On Poetry & Business Life, Part 2: “Drink Meeting at the Grand Hyatt Sun Garden”
October 17, 2012
I had a meeting yesterday with a European colleague at the Grand Hyatt in New York. We were introduced by a mutual acquaintance from outside the firm for which we both work.
As we met and ascended the stairs to the Lounge at New York Central, I was reminded of a poem I wrote in that bar many years ago, while working for an international publishing agency.
“Drink Meeting at the Grand Hyatt Sun Garden” wasn’t a very good poem, I think, but it well illustrated my discomfort at the time, as an artist in a business setting.
I used this poem in a talk called “Poetry & Business Life,” which was about the long tradition of poet-business people (Wallace Stevens, T.S. Eliot, James Dickey, Dana Gioia, etc.), and which I wrote about previously on this blog.
The name of the bar has changed, as has my comfort level with business life over the years. Here is my poem. “Drink Meeting at the Grand Hyatt Sun Garden”:
Jazz standards fill the atrium,
black and white and one uniform shade of gray
—is this a Woody Allen film?
I’m waiting for Soandso on business,
not my business,
but the people I work for, theirs—
Any moment Woody will walk in
with Mia Farrow or Somebody,
an entourage, paparazzi.
He’ll head straight for my table,
and shake my hand;
the press will want to know
who I am, and I’ll no longer
be “a minor poet, not very conspicuous.”
I fight the urge to bolt
out of the Sun Garden bar
and find some dark, unmonikered pub,
like those my father frequented.
I realize the discomfort he must have felt
when he’d visit the clean, well-lighted
establishments of Tokyo, or LA, or Miami
on business, not his
but the people he worked for, theirs—
This is not my world:
a foreign post for a poet
and accidental businessman.
I suspect they’d throw me out
if not for my Brooks Brothers suit
and American Express card, not mine
but the people I work for, theirs—
Soandso is late, or lost,
or has forgotten…no,
it turns out she’s been waiting
in the lobby, fifteen minutes, twenty,
only just now thought
to check the bar—“Silly me…”
No Woody, no Mia, no Diane Keaton.
(But wait, isn’t that Mr. Shawn by the piano?
And isn’t that Donald Trump on the divan?)
Just a meeting, information shared—
perhaps, one day, we could be friends—
business transacted,
not my business,
but what has become mine—
I light a cigarette after Soandso has gone.
“Are you finished with this one, sir?”
I order another drink
and finish my poem. This
is my business.
The world is my office.
–Scott Edward Anderson
##
October 18, 2012 at 6:52 am
Scott,
Your poem is a snapshot of your feelings at a particular time in your life….so expressive written! It IS a very good poem! Each time I read your works I feel I know you a little bit better and that makes me happy.
Xoxo
Sent from my iPad
On Oct 17, 2012, at 8:41 PM, Scott Edward Anderson’s Poetry Blog wrote:
WordPress.com Scott Edward Anderson posted: ” The Lounge at New York Central I had a meeting yesterday with a European colleague at the Grand Hyatt in New York. We were introduced by a mutual acquaintance from outside the firm”
October 18, 2012 at 12:41 pm
Thank you, Lee. So wonderful to share with you. XO
October 18, 2012 at 11:02 am
All is fodder for art. II can feel the anxiety,out of placeness. Than you, Diane
October 18, 2012 at 12:43 pm
Thank you, Diane. It’s good to be an outsider. And better for subject matter than teaching poetry to undergrads!
January 10, 2013 at 10:14 pm
[…] was perusing the blogosphere and came across this cool poem called Drink Meeting at the Grand Hyatt Sun Garden. It’s about a poet who, like all poets who want to eat, is living a double life as a […]
February 22, 2013 at 8:18 pm
Well, it’s a good poem after all (after you said maybe it’s not 🙂
I especially love the repetition of “theirs” and the idea of “not mine,” but how you’ve made it yours, somehow, through the creative act.
And… I just like it. Mia, Soandso, Tokyo. The cigarette. The leisure of the drink and the poem-writing.
February 23, 2013 at 12:25 am
Thanks! I’m glad you enjoyed it. Your reading is encouraging and gives me a new appreciation of the poem.