Actually, this is the faculty. I am not going to name names, because I don't want googlers to be able to find poets doing crazy stuff. (And I'm pretty sure these are all poets except one.) But if you were in the audience or on the stage last night, you know who they are.
Last night Doriann Laux and Pete Fromm read to us. We all melted into puddles on the floor by our chairs at the amazing nature of the art we were witnessing. This is not a lie. As my husband has been known to say on such occasions, "We're all going to drown."
There were a lot more than four people in the audience, by the way. It's just that, well, it's school, and we seem unwilling or unable to get everyone to sit all the way down by the stage.
Ms. Laux made her debut to the new among us. She's been at another residency in Colorado and only arrived last evening. She was tired and at some point couldn't find the poem she wanted to read. Abby whipped open her book and ran up on stage to give it to her. Ms. Laux said, You want me to read this one? And Abby said, Yes. Since I had the balls to come up here, I get to pick the poem. Ms. Laux said, You're right. This seems to me to be an auspicious way for them to meet, since Abby is one of Ms. Laux's students and hadn't been able to talk to her yet. Her poems were beautiful and applause spattered between them, the first time this has happened at any of the readings.
I was especially excited to hear Pete Fromm's reading, since he is my advisor this semester. I was not disappointed. He read a new story, one that he claimed to still be working on. It was told from the point of view of a twenty-seven year old woman. It was gorgeous and I started thinking right away that it could be a performance, a one woman show. I even started thinking about how I might be able to get it in front of Jeff Daniels at the Purple Rose. Not that I know him, but I know someone who has worked with the P.R. before and that might be a channel. The only difficulty--where to get an actress who can play 27 who will be up to this piece.
It's crazy how, after hearing them read their work, you start to feel like these people are not of this world. Or maybe it's that really, they are totally and completely of this world in a way that most people never achieve.
I'm a little too tired to write, having set my alarm for 5 so I could make sure I got up in time to call Marc. I goofed up last night and forgot that we only talked for a few minutes after my nap because he had people over when I called. I told him I would call when I got back from the reading, and then I was all worked up and sat down to write, not remembering that I was supposed to call him until too late.
It's our last day of residency. Tomorrow morning I will be leaving for the airport at 6 am with two of the other students. I'll spend the entire day traveling and a couple of days recovering and getting my evaluations done.
My first packet is due July 20th, so right after I get home, I am going to be working my ass off.
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