Sometimes my head splits open and bleeds like a wound from the Civil War. Sometimes I’m practically knocked unconscious with a grizzly bear of inspiration that flies with surgical paws at my face. Or it could be an asteroid metaphor. Those work, too. Sometimes, sometimes, I feel like all my stars align and it is so easy to call myself a Writer that I must simply laugh at the thought of anything else being the case. It makes you feel beautiful when you feel like you might actually be figured out for a few minutes there. Perhaps when I am older (and usually, around this time, somebody drops in “wiser”) I’ll learn the Zen exercises that will draw it out longer, so that time spools onto the floor all relaxed and silky-like, and I’ll never again snap back up like a creaky length of measuring tape.
Practice on the stage. Dress rehearsal stuff. Okay.
Tonight is the final show of Sarabande Books’ 2012 line up of poetic muses. That’s it for the year, folks, and it’s bittersweet isn’t it? While I’m sure no one is going to literally smack you in the noggin with cosmic inspiration, let’s finish out this helluva year standing on the strength of words. Join writers Justin Torres and Daniel Khalastchi tonight, Monday, October 29th, for the stunning conclusion of the 21c Reading Series.
With work featured in the pages of The New Yorker, Granta, Tin House and Glimmer Train, it’s no shocker that Justin Torres’ first book, We the Animals, was recently honored as one of the National Book Foundation’s 5 Under 35. A Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, Torres is also the recipient of the Rolon United States Artist Fellowship in Literature – and, hey – was additionally named as one of 2011’s sexiest men by Salon.com.
Also sharing tonight is author of Manoleria, Daniel Khalastchi. The winner of the Crazyhorse First Book Prize from Tupelo Press, Khalastchi’s inagurial book of poems (see: above) joins the ranks of other successes published in the likes of Kenyon Review, Jubilat, and Denver Quarterly. A recent fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Khalastchi is also a Co-founder and Editor of Rescue Press. He is currently serving as Assistant Director of the Undergraduate Certificate in Writing Program at the University of Iowa.
Sometimes I really wish I could show you all the men behind the curtain when I write for you. I guess that’s what poetry collections are really for, right babes?
Just two more months, kittens, two months to the end – less if we want to talk about the apocalypse. Ride the wings tonight and take that last spoonful of inspiration to finish out. We’ll see each other in January, after all.
21c Museum Hotel is located at 700 W Main Street.
Photo: Courtesy of Sarabande Books website www.sarabandebooks.org
UPDATE: Thanks to the wonders of Mother Nature and her friend Hurricane Sandy, tonight's reading will be cancelled - which is a bummer. However, you should still honor your almost-end-of-year-really-pretty-close with language, beauty and - ok, let's go for it - love. We'll wear those poetry pants come new year.
