Doing Something Right

by Donnie Dinklage

I read my heaviest and most powerful poem to date for the first time at a writer’s group last week. I’d been saving it up for six months. My hands were shaking. My voice was weak. But I got it out. It’s entitled Masterstroke. It’s about the feeling of no feelings, and the memory of no memories.

While I was reading it, I could hear verbal abuse from outside the library. They voiced awful lies and racial hatred. Because I’m the kinda guy to let things fly by (even unprovoked hate crimes), I almost felt guilty for not doing anything. It was a torrent of public embarrassment. Still, I read on, because names will never hurt me.

Upon leaving, there was a police car on the door. Since when was the last time you saw a police car at a library? I mean come on.

I got the biggest compliment of my life though, when one member of the group said to another, after I finished, “You don’t write poems like that without making enemies.”

Despite the sickly feeling in my stomach over the reality of gang-stalking, I fist-pumped my arm on the way home.