It's clear that I can write poems.

I worked on it. IN my 20's I went to Milwaukee with no matress a bookcase of the poets and I wrote and I wrote and I wrote.

I worked menial jobs.

I would walk the streets of Milwaukee reciting my poems quietly to myself trying to learn from their beat, meaning and sound.

He wasn't my god. Poetry was my god.

He told me one night in my studio, "You are not one of the best writer's I read."

My dad had been dead for 6 months, writing was the only thing keeping me alive.

I let him have it.

On my nephews 1st birthday I wrote a poem for him. He's Tom's son.

I said to myself for the first time, "I am a poet."

I went over to Tom's with mom and his wife said, "Your brother liked that poem." She said things he said.

I went out to the car to get into the passenger seat and Tom stood on his porch on Murray Street and he said, "That was one sophisticated poem you wrote."

I said, "thanks'

He asked if i knew that i used a certain technique. I did but I didn t know the name of the technique just how to do it.

I nodded.

He said, "I took it to school to show another English teacher and she cried when she read it."

I kind of shrugged.

Tom confirmed what I had realized, "I am a poet" Finally I am a poet. I worked so hard for it.

So don t ever tell me I stalked that Novice Master. The only thing i have ever stalked was poetry and the work i put in learning the craft shows that i am telling the truth.

No, i am not skilled enough to capture Ghost with my pen. But I do it better than anyone else who would write of him.