35 years ago, I saw Cornelius Eady read at Alabama. I have a signed copy of one of his early books as a result. In my senior poetry workshop, we had an assignment to write a poem after some poem we admired; I chose his about jazz musician Hank Mobley, and wrote about Jaco Pastorius. It wasn’t my best work, but it was a fun exercise.

And now he’s reading at Mamdani’s inauguration, which is cool.