Sacramento Poetry Center is ahead of the curve.
They are the first poetry organization to formally invite me and Oscar to read as co-features in their reading series. We have settled on January 7, 2008. And it is going to rock.
I think it's exciting, especially since I've been generally experiencing folks that seem to not know how to publicly treat or regard poet couples, and I suspect this has something to do with assumptions of gender, and with inappropriate use of space.
Because the Brownings or Plath and Hughes are not good models for me and Oscar, I always think of what I can learn from (one of my former mentors) Nick Carbó and Denise Duhamel, since a couple of years ago there was this awesome article in the Miami Herald about their professional lives as a married poet couple. I wonder if they have to endure social and unprofessional space encroachment in their public/professional lives.
I know that social and unprofessional space encroachment afflicts Oscar's and my public/professional lives, and I kind of hate it.
I appreciate very much when writers, editors, and other folks in the industry are capable of having unloaded interaction with us, collectively and individually, with minimal assumption and presumption.
The basics are these: We're married; don't disrespect that.
He has a career. I have a career. If it's my feature, then treat it as my feature. If it's Oscar's feature, then treat is as Oscar's feature.
When we co-feature, then address the both of us.
I think it's pretty straight forward.
