This Publisher's Column shall feature developments related to Filipino literature. Each monthly update also shall include a featured poet and poem. For comments and suggestions, please e-mail Meritage Press Associate Editor Jade Afable at Jade@meritagepress.com


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April's featured poet and poem is Catalina Cariaga and her poem "Ten Twenty-Six." Catalina is the author of CULTURAL EVIDENCE (Subpress Collective/ 'A'A Arts, 1999); more information about her book, a poetry collection worth supporting and refreshing for its forms, is available at http://www.durationpress.com/subpress/navframe.htm. A contributing editor of Poetry Flash, Catalina received her MFA from SF State University and has taught on the adjunct faculty of New College of California. She works in Berkeley and lives with her husband and young son in Oakland, California. In her spare time, she plays and collects vintage ukuleles. "Ten Twenty-Six" is one of over 100 poems submitted to the Six Directions Project from poets around the world (see more information below about Six Directions):

Excerpts from
SO CALLED `SONNETS' TO MY FATHER IN THE PSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL WARD OF THE MEN'S CENTRAL JAIL, COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

TEN TWENTY-SIX*

metallic, taste, tongue, time, Halydol, stiffened,
joints, paranoid, convulsant, shoulders, Depakote,

kidneys, replete, lithium, time, bladder, euphoric,
grandiose, psychotic, visions, versions, on, watch,

grimace, release, no, bail, no, reprieve, no, help,
razor, no, time, Alzheimer's, false, positive, tremor,

governor, liver, time, deteriorate, lead, chemical,
deputy, Tylenol, toilet, barber, policy, nurse, sigh,

question, if, time, medications, doktor, restraint,
visits, calendar, time, newspaper, visit, poem, of,

not, guilty, mail, cubicle, number booking, case, as,
insanity, room, time, key, no, fork, time, counsel,

by, way, of, sleep, spoon, pen, time, bed, book, night,
day, cell, sing, slur, plea, cry, low, call, light, loon --

*Penal Code 1026: Not guilty by reason of insanity.

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NOEL ALUMIT'S NOVEL: LETTERS TO MONTGOMERY CLIFT

The presence of the U.S. troops in the Southern Philippines is a sign of political failure and bad faith: failure by current and past Philippine administrations and bad faith by the U.S. government who cloaks its intervention in another country's affairs under the excuse of having been invited. Beyond the specifics of how the Philippines should fight terrorism is the reality that political and economic policies and practices have not prevented widespread poverty. Impoverishment (both physically and psychologically) breeds dissent. Failed governmental policies culminate today in this colonial lapse by President Gloria Macapagal who ignores history with her welcome of U.S. military presence.

Unexpectedly, I was reminded of the Macapagal administration's latest sign of weakness as I read through performance artist Noel Alumit's first novel, LETTERS TO MONTGOMERY CLIFT (LETTERS) (MacAdam/Cage Publishing, 2002). This is a story whose ambition is noteworthy; it features a distinctive plot that attests to Alumit's wonderfully liberal imagination. And it is an imagination that explains why the works from his first medium, plays, have been so successful. Alumit's one-man show "The Rice Room: Scenes From a Bar" was voted one of the best solo shows of the year by the San Francisco Gay Guardian and played to sold-out houses in several cities. He recently premiered his latest solo show "Master of the (miss) Universe" at Highways Performance Art Space in Santa Monica, Ca.

As the title hints, LETTERS is an homage to the 1950s and 1960s screen idol. Alumit shares that one of his intentions for the book "is to invigorate the public to Montgomery Clift. It saddens me that one of this country's finest actors has become a footnote in the American acting scene." That, for me, the novel veered from the author's intent to encompass the current events in Mindanao results from how Alumit's novel offers a space where the reader may expand his/her contemplation of the world -- an effect often elicited by wonderful works of art and literature.

Each chapter in Alumit's novel begins with a note written by the protagonist Bong Bong to Clift. Bong Bong was sent as a child to the U.S. shortly after the arrest of his father, an anti-Marcos activist. His mother, who stayed behind to look for her husband, promised Bong Bong at the airport that she will join him "real soon." The "real soon" never happens but Bong Bong never stops waiting. While being raised by an aunt in Southern California, he begins to write letters to the late actor because his aunt said, "Letters have to be to saints or dead relatives. No one else. If you write to someone else the spirits will think we do not trust them."

Bong Bong chooses Clift to be the recipient of his letters (he never mailed them but only placed under the couch where he slept) because he saw the movie "The Search" on late night television. In "The Search," Clift plays a soldier who finds and cares for a small boy whose mother was taken away by bad people. He takes the boy home. He gives him candy. He buys him shoes. He teaches him English. He keeps him safe. He guards the boy until his mama comes. Consequently, Bong Bong began what would become a 22-year correspondence with the letter: " dear mr montgomery clift, i want one thing only. please bring my mama back to me. safe. with no more bruises."

Bong Bong specifies "no more bruises" because, in the Philippines, Bong Bong had witnessed the "Military Boots" take his father away: "When those men beat up my dad, I knew he would live. When they beat up my mom, I thought she would die. // I watched from under the cot, I watched my parents' faces. They begged me with their eyes not to say a single word. To cry quietly. When those Military Boots kicked Mama in the stomach and the back and the chest and the legs, it might as well have been me."

After the beatings, Bong Bong is sent by his mother to live with an aunt in California. Away from his parents, Bong Bong's coming-of-age comes to include his awareness of his homosexuality. Alumit, who currently works for the Asian Pacific AIDS Intervention Team, also correlates Clift to this element, noting, "Like the character in the book, Monty (Clift) did inspire me. I would have hated being a gay man in the 1950s. Back then homosexuality was a mental disorder. He helped me realize the privileges of being a gay man today."

Thus, Alumit has written a novel where the Marcos regime's abuses deceptively serve as background to Bong Bong's story. It is a "deceptive" backdrop because it's really not a backdrop. This novel, too, is about the failure of politics and politicians to serve those whom they are supposed to serve. Filipinos know of the long-lasting impact of Spain's and the U.S.' earlier decisions to colonize the Philippines. Alumit's innovative novel now offers another way to explore history through the reverberations from Ferdinand Marcos' dictatorship.

Alumit was born in the Philippines and grew up in Los Angeles. He remembers asking his mother "who the Marcos family was." He says, "My mother told me, 'Shhhh. You don't know who is listening.' Even as a child I thought it was odd that my mother was afraid of a country or political family a whole ocean apart. I think Filipinos all over the world were somehow impacted by the Marcos regime; if anything it instilled a sense of distrust or fear for any government. I work for a non-profit organization to help Asian Americans. They're afraid to seek help because of negative politics all over Asia."

I am glad that Alumit chose to address the Marcos regime in this debut novel which he wrote as a result of receiving the EMERGING VOICES award from PEN USA WEST (granted to new writers in underserved communities, including Filipinos). Jose Rizal once said, "To ignore history is to repeat the mistakes of the past." That several of those who profited as Marcos' cronies are still in power cannot be viewed as having no relationship to how economic policies have failed to alleviate poverty in the areas now bearing the U.S. military presence.

As important as it is to laud Alumit's imagination and clear writing style that includes moving moments of lyricism, it is also useful to do as he suggests. Let us remember the victims of Marcos' Martial Law rule. In a flyer he sent me with his book, Alumit reminds us: "Marcos used his power and upon his orders, the military picked up and detained thousands of Filipinos suspected of subversion, among them were his critics and political opponents. The captors tortured hundreds of detainees, some disappeared never to be heard from again, and still others were held for years in these detention camps without a trial."

Alumit's research had included going through files at Amnesty International. He used the information to help develop the characters of Bong Bong's parents. The novel itself is "dedicated to those who have Disappeared." LETTERS deserves praise for having successfully integrated two topics that would not seem to have much to do with each other: Montgomery Clift and Ferdinand Marcos. But that Alumit is able to do so also has to do with the insidiously expansive aftereffects of abusive governments and failures in decent political will. This, unfortunately, remains a timely concern.
(--Commentary by Eileen Tabios)

Bay Area Readings:
To learn more about Noel's first novel, check out the publisher's website: www.macadamcage.com. Noel also will do some readings in the Bay Area this month:

April 18:
Time: 7:15 PM
A Different Light
489 Castro St, San Francisco, CA 94114
Tel: 415 4310891

April 20:
Time: 3:00 p.m.
East Wind Books
2066 University, corner of Shattuck and University
Tel: 510 5482350

More on Noel's Debut Novel:
"Noel Alumit has arrived with quiet passion, wit, and wonderful words. From Manila to Los Angeles, from the ocean of history and tears, his LETTERS TO MONTGOMERY CLIFT is a lyrical novel of belonging and betrayal, of faith and forsakeness, and finally, of compassion."
--Russell C. Leong, Editor, Amerasia Journal

"Noel Alumit knows about loss, and alienation, and sorrow. Fortunately for the readers of his bittersweet first novel, he knows even more about resilience and hope. LETTERS TO MONTGOMERY CLIFT brings us an authentic and compelling new voice that shimmers with generosity while never shrinking from the rawness of truth. How can one slim volume pack such a memorable wallop!"
--Aimee Liu, Cloud Mountain

"Noel Alumit will break your heart and then put it back together again with his absorbing and heartfelt first novel. LETTERS TO MONTGOMERY CLIFT is a poignant journal of discovery and desire, a wicked storm of a story with a surprisingly graceful clearing."
Peter Gadol, Light at Dusk

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DREAMING JOSE GARCIA VILLA

One of the goals of THE ANCHORED ANGEL: SELECTED WRITINGS BY JOSE GARCIA VILLA (Kaya, 1999) is to make available Villa's writings which long have been out of print in the United States. Meritage Press is pleased to present a poem, "Salon" by noted poet and critic Douglas Spangle. When others outside of the Filipino community begin dreaming of Villa as a result of having read his poems, it bodes well for the goal of recovering Villa from his undeserved obscurity as a major literary figure:

SALON

Lovely, lovely young men,
they were all there that night
at the Istanbul Salon.
That must have been Parker Tyler. Ned Rorem
was at the ivories, Charles Henri Ford, L. Durrell in the linen suit,

Jose Garcia Villa, I suppose,
uttering exquisite blasphemies,
a crucifix in the creche of salad.
A young Paul Bowles sat nerveless among the pillows.
Gore Vidal, his hair black as Chinese lacquer,
exchanged views with me

until I grew tired of him and turned away
to someone less tedious.
In that dreamy salon,
who was it in another white suit
to whom I swore I'd listened
as he'd murmured "Anemones,"
his best-loved poem?

I cushioned my chin
in soft phlokati
as his pen was scratching
an inscription for me.
I examined the spines of his first editions
and the sunrise was scarlet
like grenadine

through the fingers of mist
and abandoned freighters
in the waters of Marmara.
The pen's whisper
merged into soft footsteps
ascending the stairs,
one of the cats
who warm my bed these days.

Spangle resides in Portland, Oregon, where he is involved in many aspects of the poetry scene. He has emceed open-mike readings, hosted a poetry/talk radio show, and served on the boards of literary and artistic events. He is Senior Editor of Rain City Review, former Co-Editor of Moose, and in 1994 edited the Festschrift Homespun: A Tribute to Mary Barnard. His poems, reviews, graphics, articles and translations have appeared in numerous publications. His poetry collection Perseus Pursuing is scheduled to appear in 2002 from 9 muses books. He previously released several chapbooks: Initial (Quiet Lion Press, 1996), Suite: Lost Things (Flyleaf Editions, 1997) and 2 + Bridges (26 Books, 1999).

On his poem "Salon," Spangle says that it is "a dream poem. I elaborated on the dream as I wrote it, but many of the touches in the poem remain. The young men in white linen suits started it off. Parker Tyler and Charles Henri Ford did appear, or were mentioned in my brain. The rude conversation with Gore Vidal did occur, which must be some sort of wish-fulfillment. My workmate John and I had been discussing how catty Vidal is in his recent memoir, Palimpsest. That must have led to Villa, since the Crucifixion-in-the-salad image came next. In both THE ANCHORED ANGEL and Vidal's memoir appears the same photo from the Gotham Book Mart featuring Dame Edith Sitwell who appears at the center of the photo, doing her best stuffed-bird imitation; the acclaimed literati of the time are also there, including Villa and Vidal. THE ANCHORED ANGEL names all the parties in the caption; Vidal mentions himself."

Spangle adds, "At any rate, Dame Edith was a very important patroness for Villa. The Crucifixion motif comes from my impression of his first collection, where he comes across to me as a sort of anti-Catholic mystic. A very interesting position, Baudelairean or Rimbaudian, perhaps? Anyway, the youngish Villa in the photo and the unique aesthetic of that first book impressed me so much that it surfaced in my dream. I also now wonder how much he hung out with those 'lovely young men' whose generation is represented in the dream and the poem. Most are now dead, except, Vidal himself, [Ford] and, I believe, Ned Rorem. There are good arguments to be made thereby for Villa's importance both as a Filipino and as an American writer. He's just been neglected a bit--but so have Tyler, Ford, and others of the same generation (and Dame Edith herself?)"

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THE 2002 POTRERO NUEVO FUND PRIZE

The Potrero Nuevo Fund Prize is a program of the Potrero Nuevo Fund and administered by New Langton Arts. The Prize awards $12,500 to Bay Area (CA) artists whose community based works promote consciousness of the local urban ecology. Recipient Eileen Tabios anticipates that her project with Summi Kaipa will involve promotion of Asian American / Filipino art and literature. This year's Prize selections are:

"INTERCEPT: TO THWART, CRADLE, EXCHANGE," a performance and literary project by Summi Kaipa and Eileen Tabios;

"The Energy Rangers" and "The Black Cloud Menace,' a web-based animation by Pratap Chatterjee and Wiliam Sievert;

"FOO: Frequency of Occurences," a narrative video project by Julia Segrove Jauriguia; and

"Cosmic Blood," a video based performance and sound piece by Gigi Oltavaro-Hormillosa and Melissa Doughterty.

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FILIPINO POETS IN RECENT PUBLICATIONS FEATURING INNOVATIVE POETRY AND POETICS

Technologies of Measure: A Celebration of Bay Area Women Writers:
Produced by Small Press Traffic in collaboration with Kelsey St. Press and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. This anthology documents the extraordinary literary production of women in our time and place. Featured authors include Etel Adnan, Dodie Bellamy, Mary Burger, Catalina Cariaga, Kathleen Fraser, Barbara Guest, Lyn Hejinian, Rachel Loden, Sianne Ngai, Leslie Scalapino, Norma Cole, Eileen Tabios, Sarah Anne Cox, Yedda Morrison, and Stefani Barber. For a copy, send $10 + $2 S&H to Small Press Traffic, 1111 - 8th Street, San Francisco, CA 94107. All proceeds will benefit La Casa de las Madres (a San Francisco shelter for battered women and their children). The project is supported by the Goethe Institut, Roselyne C. Swig and the Swig Foundation. For more information, go to http://www.sptraffic.org/

Interlope #7
Interlope is a journal of poetics and poems which seeks to publish innovative Asian American writing. Issue No. 7 features Eileen Tabios, Mona Nicole Sfeir, Paolo Javier, Barbara Pulmano Reyes, Vidu Prasann, Pang Hui Lim, and Bhanu Kapil Rider. To order, send $5 to Editor Summi Kaipa, P.O. Box 423058, San Francisco, CA 94110. For more information, go to http://www.interlope.org/

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POEMS FORM/FROM THE SIX DIRECTIONS
(a multidisciplinary project by Eileen Tabios)

From August 2001 to just days before the first Six Directions exhibit opened at Sonoma State Union Gallery on March 4, 2002, poets e-mailed over a hundred poems for use in "Poem Tree." Submissions came from 12 countries: Philippines, United States, Canada, England, Singapore, Israel, Australia, Iceland, Russia, Germany, France, and Indonesia.

Some poets are among the leading contemporary poets, e.g. Charles Bernstein (New York) and Denise Duhamel (Florida). Some poets chose Six Directions as the means for sharing their poems to the public for the first time. The youngest participating poets are 11-year-old Olivia Barnes from Massachusetts, 10-year old Tala Kernan and 12-year-old Amihan Kernan. The latter two are sisters living in Oregon whose poems were submitted by their grandfather, noted Filipino playwright Alberto Florentino (who also used the occasion to send in a poem). One poet sent in a poem she "wrote in [her] mind" while running away from an ongoing battle in Mindanao (one of the sites where the war against terrorism has escalated from Afghanistan). One academic chose this project to come out of the "poetry-writing closet." One poet who became a first-time father in his early 50s sent in a poem inspired by having to feed and clean up after his infant daughter. And several poets sent in words written after the "9-1-1" tragedy in an offer for "healing."

A more comprehensive program involving Six Directions will also open on August 1, 2002 at the Pusod Center in Berkeley, Ca. In addition to the art and visual poetry exhibit, workshops and another wedding "happening" are planned; this month's featured poet Catalina Cariaga has promised to help provide music by playing the ukelele (stay tuned for details).

Meanwhile, Meritage Press is pleased to offer a report on the Sonoma wedding performance that initially had been sent by Eileen to the poet-participants:

Dear Six Directions Poets,

On March 12, 2002, I "married" Mr/s Poetry in Sonoma, California. Thank you very much for attending my wedding by sending me your poems. This ceremony was like a Las Vegas post-elopement rite; a larger wedding will take place again in August at the Pusod Gallery in Berkeley, CA when "Poems Form/From The Six Directions" will be exhibited for the second time. Meanwhile, I wanted to send a brief report on the "Poem Tree" ritual that just transpired.

As you know, the wedding rite introduced the "Poem Tree" installation. "Poem Tree" references the Filipino wedding tradition of guests pinning money on the bride and groom's clothes during the wedding celebration to offer financial aid for the new couple's life together. "Poem Tree" is pinned with print-outs of poems to symbolize my commitment, or "wedding," to Poetry, as well as the notion that Poetry also feeds the world. Reflecting another Six Directions concept of integrating the (external) world into the (internal) world of my poetry, all of the poems are written and were sent by other poets from around the world.

Natalie Concepcion, a young poet and student at Sonoma State University, wore my dress. I wanted someone else to wear my dress to reflect my view that the Poem can transcend a poet's autobiographical intent (well, okay: and, not that I tested the issue, but it's certainly possible I no longer fit in that dress from over 15 years ago!). Nonetheless, I intended the use of my own wedding dress to reflect authenticity even as identity shifts, as well as the presence of my "I" in my poems.

I originally envisioned your poems to be printed out and then pinned onto the dress. Three days before the rite, I reconsidered this notion. For purpose of the exhibited installation, the dress will be pinned with your poems. But for the wedding "happening," I decided that audience members should take your poems home to serve as a wedding party souvenirs that hopefully reminds them to remain/become involved in poetry. (In my original wedding, I handed out candied nuts in lace wrappers; I think a poem is much sweeter). I hoped that their bringing home an object, a poem from Six Directions, would strengthen the memory of what they experienced that day as we celebrated the joy of Poetry, and perhaps help integrate poetry into their daily lives. (Perhaps your poems are now hanging from someone's refrigerator door!)

So, for the Sonoma wedding print-outs, I shaped out a (65 by 160 mm) section featuring the title and author of the poem. I cut out those sections ahead of time and attached them back on the page with a small pin. During the wedding rite, each audience member detached that section and pinned that small slip of paper onto the wedding dress. The process allowed the participant to enact the Filipino wedding tradition of pinning poems/money onto the dress while still enabling the participant to retain the poem.

Though participants take home the complete text of the poem, their 8 X 10 printout souvenir is now missing the section that they had pinned to my dress. I viewed that gap in the paper as a "space" for the memory of the rite, and whatever significance they choose to invest in it. It might be akin to a caesura (spaces breaking up the text of a poem), and how different readers may react differently to that space delineated within the text of the poem.

The section bearing your name and the title of your poem is sized 65 by 160 mm because that is the dimension of a Philippine peso bill. The size of that section relates to one of the underlying concepts of Six Directions, which is the exploration of Identity -- both poetically and as a human being. I referenced the Philippine currency as I am Filipino.

I originally intended to cut out the 65 X 160 mm pieces of paper from brown paper bags. I liked the idea of transforming "detritus" into "art," of recycling, and of the coincidence that the color of brown bags symbolizes the kayumangi or brown skin of Filipinos. But, by coincidence, I had ran out of paper bags. I could have bought brown paper to achieve a similar effect, but I didn't like the idea of acquiring new paper (cutting down new trees) rather than recycling. The intent of Six Directions is for Poetry to feed the world, not eat the world (so to speak).

Thus, I chose instead to section out an area from the print-outs of the poems. I had printed your poems out on yellow paper because I liked the Buddhist notion of gold symbolizing consciousness. What were pinned, therefore, on my dress were yellow/gold paper, rather than the brown pieces of paper whose color would have symbolized the Filipino. But I thought this result is still fine as I don't think that the search for one's cultural or indigenous roots necessarily means dismissing other cultures.

I also added real dollar bills to some of the handouts. So some audience participants received real money during the process of picking out a handout from a randomly-ordered stack. I used real money to give away to reflect how the decision to live and work as a poet exacts very real financial sacrifices. We are not yet, after all, at that highly-evolved state where we can use a poem to pay for rent. Having said that, two audience members who had received dollars returned the money to me. One said, "because the Bride often receives unexpected gifts." The other said, "I'm a poet, too, and understand what you mean about financial sacrifices. There is no way I can take this money away from another poet..."

Music during the wedding rite was provided by "Mango Kingz," a local band composed of Derrick Posadas, Arturo Bautista, Janjay Coquilla, Rodney Domingo and Alan Aliga. Not being previously familiar with this band, I found their presence to be a marvelous surprise. But I also thought their unexpected presence was appropriate for evoking how a wedding celebration often unfolds with surprises. Similarly, I am often surprised by what occurs in a poem that I write --- which, for me, proves that the poem ends up being the one telling the poet what to write and not the other way around.

It's worth noting that the manifestation of the wedding rite at Sonoma was created as a result of discussions with various Sonoma participants, including Professor Leny Strobel, Natalie Concepcion and Sonoma Intercultural Center Director Darius Spearman. The wedding rite is expected to take another form during the Pusod Center exhibit in August-September 2002, based on decisions by the Pusod staff and its volunteers. I wanted it to happen this way, as I viewed my role as having offered a poem, a space, for the reader/audience's interpretation by offering the Six Directions' concepts. The different manifestions of the wedding rite are, for me, similar to how the same poem(s) can be read in a multiplicity of ways.

Lastly, this Six Directions project could continue (I've already been approached by another school about it) in a number of other forms in the future. So I could be marrying Mr/s Poetry several times. I think that's appropriate because, as I joked to a friend, I decided to marry "Poetry" so I can marry as many people as possible. This relates to how Poetry can be about anything and everything.

I hope you had a good time reading this report. Thanks so much again for sending me your poems without which Six Directions and the Poem Tree would not be as marvelous.

All Best,
Eileen Tabios

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Meritage Press is also pleased to offer a poem written by Natalie Concepcion, the young poet who played the role of "bride" at Sonoma. Natalie says she has written primarily as a "slam poet" and that this poem is a new direction for her; we are pleased that in writing a poem specifically for Six Directions, Natalie was open to widening her own poetic vision:

Poetry -- Poet Tree

I spread my branches out in Six Directions
The external world becomes a part of me
A message is sent out into the blank void
Faceless voices of many respond physically
Leaves of paper decorate my form
With words that are only words, until meaning is found
It lies hidden and sleeping, invisibly
Between yellow recycled paper and satin
I thrive in the light of your consciousness
Life inspires and feeds me
Discover me as an imitation of life
Transcending intangibility
Evoking emotion and memory
Translate words into a physical being
Learn from the beauty in your experiences
Resolve the mystery of poetry

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POETRY FEEDS THE WORLD

Meritage Press is pleased to feature an update on the ongoing saga of Tony Robles' experience with his poem "Ode to the Sandwich Makers" that won second place in our 2001 Holiday Poetry Contest; for his first poem, see the February archive and for his second poem "Upon getting 2nd place in a Poetry Contest," see the March archive. Tony's third poem "Free Lunch" also revolves around "Lee's deli" at the corner of Market and Montgomery in San Francisco. Tony says the deli is "near the corner where people congregate on the steps to eat their lunch...especially on sunny days. Those folks make the sandwiches real fast...so fast, in fact, that when you ask for a ham sandwich, you might get a deviled egg...and if you want mayo..you might get mustard." While Tony's second poem had bemoaned how the deli proprietors had ignored his first poem's second-place award, his latest poem offers proof that, ultimately, Poetry feeds the world:

FREE LUNCH

An ex-girlfriend of Gregory Corso
told me that the poet used
to walk around
SF

Going from liquor store
to liquor store

peddling
poetry
for booze

"I'll write you a poem
for a fifth of
vodka"

Sometimes it
worked

sometimes
not

I never had the guts
to do
that

Poems don't grow
on trees, so i
work an 8 hour job
in the financial district

I've tried to
use the poem for
personal gain

I've tried to
woo women,
praise

favors,
etc.

The women usually
run and the praise
is thin

Poetry seemed to
get me
nowhere

I recently entered
a poem in
a contest

a poem about
sandwich makers
in a deli

The poem
took second place

The editor said
that the judge
had a hard time
selecting the first place poem

It came down
to me and a
kid from back home

in the Philippines

The judge
flipped between
the 2 poems like
lunch meat

My sandwich maker
poem got second

The kid from back
home got first

...he deserved it

Brought the poem
to the sandwich
shop

"That's nice" the
manager said as
he rung me up

Came back
a few times

Not knowing
where the poem
went

It wasn't on
the wall

wasn't in
a frame

or between
slices of
bread

It was nowhere

Yesterday i
walked in
again

The manager
said "Hey, you're
the guy who wrote
that poem"

He said that
the shop owner
liked it

Waived me
through the
line

A free
salami
sandwich

Went back
to the office
finally knowing

what became
of my
poem

It was
in my
belly