Here I am at last week’s Sideshow, reading some of my greatest hits of the ’90s.   As someone who tends to celebrate inane anniversaries, I realized this month was the 17th anniversary of my first open mic. Yes, that’s right folks, my spoken word career is almost old enough to obtain a driver’s license in New Jersey.  To mark this long-standing labor of love, I decided to amuse myself by reading some of my earliest performance poems written in the previous century.

Incidentally, one of the poems I read, “Another Brick in the Mall, Part 1,” involved driving on a NJ highway and in it, I managed to name check both Ozzy Osborne and Sylvia Plath.  I also read a poem called “Female Ejaculation,” which probably needs no explanation.  And if it does, do some research.

Probably the best received pieces that night were my “Haiku for My Inner Guido,” which I wrote for a drag king show I had mysteriously been asked to participate in way back when.  I went all out for that show, borrowing a shiny track suit from a friend (who had luckily gone as a Guido for Halloween), slicking back my hair, binding my boobs, donning some 99 cent gold frame sunglasses and creating a mound of chest hair from I can’t remember what.   When I looked in the mirror after my greasy, hirsute transformation, I scared myself.  I read a few Guido-themed poems that night, but only the haiku have survived the multiple computer snafus since.

Here they are:

Haiku for My Inner Guido

I talk to her tits
Stare at her ass when she walks
I do love New York

I like lap dance
It feels like a water slide
I’m a kid again

Clearly I was ahead of my time, getting in touch my deep seated gavone through verse, way before the guinea buffoonery of “Jersey Shore.”  If only I had earlier figured out a way to exploit my people for profit, I could have said goodbye to this poetry scheme long ago.

Anyway, returning to those pieces allowed me a glimpse of  my younger self: Unapologetic, offbeat sensibilities, an in-your-face stage presence that hid a severe off-stage shyness, the still-new rush of adrenaline, and the feeling of accomplishment whenever I stepped off stage after engaging with the audience, thinking to myself, “Damn! I can’t believe I did it again!”

Ah, the beauty and wonder of youth!  Time passes and these joys become easy to take for granted.  Due to a variety of personal issues and general inertia, I’ve basically been hibernating artistically for the past few years.  I cut down on my own readings for a while and I produced a show where I was completely behind the scenes.  It was my way of keeping a hand in the performance community, while not putting myself and my work out there on a regular basis.  Although the show became popular and as successful as an underground performance series can be, this hiding tactic left me unfulfilled and depressed.

I also fell behind on my writing, leaving multiple pieces unfinished, most notably the full-length memoir I’ve been working on for a while and am now determined to finish.  And the pieces I did complete, sat in my hard drive until occasionally an editor friend would coax me to set them free.

In the last year or so, thanks in part to the support and examples set by my lovely, hard-working comedian girlfriend and my collaboration with the inspiring Sinclair Sexsmith on Sideshow, and the many other creative folks that keep me going,  I feel like I’m finally back in the game for good.