san francisco
Right now I'm in the basement of a house in the sunset district that was a speak-easy in the thirties and when the tenants moved in, they found photos down here of the people who sat around of an evening drinking bathtub bourbon. They bought it with contents and it's an incredible place, gorgeous furniture from 'back then'. Everyone's asleep but me and I've left a window open so that the distant smell of ocean can drift in.
I've had my first real bath in maybe five years. I don't count those dinky puddles in motel sixes along I5. This one is deep and wide and if it weren't late, I could have unbraided the hair and washed it under this swan-neck faucet. I plan to do that in the morning when there's sun and time for the hair to dry. I've noticed I've started referring to my hair , as The Hair. Like it's either a separate entity or a biblical story. Rachel. Deborah. Esther. Rebekkah. Leah. Miriam. Tabitha. Priscilla. No wonder Paul told us to cover it in Fellowship. It IS distracting. It's beautiful, it's glorifying. I usually cover mine at church, but a Poetry Reading is another kind of church-is glorifying the gifts He gave me. San Francisco is abundant with churches. Catholic, four square, evangelical, storefront. This Sunday, I'll probably be going to a Chinese protestent because it's around the corner. And I will probably not understand a word of it and I'll probably understand every word of it. Tomorrow night we read, morning-day we plan to play. I want to go to bead stores and paper stores. I mean, we don't have any money really, but I love to see what's out there.
I brought a buncha long and short raven feathers down. Sometimes in Willits, I stick them in my one-over-the-under-in-the-back braids at odd angles and it's my power holder. It's my play. These feathers are my poem-holders, each feather carrying the words of the poem I'm going to read in my twenty minute set. I walked in the door with a briefcase of poems and a long vase of feathers and one of the tenants' boys, seven year old Ty, exclaims. He also collects feathers and shows me his raven feathers, which he calls crow feathers. I have to tell him, we have raven here, they're a bigger bird and he likes that. I promise to mail him some more, plus some peacock and a flamingo feather. I had a friend whose ex worked at the San Diego zoo twenty or so years ago and she gave me some of the feathers he would clean out of the ponds and aviaries. I have a parrot feather which is bright blue on one side and bright yellow on the other. The flamingo's pink is shameless. It's like a ju-ju dress at Mardi Gras in the old N'Orleans day. This child was dancing with feathers to the music inside his head. I fell in love.
After we read we'll both get checks for $100 and hopefully we'll sell books too. That's what I reallly want and then go buy beads and paper. With money I've earned with my tools. My voice. My mind. My hands.
I've had my first real bath in maybe five years. I don't count those dinky puddles in motel sixes along I5. This one is deep and wide and if it weren't late, I could have unbraided the hair and washed it under this swan-neck faucet. I plan to do that in the morning when there's sun and time for the hair to dry. I've noticed I've started referring to my hair , as The Hair. Like it's either a separate entity or a biblical story. Rachel. Deborah. Esther. Rebekkah. Leah. Miriam. Tabitha. Priscilla. No wonder Paul told us to cover it in Fellowship. It IS distracting. It's beautiful, it's glorifying. I usually cover mine at church, but a Poetry Reading is another kind of church-is glorifying the gifts He gave me. San Francisco is abundant with churches. Catholic, four square, evangelical, storefront. This Sunday, I'll probably be going to a Chinese protestent because it's around the corner. And I will probably not understand a word of it and I'll probably understand every word of it. Tomorrow night we read, morning-day we plan to play. I want to go to bead stores and paper stores. I mean, we don't have any money really, but I love to see what's out there.
I brought a buncha long and short raven feathers down. Sometimes in Willits, I stick them in my one-over-the-under-in-the-back braids at odd angles and it's my power holder. It's my play. These feathers are my poem-holders, each feather carrying the words of the poem I'm going to read in my twenty minute set. I walked in the door with a briefcase of poems and a long vase of feathers and one of the tenants' boys, seven year old Ty, exclaims. He also collects feathers and shows me his raven feathers, which he calls crow feathers. I have to tell him, we have raven here, they're a bigger bird and he likes that. I promise to mail him some more, plus some peacock and a flamingo feather. I had a friend whose ex worked at the San Diego zoo twenty or so years ago and she gave me some of the feathers he would clean out of the ponds and aviaries. I have a parrot feather which is bright blue on one side and bright yellow on the other. The flamingo's pink is shameless. It's like a ju-ju dress at Mardi Gras in the old N'Orleans day. This child was dancing with feathers to the music inside his head. I fell in love.
After we read we'll both get checks for $100 and hopefully we'll sell books too. That's what I reallly want and then go buy beads and paper. With money I've earned with my tools. My voice. My mind. My hands.