the wounded bookshop

So tonight I made my first venture into the world of open mic poetry. After much persuasion from my fellow writer and poet friend Chelsea, I agreed to attend the open mike poetry night at The Wounded Bookshop downtown and read some of my poetry. I LOVE The Wounded Bookshop - the atmosphere, the building - it's a used bookshop in an old, old building that used to be a machine shop - now it's filled with mismatched sofas, artwork, dones of aged wooden bookshelves with old books, coffee, tea, wine, creaking staircases, fabulous rugs . . .

I loved listening to other people's works and meeting so many interesting characters: the elderly woman who published a book of poetry years ago, who still writes . . . the young man who's traveled the United States and just recently arrived in Fredericksburg to start a non-profit environmentalist action group - he also used to teach to gang members , one of his favorite students was shot in the forehead . . . the 15-year-old girl with long blond hair pulled back in a ponytail, black-rimmed glasses who declared that she normally writes fiction but what the heck, she gave poetry a try (incidentally she is an extremely talented writer across the board) . . . Chelsea my comrade English major and writer (with all of the OCD characteristics that I posses) - she's a great writer as well . . . the middle-aged man with curly blond-gray hair and glasses, who wrote a poem about Isaac Newtown (and said that if anybody wanted to know why he wrote about Isaac Newton, he would tell him "offline") . . . the young man with a pale yellow buttoned up shirt and black-rimmed glasses, who disliked the government and organized religion, who hestitated reading a poem he had written about sex . . .

I read three of my poems - first time ever reading them in public. It was amazing. I think I'm hooked.