A Tuesday night poetry reading at the Beat Museum
Squeezed into a hard gray folding chair and
I’m not drunk enough for this shit but a friend is reading so I have to attend
A young man steps to the mike, yellow-blonde hair, barely old enough to shave
His hand trembles as he recites from the white sheet of looseleaf notebook paper
History is mystery, he reads
And our myths grow longer every night
Dramatic pause and the paper is folded, signifying the end
Polite applause
I’m thinking, that’s all you’ve got?
That’s it?
Paul Valery approached it with more poignance when he said
All history is nothing but myth …
each moment fades each moment
into the realm of the imaginary
Of course there’s always Sherwood Anderson who wrote:
The true history of life
is but a history of moments
Perhaps I just read too much
Which leads me to expect the same from those who want me to
Respect their written words