PI On A Hot Tin Roof

Blancaneaux, to let the kid read second. She figured first would send her over the edge with fright and third or lower would require hospitalization.
    The bribe consisted of only a couple of drinks, but it did mean Lemon’s self-important company for half an hour. Lucy was going to owe her.
    Lemon began the evening with his customary greeting, so well known to the habitués that they shouted it with him. “How y’all tonight?”
    And then everybody shouted and high-fived, leaving Lemon to inquire loudly if they were making fun of him, which caused even more hilarity and a mock attempt on Lemon’s part to leave the stage, which meant he had to be shouted back, however insincerely. Lemon had a reputation for loving the sound of his own voice.
    So they endured a good ten minutes of inane patter before he even condescended to announce the first poet, also a young white girl—though considerably older than Lucy. She had written a love poem, which contained words that neither Raisa nor Lucy (with any luck at all) had ever heard. Throughout the recitation, Darryl squirmed like a kid who had to pee. Not wanting Lucy to have to follow that, Talba had a whispered conversation with Lemon—switching the Princess to third place—and causing him to do what he always did when he was a little confused, or at a loss for words or just lonesome for his own voice. Once again, he shouted out, “How y’all tonight?” and over the ensuing uproar, Talba could hear Raisa whispering to Darryl, “Daddy, what’s ‘come juice’?”, which Lucy caught on tape. Talba could only pray the tape never fell into the hands of the dread Kimmie.
    The next poet was a house favorite (though not the house star, who was the Baroness de Pontalba). Serenity Prayer Jones was renowned for his alcohol consumption, known as “Prayer” to his many friends and drinking buddies, and well known for his doggerel about the joys of being an unrepentant reprobate. Tonight’s poem, entitled, “Lounge Lizard,” was about himself and was mercifully short.
    Lounge Lizard
    I slither to the corners of the bar,
    Drinkin’ everything that ain’t nailed down.
    They say I don’t work,
    But shirk’s its own form of work.
    Know what it takes to charm
    A hundred people a night,
    And get me sailin’ like a kite?
    I ain’ no use, I ain’ no help.
    Got no beauty, got no brains.
    All I got’s a few refrains—
    “How y’all tonight?”
    Folks like me ’cause I ain’t
    The mayor
    And I ain’t Rumsfeld
    And I ain’t the emcee—
    “How y’all tonight?”
    And I ain’t the poor
    And I ain’t the rich.
    I’m just a broken down
    Son of a bitch.
    When Lucy mouthed that line along with him, sure of what was coming next, Talba knew everything would be fine. And then when everyone shouted the last line together—“How y’all tonight?”—the kid whispered, “I can do a lot better than that,” which Raisa caught on tape.
    Lemon came back on, with a hearty, “How y’all tonight?” and introduced Talba for about a year and a half, after which Her Grace took the stage, to foot-stomping and shouts of “Baroness! Baroness!”
    She quieted them down with what they recognized as her usual exit line, “The Baroness myself thanks you.”
    “But I’m not going to read tonight,” she continued. “Instead I’ve discovered a great young talent—a very young talent, folks—only fourteen years old. A young talent who’s making her debut tonight. She’s going to read two poems for you, so join me in welcoming another member of my royal family, Princess Lucy of the House of Champagne!”
    Because of the “family” remark, everyone, of course, was expecting another black poet, and so all was silence till Lucy shouted, “How y’all tonight?” And the audience was hers.
    Sensing it, she took over the stage like a pro. “Debut,” she said.
    Debut
    No long and glittering gown for me,
    Nor social pedigree,
    No silver spoon,
    No mother.
    And no hope.
    A lovely life for a cockroach.
    I lived so quietly before!
    As simple social insect
    And household pest,
    Foraging for crumbs
    In a kitchen of dissension.
    And then my father died.
    And so begins the moment
    Of my reinvention.
    My body is a carapace that cracks
    And spews upon the pantry floor,
    And my soul scuttles into darkness,
    And an animal eats it.
    I am dead.
    But I am sticking to its ribs!
    I am clotting,
    I am holding.
    I can feel that I am staying,
    Cleaving, clinging,
    My carapace in tatters,
    My