workshop kerry allie talked me into this online poetry workshop and she didn't even show. when i signed up i was even less employed than i am now and i asked the arts memorial for "financial aid" so i could pay $100 instead of $250 (my god) ten stranger-writers on camera, the instructor thin and pale and lanky-haired who smiles to himself as he reads us yoko ono and ck conrad the phillies are maybe winning the world series during this workshop, the stadium is only two train stops away and i can heard the roar of the crowd from my desk, and louie is quivering because he's nervous and needs a lap to sit on and arms to squeeze him and tamp down his anxiety this and the indian takeout downstairs distracts me as other people are skimming my words and i can see the glow of their computer screens in their glasses and the woman with the nasal voice and triangle hair and insightful comments reads my "poem" and their observations terrify me it makes me want to be in red 221102 ... raze i've been writing an email in my head. it was going to say things like, "i hope you have a great time," and, "you're brave to put yourself out there like that," and, "they're lucky to have you." i'm so sorry it wasn't a good experience. but i'm so glad you have this place to return to, where every word you set down is valued and appreciated. 221102 ... kerry i didn't see that you wrote this until i came to complain some more! thanks for what you wrote in the email in your head. i had a feeling this was how it would go, so i'm not too surprised, but i will continue to complain. 221104 ... kerry "it's very prose-like. i wonder what would happen if it was pared down... some of these words taken out." he gave examples, just spitballing. "that could help it... breathe." i said thanks to everyone for their comments and suggestions. i thought about how that was something hemingway said, or wrote, or whatever--that trimming the fat, removing any unnecessary words, would help the reader be more fully immersed. he's not wrong, i guess. 221104 ... kerry the_guy_from_the_train wants to help me write. we were on south street, rain was just starting in little drips, we pulled the hoods of our black sweatshirts over our heads. i told him what carrie asked me: "do you want to write, or do you want to want to write?" two weeks later, sitting in tattooed mom with pylon playing loud on the speakers all the walls pink and turquoise beer and shots of cheap whiskey on the table between us and two sheets of paper--our responses to the prompt he came up with ("it only takes a single dose") "do you want to go first? or do you want me to go first?" i say i'll go first, which turns out means i am the workshopee, not the workshopper, and right when he starts talking, when i see his scribbles and edits on my writing i am hurtled back in time, to a miserable point in my life, and i am hardly hearing the words he is saying but i respond "mmmhmm. yep, i know what you mean." there isn't enough air in this room. there isn't enough whiskey in this glass. he just wants to help, but all i can think of is this familiar feeling of being trapped and nipped at and poked and prodded and i am supposed to be learning from this, i am supposed to be open to critique, and this was why nearly every week joy and i would smoke a joint to get through workshop, three straight hours of torture. i was rarely sober for workshop. i didn't know (or care) if anyone noticed, until the roast at the end of the program when ben joked that i was always raising my hand to say "someone might have already said this, but..." and even then, just to get through the experience of being witnessed on stage in front of all our families and all three cohorts and all our professors i had two drinks and two benzos and my hands still shook as i read a bit of my own writing, they shake still, all the time "are you okay?" we step outside for a smoke. it is raining again and the streets are slick. "we don't have to do this," he says. "i know you're sensitive," and coming from him sensitive is not an insult, it is a gentle observation, and he is right. he is only trying to help. 240214 what's it to you? who go blather from