When I was 16 my dreams of becoming a death metal singer were stalled, but for some reason, I kept writing lyrics for a band that could never find a drummer. Sometime around then, a friend thrust a copy of Jim Carroll’s The Basketball Diaries into my hands while I was standing by my locker after school. A few weeks after that, I bought a copy of The Viking Portable Beat Reader from the terrible little chain book store in the crappy mall in my town. Little did I know that I had found out something important about the life I wanted to make for myself. These things happen.
It was 36 when I finally wrote a poem (just a stanza of a poem actually) that I was really happy with, that came out reading as good as it sounded in my head. I began to take myself seriously as a poet. I asked friends who were more accomplished writers to check out my work. They didn’t hate it. I considered “getting myself out there.” I kept writing. The poems started to accumulate. I started seeing poems I wrote when I was an undergraduate over 20 years ago in a different light. I could finally make the old stuff sound on the page as good as it did in my head. I had a binder with about 100 secret treasures that I showed virtually no one. Every time I crossed the street or drove when the roads were slick, I thought about what would happen to that binder after I was dead. These things happen.
Publications started to trickle in. I got into a workshop group of excellent poets. The lingering pangs of imposter syndrome faded away. One afternoon, I remembered that a press that published several poets I deeply respect, and several books by strangers I admire from a distance, had an open reading period. In 3 hours I raided that binder of secret treasures and called it a manuscript. These things happen.
Today is the official release date of The Red Glass Cat, my book on Alien Buddha Press. You can read a sample of 5 poems directly from the Alien Buddha website. You can buy it from the giant internet borg book seller, and if you’re local to Southwestern Pennsylvania, I should be able to do a socially distant porch drop off sometime in February (or mail you a copy). Autographed copies available by request. (I’ll post contact info and Venmo/PayPal info when I’m ready) Further annoying attempts at self-promotion forthcoming.