boss, I suggested that I would fuck a dog as part of my feature.

I didn’t.

In far more important news, the poem I wrote for the Stonewalkers is up on their website: http://www.peacefultomorrows.org .

This pleases me so much.

What a great event.

It was cathartic to read “Dispatch…” last night. I had retired it, partially because of the emotions it brought up —
and doing it last night, it felt right that I had retired it, and that I had brought it out as well.

It turns out that one of the women who spoke last night had lost her husband, who happened to be sitting next to Robin Kaplan, one of my friends, on Flight 11. We hugged, talked, and it was good.

They are going to hang my poem, “Gift”, on the caisson of the stone as they walk.

No, I don’t miss Nationals. Not at all.

If you’re in Boston, come see me tonight at the Cantab, where I’ll be featuring…we’ll talk non-slam stuff and read poetry.

love,
T

Coulda predicted this.

Your CD collection is almost as big as your ego,
and you can most likely play an instrument or
three. You’re a real hit at parties, but you’re
SO above karaoke.
What people love: You’re instant entertainment.
Unless you play the obo.
What people hate: Your tendency to sing louder than
the radio and compare everything to a freaking
song.

What Kind of Elitist Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

really really well.

Profoundly well.

I am glad I went, glad I read what I read, and glad beyond hope that they are doing this.

More later.

I’ll be preparing three poems for tonight.

One, “Dispatch from the Home Front, Halloween 2001”, I wrote shortly after the attacks, in early November of 2001. It’s in the About.com online anthology of poems about 9/11 if anyone’s desperate to read it.

The second one will be a poem by Susan McMaster from the 100 Poets Against the War Anthology. You can find it, if you’re so inclined, at http://www.nthposition.com in the online version of the anthology.

I’d provide links, but I’m pressed for time.

This is the third one…amazing what a deadline will do.

Thank you again, LJ Posse, for helping me think. Love you guys…

GIFT: for the Stonewalkers

We have always
wanted our gifts to come to us
tied off neatly

with tidy bows.
This isn’t one of those. Unraveled
ends trail off this one like ripcords,

just waiting for one strong tug
to open up and set it free.
It may wait for years, and

even when pulled long and hard,
it may never unwrap completely
in one lifetime. Still, every gift needs

to be opened. Everyone
needs to see what may be inside –
despite the fear that it may

rise, or burst, or be so
unlike what was expected that
everything around it will have to change.

This is the hope contained in anything before it is unwrapped:
that everything will change
once someone reaches out, takes hope in hand,

and pulls.

Can I tell you, I’m scared to death to be reading tonight at this event?

Here I am, speaking, reading allegedly meaningful poetry to a group of September 11 family members united for peace.

And I can’t even read a Sept. 11 poem in NYC, three years after the event, because it makes me so insanely upset.

What do I choose? The pieces written in the year following, that speak to the pain and anger? I don’t think so.

Yet the more recent stuff seems wrong for this event.

And the political stuff is just flat out wrong, as they want the event to be decidedly non-partisan.

It’s not just about material choice — it’s also about my state of mind.

I’m not worthy to be there, is the main thing I’m thinking.

Who would be, is the answer I keep getting back.

in the night garden, a bird
is calling.
my pulse sifts
in and out of my ears. it is not enough.
if there were coyotes here they would cry
and it would not be enough to keep me
from running

toward the far off light in a stranger’s house,
if there was one to see; where
if i pounded on the door, i would surely be
rejected, falling to the stoop
smelling of jasmine and
flop sweat: beauty tinged
with despair.

i once hoped for this
solitude, but am losing faith
in its value: if i am this alone,
how will i recognize the presence
of truth? i may become too eager
to accept anything
that might speak to me,
simply to escape the empty sound of
no voice at all.

a still, small voice, they said.
they put me here and told me there were ways
to find god in the silence. listen for the still,
small voice.

i am listening and all i hear is my own.

art isn’t worth it. god isn’t
worth it. nothing is enough
except the fullness of
another person — woman, man —

nearby.

i am trying to remember that language
is an exchange.

faith and face poem…

It’s a pretty radical shift, but headed now somewhere I’m more comfortable with…still a way to go.

It’s always interesting to me how the poem changes as I change.

WHO WE ARE

there is
a greed that knows nothing of god.

there is a farce and there is applause.
there are always the same
damned people
saying the same
damned things.
there are
forever more bullets than prayers, more
fallen robes in the closet no one
ever hangs up, smooths out, cleans off.
there was honor in the rubble,
but the flag was so brilliant
honor was forgotten and left behind.

if ever there was a reason for an angel
to give up,
it sits before us like a star chart of judgment day.
if ever there was a reason for a human face
to melt away and expose its faith, skeletal and frail behind it,

this is it:

an age of blue and slippery causes,
chewed ethics and faded bloodstains,
inconvenient skins and trees.

this is it.

in spite of which, we
don’t. can’t.

we are that order
who will
not.