I performed the last two entries of faeries in my coffee yesterday, along with two older pieces. It was my first time onstage, something I have previously avoided because of severe stage fright. I stutter and shake. But I tried my best to mask that yesterday. It is really just a matter of a mask.

There were these voices:

• a chain smoking butch; permanent cigarette in hand, a walking ad for a hot roommate on her, charm all over. “Times are changing, mother!”
• an endearing economist reversing the action of walking the path of duty at puberty, so very many years ago
• a fellow tree-hugger with shorter shakira hair & a dream of bob dylan
• a boy. besides the economist, the only member of his gender offering a voice this time, and it is a severely accomplished voice; awarded, published, interviewed, featured.
• an excited english teacher with hippie-long hair and poems in different shades of green.
• a woman with a beautiful name and an attention to detail. She wrote and delivered a poem about sixthseal.com and I loved the context.
• a girl that summons the word ‘loud.’ She likes star signs, writes poems with Greek names and a vocabulary to rival the extensively intense colours of her outfit.
• a diminutive woman with hair almost to her knees. She is rich with sensuality, and I have declared her my Arundhati Roy, especially because of her voice & diction. I hope she gets to fulfill her invitation to read in Chicago.
• and me.

We were shepherded by an extremely cool man, a man with a manifesto, a calm basketball Brit poet with body language and a voice that invaded every corner of the room. He sold chapbooks capable of kissing scars. He began a sentence to me with “when” you are famous and not if, which scared me a little. He wrote a hate-note in my copy of his book. He was babysitted by two gorgeous women who I think have one of the coolest jobs in KL in general. I don’t think I let it show as much as I wanted to but they all grew on me. I think I couldn’t have been more privileged this past few days, and it just might be my best spontaneous move of this year.

I was floored by the people who came up to me personally after my set and told me that they loved it. A lovely woman even took a picture and a step further. I won’t go into detail, but this will not be the last time I will have to wear my anti-shakestutter mask.

PS: It was actually Minnie Mouse, not Donald Duck.