All right, I say, had Arrow, Hey, how are you doing
today, Tony? Ah, there we go. There's a person's voice.
I'm joyful this morning. That's what I am, dude. I love that
kind of energy. That's that's the kind of stuff that you believe in the
power of choice. And your choice today is to be in a great mood.
Absolutely absolutely, And I've been choosing the word joyful on a purpose lately
because that's the only way to describe how I'm feeling. I got to tell
you, Tony, I'm very proud of you with this book. And the
reason being is because I've been a daily writer for thirty years. I've done
everything humanly possible to try to get people to write themselves. And then here
comes your book and it is an expression. It is emotion, it is
your journey, it is it is so much and this is the kind of
stuff that people need to read so they can do it themselves. Wow.
Thank you for that affirmation. Wow Wow, thank you. Thank you to
put it out on paper, though, because it's one thing to live it
and you know the emotional changes that we go through when we're living in But
now when you relinquish it to the readers, what are you going through?
Yeah, that's a rule. There's a good question, you know. Ah,
there is a there's a there's a sense of release, and then there's
this like a bit of vulnerability. I still feel right because the stories,
at least the memories and that I've crapped, the stories around and the poetry
that's included are poems and memories that nobody knows that I've had, parents,
family members, friends, And so there is something to be said about like,
not only is the world getting it, but even people who are in
my world, like in fact, they're getting it too. And so there's
something to be said about big breath. I'm so glad I got it out,
but also I hope this's not only them understand me, but help them
them understand themselves so much better too. And so there's a sense of like,
gosh, like now there's a book out in the world that I could
have used as a kid that helped me realize how humor I was, you
know, yep. Yeah, And that that goes all the way back to
when I said that this is what I've been doing for the past thirty year.
My wife goes, Okay, all your journals when when you transition.
We're we're going to get rid of the journals, okay, And I go,
no, you're not, because these books are for somebody that's well beyond
me. Yes, yes, that's it. And and what you know with
this thing part about the part about this is too because really I wrote this
book as an adult. But the poems that I've included the story is this,
I was actually in therapy. This is a real thing, like actually
like the cognitive behavior therapy, right, dealing with some stuff and the suppressed
anger and sadness and uh, there's sort of like the suppressed joy that I've
had, like that were still in those poems because I've been carrying those poems
around with me forever. My therapist this book I wrote. The book was
like, Tony, you know that box of poems you said you've been carrying
around since you were a kid. May the time you went back and revisited
those poems and I spent a week in reading and crying and ripping some of
them up. But it was almost like ritualistic. But I was like,
oh, all of the fears that I've had about myself, everything that I've
sort of been whole being on to hoarding around emotionally as an adult. They
they've been here the whole time, and so it was a matter of like
figuring out which one of the these ones though, led to my freedom.
You know, those are ones that I made. I went included. Man,
I'll tell you what the now, Now you've just explained the title to
me. From from my point of direction, the boogeyman becomes the poet.
I mean you you had some boogieman moments, and then when you found your
poetry, all of a sudden you found an expression of freedom. Yeah,
that's exactly it. That boogeyman for sure. You know, for readers,
it's absolutely metaphor for a fear right of internalized racism, internalized homophobia. We
grew up for not in poverty. I want to make that distinsion you distinguished
single mom. My father was adictions of the drugs and it was a messy
time. He was a wonderful, amazing sober man. Now, but you
know, writing about that stuff during that time. But like I had internalized
this belief that I was not great, that I was you know, not
a good person that you know I needed to always be. I need to
always perform, right, I need to perform in a safe blackness. I
need to perform straight. I needed to know there was a performance that I
had to just keep putting off. Ess. Mark Twain in his autobiography talked
about how writers need to keep their accent, and in reading your book,
I see your accent clearly, because there are some sentences here that don't start
with a capital letter, and your commas and your posities, and I'm going,
my god, I love this man. I love the way that he
convinced his editor let me do my thing. Oh wow, thank you er.
That's exactly how it went down to write. And so you know,
the readers need to know. I am not a like academically trained writer.
This is the truth. I've been writing poetry as a kids, just to
write poems as a kid. I do enjoy reading and stuff like that,
but I don't have an MSA. And so form is what you're referring to.
And this memoir and verse developed into a form because I naturally think and
write poetically. Even in my academic writing sometimes I try to slot a little
rhythm, illiterate and so you're right, this is a memoir written in verse.
And I broke the text up on the page with the line breaks and
so that people can catch the occasional rhyme to you know, to catch the
moments and I might take my breath, or to catch the really extended message
forward. I wanted people to engage, you know, with the book,
you know, beyond just reading, you know, a memoir like oh this
is this is actually fun and engaging to read, especially for young readers right
who may not get anything written like this. Although shout out to Mahogany Brown
and Candice Elo and Elizabeth Glasklez and Elizabeth Oceabato who also have written memoirs and
verse Dean Ada. Anyway, I just had to throw that out there.
But there's a form that exists, and I'm so happy to have that language.
Now. Now, as a poet, and you speak the language of
the poet, how do you get people to understand what you're saying? Because
there are many times people will look at me and say, come back down
to where I am, man, you're talking way over my head. Yeah,
translation is the word that pops in my head because I am a PhDe
the person who I published in you know, peer reviewed academic journals, and
words are always thirteen letters long, you know, When I was writing this
book and when I was engaging in this reflection, I treated it almost like
an academic essay because the title of the book actually comes from a poem that
I wrote, maybe over a decade ago, and the last line is and
so the Boogeyman became a poet? Actually, that poem is in the epilogue
of this book. And I wrote it, you know, over a decade
ago. And what I realized is everything that I write is always for me
first, right, and then there's a moment when I want to share it
with the world. And so I wrote this book with that title in mind,
and I wrote it, how did the Boogeyman become a poet? Tell
me? How did you become so unafraid to unapologetically be who you are?
Right? And so that required a translation because it was like, oh,
we don't need to write this in this academic context with all this fancy words.
Write this for younger you. How would you want to read how would
you want to understand how complicated the world is? Without explicitly saying how can
you write about racism without really like writing the words? Right? So I
think I might have written that word once, like how I don't even think
I use the word homophobia in the book at all. Right, but like,
how can you write about this in a way where the language accessible.
Yeah. The only time that you bring anything like that up is when you
when you go in at ten fifty six pm at night to go on AOL.
And it was like, man, he's brave and very honest in this.
But the thing about it is, though, that you show the text
messages or the IM messages and I'm going, my god, this guy knows
exactly what he's doing in this story. Yeah, yeah, I'm so glad
you mentioned that. And this is the important thing about memoir, right,
So this again, this takes place, you know, spring nineteen ninety nine
to fall two thousand, so it's a short time period in my life,
seventeen year old Tony. And you know, when I had to think about
like what kind of memories and things include, I had to be very sort
of strategic about that, and so you know, oh, I'm off my
point. What was I going to say? I was very excited about that
question. What's he saying? I was talking about when you went in and
you hooked up to AOL. And I think one of the funniest lines was
that you looked over your shoulder and You're wondering God, God was going to
be the only one that was going to see your witness, but it was
okay. You were one year away from turning eighteen eighteen. Yeah, now,
I really yeah. I got lost in the story because I was like,
wait a minute, because in terms of what's include, So here's the
thing. You know, I do not remember exactly every single conversation I had
with someone in nineteen ninety nine and so, but I have very strong fond
memories of finding chat rooms and visiting websites. Right around the time the Internet
was sort of like becoming more accessible to just people just in their homes.
And I had a computer in college, and I'm you know, Google wasn't
out. I think it was Yahoo at the time. But that was the
first time I was able to research information and find a community. I even
think in the book I mentioned like how you know the internet was the safest
place for a lot of us, and wild it is. You know,
I've been married to my husband now for five years. We met, you
know, almost eight or nine years ago, and we met online. Like
the fact that the internet still continues to serve. It's sort of this space
where there's a safe I don't know a way to be. This is it.
Yeah, Now what's the next book? You've got to be working on
another one, because now that you've been published, man, you're you're part
of the group. Now. Oh, it's happening. It's happening. So
I'm happy to share that I was actually offered a tuber deal from Harper Collins,
Captain Ticket Books and Harpercollums. And so the next book because coming winter
twenty twenty five. It is called Knuckleheads, and it's a collection of Yeah,
it's a collection of poems two black boys and men, especially the gay
ones, and the people who love us. So I tell the word of
you love me and I love you. This book is for you too.
And the cool part about it is I originally wrote Knucklehead first, and when
my wonderful agent, Annie Lang I should Pandy literary love ay so much.
When she was pitching me the publishers, we included in the proposals that I
was also working on a memoir and verse. But how the boogeyman became a
poet and it wasn't tell my editor who I wound up connecting with Ben Rosenthal
at Harper Collins was like Tony the memoir, I've got to come first,
man, like the world needs to know who you are. And so the
cool thing is I embedded Nuggets in how the Boogeyman became a poet that directly
connects the Knucklehead, and nuggets and Knucklehead that directly keets out a boogeyman became
a poet. So these two are huge. They compliment each other very very
well. As my agent says, Tony, it's like it's like the book.
It's like the flesh, but the poetr're collecting. It's a bone and
they stick together. I'm really excited about that. But it's called Knucklehead.
Yes, well, I expect to talk to you next year then in twenty
twenty five about Knucklehead. Let's do it. Let's do it, dude.
Please come back to this show anytime in the future. The door is always
going to be open for you. Thank you so much. I've had a
wonderful time, man, take care. Will you be brilliant today okay or
what wait? Wait? Wait? You be joyful all day today and forward
there we go. I shall be joyful. Thank you, Thank you,
thank you, thank you God,