November 10, 2021

Blazing day. Looked out the back window to see a heron flapping out of my garden northward. 

Started a Facebook page called The Last Poet. Couldn’t believe nobody had that name. Wiley Cash being interviewed on the radio inspired it. I’ve done almost nothing to sell my work because–absent a reading tour–I don’t know what to do. Maybe this is it.

Each time I hear DFL I like the music better. Though the libretto does contain the line “It’s all about we.” Last night’s rehearsal seemed ghastly, if better than the night before. People listening from the theater insist it sounds wonderful and that on stage you don’t get a good idea of the actual effect. I want to believe that. I do recall that from other appearances at the Wortham. I’m literally the only second bass, holding down the down part myself. Fuzzy grandpa next to me sings sometimes when the note is F–he must like F–and Jose beside him refuses to open his mouth because he can’t “hear the note.” I want to tell him “sit by me,” but that sounds jackass-y. I got most of it last night. The baritones to my right are strong, and that is helpful. The lines are repetitious, and that is helpful. Conductor/composer Drew is very patient and very musical, however many plates of spaghetti he should be given. We have one more rehearsal and I still have never rehearsed my actual lines– which are, incidentally, among the hundred or so that could be cut without harm. It’s good to be back in the Wortham. My name appears twice in the show tiles on the ceiling of the green room, once for The Normal Heart and once for Six Degrees of Separation. I managed not to point that out more than once. The kids seldom address themselves to me. I remember well that in the theater you don’t notice anyone who’s not in your age group. It’s all right. You step from one scene into another. Young David– Brendan– and I had a lively conversation on the night street walking to our cars. He had done terribly one rehearsal and fine the next, and was deservedly excited. 

Exhaustion. Achy inflammation of every joint. 

Drew says in an email: I know some of the chorus can't hear a lot on stage with the cacophony of sound that is happening, but I can hear the bass section loud and clear and you all sound fantastic! So, I am somewhat at rest. 

When I entered the front door this afternoon, Sweetboi, airborne, screamed at exactly the right second to fill the room with wild, reverberating sound. I thought for a moment he was inside.