That Time Sondheim Compared me to Auden
Earlier today on Facebook, in honor of his birthday, I posted a picture of a letter I got from Stephen Sondheim many years ago (pictured below) about some poems I'd written. He and I had been penpals for over a decade at this point, writing to each other a couple of times a month about anything and everything, so it wasn't a huge presumption for me to send my chapbook. However, I also sent a few paragraph-length palindromes written by my then-boyfriend Bennett as a buffer in case he hated the poems (and believe me, he would've told me). Several people have asked (nay, demanded) that I produce said poems, so here they are, below the photo. Smoke for AT I walk by your old apartment, the smell Of smoke and the grimy High Street dusk reminding me Of the evenings we spent On your rotting second-floor porch, two singers Sneaking Virginia Slims, giggling Like ten-year-olds, first Best Friends. Knowing that our voices would be Foggy and hoarse the next day, We puffed and postu