Putting a sign on poetry

He was late arriving at the bookstore.

Jim, an assistant to the event coordinator, looked nervously out between the slats of the window shade last Monday. He was hoping to catch a glimpse of a car pulling up in the lot behind the University Book Store. Behind him was a table with a cup full of pens.

Then there was the line. It started as a square, a little queue of zigzag cloth barriers like a bank might use. Three hundred strong, it continued past shelves and sections, down stairs, out of the book section and into the gift section, which it nearly encircled.

The crowd at the front of the line, which had been for the most part lounging, reading and talking quietly among themselves, promptly stood up roughly 20 minutes before he arrived and remained on their feet.

Ben Leon was at the front of the line. The senior and English major at the UW, proudly owned up to waiting that morning for the store to open its doors.

The scene is striking for many reasons, not the least of which is how different this is from an average poetry event. The signing for Billy Corgan's first book of poetry, Blinking with Fists, Monday night was an efficient affair, small talk and handshakes, quick photos and more than three hundred books signed in a little over an hour.

For Corgan, the day followed a now common routine, a flight in, an interview, an appearance at a radio station and a sound check before heading to the signing. He walks in the front door, wearing a raincoat and stocking cap. The change in tenor of the winding line of fans is barely noticeable. They are still excited and still largely hushed. Within minutes of arriving, Corgan is seated at the table. He has scarcely said a word. Leon steps forward and for his 10-hour wait he receives his prize, several illegible lines in thick black ink on the first page of his book.

At a more mainstream poetry event one might expect a reading, a talk with interchange and questions and a much smaller crowd. But then, the 37-year-old Corgan is not your ordinary poet. As the former lead singer-song writer in the alternative rock band, Smashing Pumpkins, Corgan had sold his words in the form of rock songs to countless millions long before the idea of a book of poetry started to jell in his mind. Still, Corgan claims a connection to the written word that predates his fame and status as a rock star.

"I wrote poetry; I wrote stories and stuff long before I was a musician," said Corgan.

He thought that music had pushed his interest in non-music writing far enough to a fringe that it would not come back, and he was somewhat surprised when it returned to him. Moving from the album to the book did not intimidate him, however.

"People make the word holy and the music holy, but to me it's all there to be kicked around."

What does concern him is if he is getting his meaning across, an interesting concern in light of the way Corgan is conducting himself in his role as a poet.

In Corgan's world of rock tuned to poetry, the reading is a ticketed event at the Mirabeau Room after the signing. Corgan was upset at the fact that the over-21 club was going to shut out a good portion of the fans who had come to the signing. Despite the age restriction, the show was sold out.

Near the very end of the signing a young writer, Shelby Davie, who came up from Eugene, Ore. for the signing, leaned close to ask Corgan a question on how she can become famous for her own words. In the exchange Corgan invoked the status of a god-like father of his youth. He told her how his father, also a musician, told him he would never make it in music. Corgan then channels his god in a mixed blessing, perhaps the most poetic event of the evening.

"You just haven't run into enough brick walls," he tells her.

It is difficult to deny after watching the face of happy fan after happy fan, who uniformly heaped praise on Blinking with Fists, that Corgan has climbed to the top of the music world wall, and intends to stay with a solo release due out spring of next year. Reading the mixed critical reviews his poetry has thus far, one might question, however ,if he is hearing his own voice, if he still has poetic walls to hit. It is tempting to simply dismiss Corgan's book as the latest cross-over, or a commercial ploy to whip up his fans for his coming music release. Still amid all the rock star glitz of his signing, it is hard to deny a sincerity like Corgan's poetry.