House of Blues 

I was trying at the very least to show off, at the most attract attention, 

at the outside get some love from my mother and sister—

so me and my lover took them down the Sunset Strip for both holidays.

That year Christmas and Hanukkah fell in bed together (calendar-wise)

so mother being of one, sister the other, I knew I’d make it to family hero status

getting everybody together at the House of Blues Sunday Gospel Show. 

But no. 

Us up in the creaky balcony stage left, soul and gospel singing below, 

champagne and music glittering all over us, Miss Blue Diamond stepped forth

in footlights, said if anybody wanted to get up on stage and sing, come on!

I swallowed bubbles, skipped stairs, got on stage, into Blue Diamond’s arms 

(she saw me coming), who then released me covered in some kind of a RED

perfume, singing—I knew all the words, someone pushed me 

with the pink-feathered pump of her foot

into the footlights, and I threw my hat into the crowd.

Minutes later, back up in the balcony, happy as all get-out, 

my lover told me behind their backs that mother and sister, 

during all that, were turned away from the stage

facing away, they were not going to look at nor enjoy me. 

That almost made me cry when I went to the bathroom 

as mother and sister asked for the check, parking validation, 

and if anyone had found my hat, but I didn’t. (Well, of course I cried.) 

Instead, I smiled. I mean, really smiled. At the me in the mirror. 

Those two turned away from me in the House of Blues in Hollywood,

just like they turned away from me from everywhere,

wherever I was, anywhere, and in that house of blues I grew up in. 

But so what? 

Who needs an audience, parking, or any other kind of validation 

to get up on (your own) stage?

I was, at last, as always—happy as all get-out. (I got out!)

                                                          

 

Like a red light on the dashboard 

My mother told me I was nothing and hopeless 

every day for years, before I could even drive,

every time I walked through one of our run of rooms. 

In that slum I felt like nothing and nobody,  

being in those little rooms proved it to me

and I believed her, about me, all the way down.

But when I got out there in the fresh air

all those other people smiled at me, 

so I felt a lot of hope, and I smiled back, triple! 

But, when I got back home into the TV dinner air, 

she wiped it off me when she told me they 

didn’t know me like she did, no one else ever would. 

She did that intentionally,

did her best, like a plan

to keep me close, friendless. 

That woman fucked me over. 

Because, now …

sometimes, years and rooms later

I see a red light on my dashboard

and sometimes, I still believe her. 

So, now … 

rather than turn up the radio, so 

I can’t hear the grinding of my engine 

or brain

I get out of the car

and walk out of there.