The First Time

The first time  
I read before strangers  
The crowd was over 500 strong...  
Before my first time,  
I read to small groups of friends  
In the dayroom of an Air Force barracks  
A half dozen strong...  
My flyers got me pulled before the base commander a time or two...  
I found this to be entertaining,  
Although he was not entertained...  
But this first time  
Reading before strangers  
Was in a college ballroom,  
Every seat full...  
I was nervous...  
The crowd was huge,  
And the murmuring multitudes  
Never lowered their volume  
For any of the poets before me...  
I thought to myself  
That this was okay...  
I could just murmur along with them  
And blend into the atmosphere...  
I could be the smell of coffee...  
Or the scent of cigarettes smoked in a stairwell just past the main entrance...  
I could be the incandescent lights of the yellowed chandeliers,  
Or the slight starburst in the night  
From the streetlights below,   
Just outside the large bay windows...  
Moths fluttering around them...  
Stray bats catching a meal...  
No one would notice,  
So any fear I had could be ignored...  
My time came and sat on a high barstool...  
Adjusted the mic...  
The crowd still murmuring,  
Conversations ongoing at every table...  
I opened a journal,  
Large, green book,  
Used to be a blank ledger from the Air Force dining hall where I used to work...  
Now filled with what is now my oldest material...  
Back then it was brand new...  
Love poems and pining used to be my subjects...  
They seem so silly now  
After three decades more of living...  
I started reading...  
Not looking up from the journal...  
Expecting to blend in like all the others...  
Expecting to hear the crowd through my time on that stage...  
But there was a hush  
That started on one side of the room  
And spread to the other...  
I kept reading, undaunted,  
But glanced up for a moment to see every eye in the room trained on me...  
Not a conversation being had...  
The sea of murmuring had gone silent...  
The first poem came to a close  
And the room exploded with applause...  
I've written about this moment before,  
But I'm revisiting it in the night,  
Alone in my room,  
Because it was my first taste...  
My first taste of power...  
Being seen by people who didn't yet know me by name...  
I've become wiser with age...  
Approach less simplistic things now  
Than unrequited love and raw lust...  
I've become a little boring...  
I've had some of the innocence and wild beaten out of me by time and experience...  
Time ticks on...  
There may be more adventures ahead,  
But, at the moment, I wait...  
Working towards an escape from this prison cell a years time from the now...  
I am temporarily become  
The mildew on this apartment's bathroom tiles...  
The hot, humid Austin nights...  
The bats leaving the bridge at dusk over Ladybird Lake that I never get out to see...  
The homeless on every on and off ramp to I35 that I strain to avoid eye contact with because I have nothing to give  
Being just a paycheck away from that place myself,  
Much like millions in this country are...  
I'm the roommate who never leaves his room but for work and for groceries...  
Been licking my wounds for too long...  
I have lost touch with those feelings of power...  
Spent too long just looking for peace,  
Although just peace is more valuable than fine art by the masters...  
No more unrequited love poems...  
Now it's about black holes at the center of my being...  
Straining to bring back meaning,  
Or a reason to become ambitious about rediscovering meaning...  
It's nowhere near twilight,  
But you never know what lies ahead...  
That used to be exciting,  
But now it just makes me anxious...  
The lights flicker...  
It's 2:30 in the morning...  
Sleep escapes me for now...