Best. Feature. Ever.

Thanks to everyone that came out to the Blue Ox last night. There's no possible way you could have enjoyed it more than I did but I hope it came close. Having family, both blood and chosen, and friends in the audience along with a nice mix of complete strangers helped make it a truly special moment. Other than the night I proposed to Salomé at the Nuyorican, nothing else I've ever done on a stage even comes close. At the beginning of my set, I mentioned Tony Brown's approach of what if this was the last time you ever…

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Aniticpating Acentos

I don't usually get nervous about a reading until 10-15 minutes before it starts so the premature butterflies that have been floating around since last night have me feeling really dizzy. I found out last night that my aunt, youngest on my father's side and more like a cousin, is coming to the reading and got a little freaked out. A couple of my cousins from my mother's side will be there, too - who haven't seen me read since my first couple of slams at the Nuyorican - as well as a handful of non-poetry friends, turning it into…

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For the last time…?

Truth or hyperbole? I've learned to never say never but in all likelihood, Wednesday, August 4th will be the last time I appear on stage as a featured poet. I fell into the slam scene on a lark back in the summer of 1997, competing in my first Friday night slam at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe on August 8, 1997. In the years since, I've attended four National Poetry Slams, written a lot, met a lot of people, visited places I wouldn't have otherwise, got married, had two kids, returned to the Bronx [twice!], and tapped into a side of…

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Set This House in Order

Finished Matt Ruff’s Set This House in Order: A Romance of Souls yesterday. Absolutely amazing! He’s one of a handful of writers I want to BE.

A description of the plot would be inadequate because his work is so layered and full of texture that it wouldn’t do it justice. Kind of like explaining procreation in clinical terms. Suffice to say that his ability to convey a multitude of distinctive characters has never been stronger than in this twist on a coming-of-age tale of two people with multiple personality disorders. Each personality, or “soul” as he calls them, is as sharply drawn as any of the major characters in Fool on the Hill or Sewer, Gas & Electric: THE PUBLIC WORKS TRILOGY, and the way he presents life inside their heads is nothing short of brilliant.

That the story takes place in the real world, as opposed to the hyper-realistic fantasy settings of his first two books, is a testament to his versatility and a body blow to the idea that “fantasy” and “literary” are two separate genres.

The lives of Andy Gage and Penny Driver, the protagonists of House, will stick with me for a long time.

Up next: Crawfish Dreams, by Nancy Rawles, another random-while-browsing discovery. One chapter in and I’m liking her style.

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louder than words: tweaked

New York City at night is a beautiful thing. I love walking the streets, breathing in cool, crisp air and not having to deal with the obstacle course of confused and starry-eyed tourists that clog the sidewalks during the day.

As dive bars go, few can match Rudy’s on Ninth Avenue up in Hell’s Kitchen. (I refuse to call it by its gentrified name, Clinton.) $8 pitchers, free hot dogs and one of the coolest jukeboxes in the city. Back-to-back Hall & Oates songs made my night! The Boomtown Rats’ I Don’t Like Mondays was a pleasant discovery, too.

Once inside, you can forget that the Disneyfied, tourist-ridden streets of Times Square and the Theater District are only a couple of blocks away. The clientele has changed a bit over the years, getting younger and pseudo-hip, and I don’t remember the backyard being open – but with the Mets game on the TV over the bar, it’s still a perfect spot for drinking and jawboning with a best friend about to hit the road. (Yeah, I said “jawboning.”)

In between random talk of everything from life in the military to the beauty of Colorado to the awkwardness of dealing with “divorced” friends, we decided to scrap much of the formality for tomorrow night’s show and send him west with a healthy dose of irrereverance and a nod of recognition lacking from other quarters.

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Return to the Nuyorican Poets Café

Hello Guy,

Here is your Free Daily Horoscope Service for today, Feb 17.

You might need to connect with Mother Earth, Guy. Lately, you’ve been feeling less than grounded. You might have the sensation that your mind is drifting somewhere above your body. If your work is mostly of the mental variety, and if you spend a lot of time on your computer, you might experience some feelings of disconnection from your body. Correct this by going for a long walk in a park, or sit by the ocean or other body of water.

Amen to that as I’ve been feeling totally disconnected for the past few days. Between the impending one-year anniversary on the job I no longer love but don’t quite hate, the weird night hosting at the Nuyorican, and the future homesteading question – I’m in a mild state of confusion.

Last week’s return to the Nuyorican Poets Café was significant, for me, for several reasons, not the least of which was that it was my first time on that stage since that fateful night in December 1998 that led to an ugly 1999 and me being banned for a couple of years beyond that. While I did read at Felice Belle’s farewell at the end of 2002, that felt very different as it was one quick poem and I’d been completely off the scene for a year at that point. Hosting Encomium was a much bigger deal – even bigger than I initially realized as my presence apparently had to be cleared through Carmen Pietri-Diaz, the Café’s Executive Director. If true, and I have no reason to believe it isn’t, I imagine it came about solely as a result of my co-hosting the Rev. Pedro Pietri benefit at the Bowery last month. It does present an interesting question, though: with Keith Roach long gone from the Café, and he and I having pretty much buried the hatchet, who’s still holding a grudge?

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I Get Around

create your own visited states map or write about it on the open travel guide Of these, I've lived in NY, NJ, TN, FL and VA. The majority of the other states were solely thanks to poetry gigs as I would otherwise have never visited them at all. Specifically, California, Colorado, DC, Illinois, Minnesota, Texas, Rhode Island, Washington and Vermont. Yeeeeeeeeeeeeearrrrrrrgh! ;-) From 1999-2000, when I did most of my sporadic "touring," my primary criteria for traveling somewhere was whether it was a place I'd likely never visit otherwise. As long as I could make enough money to break even,…

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