siouxsiepoetuncensored: yes, now i remember....

it was an exhausting, exhilirating day. had my ass handed to me yesterday, went to bed feeling like the biggest loser on the planet, drank some unsavory whiskey (mostly because i had nothing to partner it with, will rethink my liquor choice for the intensive, what we drank last year we drank straight out of the bottle that we passed around. we had just come back from having several rounds at the bar, then finished off a fifth, i'd say of something quite divine--though by that time, i'm sure we could down jd straight. still, i want whatever was in that bottle from last time).

i arrived early tonight to the reading, after the potential 11 hour day scare at work. we have a pregnant shift who had to rush in to the doctor, and that meant all hands on deck while we scrambled to figure it out. i worked with the boss, whom i love. i love her. that's all there is to it. she and i are very similar, i think, and i can learn a lot from her. i find myself trusting her, which is a good thing. i've generally trusted very good people in my life.

she asked me about yesterday and ultimately said,

don't worry about it

(this is her mantra). just then another manager walked in and got the briefest update and said to me,

she wasn't staying anyway

(of the girl who walked off her shift yesterday during my watch. long story).

this pleased me, and absolved me of much self-inflicted guilt. i didn't really know if they were just telling me it wasn't my fault to be nice. i have been known to make people cry.

so today, the vibe (three women most of the day), was entirely different. we grooved, we gelled, we got shit done. and bonded. what can i say. the other lady is a californian as well. very nice.

i dragged myself out of there and hit the shower to try to revive myself for the release party i was to read at.

it worked, somewhat. but i knew i had one stop to make tonight, one thing i had to say, one apology. yet, my erratic behavior continues (and i just can't help who i am, i'm strange as strage goes).

having said it, i left to get a good seat at the reading. the best cushy chairs in the front row, where all the action is.

i got them, parked myself right in the middle and was flanked by the matriarch, who was exhausted. the other host sat two seats to my left, and i flagged down my fellow poet photographer, because you've got to be in the front row if you're taking pictures.

i had selfish motivation, i know. if i couldn't video, perhaps a still would come out that was salvagable. i hope so.

several shots of me were taken, who knows if i'll ever see any of them, but i saw a few flashes as i read.

being there, i saw one man whom i thought i knew. but being that this is a journal release party, these were big deal poets and i'm a small fish, as they say. i didn't go up to him, but he came over to me.

i remember you.

and i remember you. you ...

and i told him what he did.

yes,

he said.

i remember you from that night, too and you didn't even fall (it was a prank to preface his poem, he stumbled to the floor)

it was probably two years ago i read there, maybe a year and a half, but it's been a long time. and for these big deal poets to even remember me is something. i'm grateful to share pages with them, let alone a spark of recollection when i appear.

i'm still socially awkward, i have no idea how to mingle or why, but we talked a bit, and i said hello to other poets i know though they have no fucking clue who i am. after i read it's hard to forget me, i say. and, well, i just have to jog their memory.

and so i did.

it was fucking amazing.

i talked to those i know more from repeated intensives, i realize we're not all so comfortable and anything i can do to help, i do. but it's not easy and i don't enjoy it. i'm just going to have to get over it. even got the cheek kiss from a poet as i flanked the matriarch. i have to master that one, i don't do it, i'm more of a deliberate kisser, someone who turns her head and catches the kiss on the lips. too agressive that way. but what else is new.

i have poems to write. i feel them bubbling inside me. a cauldron boiling over. and soon, the intensive, where i'm free to, dared to write the things i cannot, should not utter aloud. the intensive throws open doors i hide behind and permits me, in the company of my fellows doing the exact same damn thing, to explore the darkness.

only this time, the darkness has ivory skin.

mark this, it's probably not the best idea to spend time with a confessional poet. shit finds its way into my work.

as the soundmand told me a story, i laughed and said,