My next poem was the title poem of my collection,
New Faces of 1952, which is on sale tonight.
It was the year of my birth, and it was also
the year of a Broadway musical revue called New Faces of 1952.
So it's me trying to reconstruct my past.
It's called "Biographia Literaria."
"You remember new faces of 1952, entertainers blurred and green,
as bad counterfeit.
From her lap you watched your mother watch TV.
Sometimes she'd accompany the aquamarine vocalist
in "Sentimental Journey."
But always during commercials she looked confused.
Was she trying to separate your squalling from your future,
as critics detach art from art?
The dominant hue was infant red.
Face it, your childhood was shaped by daily viewing
of "Divorce Court."
To enhance your witness box approach to life,
you began each sentence with "your honor"
and practiced crying in a full-length mirror.
As credits cascaded down the screen,
you admired the boomers and gaffers, unheralded as bacteria.
By now your tears had a charisma so strong they performed
without you at Edsel sales.
With the crisp, high step of majorettes,
they preceded you down Main Street.
When your mother questioned, you pleaded the Fifth,
or practiced evasion.
Inventing the enemy, you said in the mirror.
An optimist, she labeled you artistic.
The other choice was worse."
And someone at dinner tonight asked me
if people ever think I'm crazy because of my writing.
And I said, only my mother.
So that's in the poem, I guess.