Revised Older Poem: FOR POET ANONYMOUS

“It’s better to be king for a night

than schmuck for a lifetime.”—

line written by Paul D. Zimmerman

for Martin Scorsese’s  THE KING OF COMEDY

Once you had time for nobodies like me.

Hell, I even liked/respected you enough to 

give you a lift in downtown Austin 

when we were both participants in

a poetry festival eighteen years ago.

But you wanted to be appreciated by the right people.

And I went through a phase in my life

where I was too easily angered by

the right people openly despising the wrong people 

instead of realizing what I couldn't change

and what others didn't want to change--

and going about my business.

So I became enraged at you in a public place

when you were surrounded by the people

you never wanted to be separated from.

And I--

in just over a minute--

built a wall between us

far too high to ever be breached.

Eventually, I stopped trying to

either beg for a clean slate

or continue being frustrated

over your relentless resolve

to keep miscreants like me

out of future poetry conversations.

I acknowledge I hurt you
with my belligerence and wrath.

And all I can do now 

is to write this poem

from permanent exile

and keep going about my business.

Exit Statement re my recent stint as poetry host.

From March to this past Friday, I was the Second Friday host in the poetry hosting rotation of The Rapp Saloon reading in Santa Monica CA.  Earlier last week, I resigned my volunteer position.

This is the statement I posted Saturday on Facebook:
One comment on stepping down from hosting at The Rapp Saloon: it gets very disheartening to book poet/multiple poet bills and have few (or in one case, zero) people in attendance. And, yes, I'm aware that other venues cope with this too. In the Rapp's case, I'm also aware of years past when attendance on a weekly basis was good-to-excellent. I did my best in booking and promoting, and that's all I can say.

In addition, I was booked by another Rapp Saloon host (Joe Camhi) as a feature.  No one came to see me.  I'll make no further comment on this--except to say it happens to other poets too.

How much of this under-or-non-attendance is due to aging of certain poets, reluctance to drive long distances when gasoline is over $4.00 a gallon, or the reduction of the SoCal scene to Literary  Pantheon Aspiration with gradual weeding out of Folk Art (something that certain prominent people in the scene dearly wanted) is a question that only you, the reader of this post, can answer.

That is, if you truly care about answering it.

 

Passing along another poet's wisdom about hosts and readings.

Here's a Cobalt Poets (available to the public via Yahoogroups) listserve post from veteran SoCal performance poet Bowerbird Intelligentleman, written in 2006.  It's slightly dated since the 2012 scene has shrunk somewhat in terms of venues and featuring opportunities, but worth sharing nonetheless:

i see from an e-mail in my in-box
that venue hosts are being called
"the unsung heroes" of the scene...

yes, hosts do a lot of work, it's true.
and if you've never done it yourself,
you'll likely underestimate, by half,
the amount of hassle that it can be,
constantly dealing with a bunch of
ego-maniacs who want the stage...

but let's look at the other side too...

first, producing gives you a huge boost
in visibility, and perceived "importance",
not to mention stage-time of your own,
and without having to fight anyone for it.

second, the ability to _book_others_
means that you have "a favor to trade",
and the favor-trading is very obvious...

indeed, when deserving poets come to me and
ask how they can get more feature invitations,
i regularly give them two recommendations:
1. just plain ask, and several will follow, and
2. start up your own series and book hosts,
as that's a sure way to get return bookings.

so let's not pretend that hosting is selfless.
it cuts both ways.

how these competing factors "balance"
is up to each one of us to decide, but
i think the fact that there is no shortage
of poetry series -- each with a host --
indicates how most poets weigh it out.

if hosts were really "the unsung heroes",
there wouldn't be so darn many of 'em,
because poets are _not_ very altruistic,
as anyone with experience will tell you.
(and hosts will be the first to verify that.)

no, where we have a clear _shortage_
is with the number of poets who are
willing to come to a show and _listen_,
without a strong ego-need for the stage.
_that_ is how selflessness reveals itself...

so if you're looking for "unsung heroes"
in _this_ scene, look for _those_ people.
(and hey, best of luck on finding any...)

as it is, any events that "host the hosts"
or "honor the poetry series in our scene"
looks like just another mutual back-pat
in the perpetual circle-jerk of our scene
from the perspective of _this_ observer...

-bowerbird