10/13/2011
I am in love with a couple: M & M. They write fiction, have tattoos, are waify and dress all in black, drink cheap beer and have too many bookshelves. They are, somehow, very queer together, despite their different genders. They curate a femme-centric reading series in the small mountain town where we all go to school, and when they get into prestigious MFA programs, they leave Juniper Bends in my care. I am self-assured, but terrified.Â
My chubby, weird poet identity cannot hope to complement their easy cool, their low-key townie charm, the way M sneaks cigarettes when M is not around to scold him, the way M has a collection of sex worker zines and wins dozens of writing prizes, has stories is the most prestigious magazines.Â
Nevertheless, every three months I drag folding chairs from the storage room of the industrial used bookstore and uncork cheap bottles of cabernet sauvignon and pinot gris, pull together authors from all over, host traveling book tours, read my own weird, self-conscious poetry in front of a room jam-packed with friends, writers, my best friends with their perfect haircuts.Â
One writer on this poster is dead now. Two no longer write; one won a distinguished poetry-world award. The final is just me.Â
