The classifieds had two listings under “Writing.” One was for a professional résumé service that was called, conveniently, A Professional Résumé Service, the A appended to the company name in the manner of exterminators and locksmiths vying for top billing in the yellow pages. The other was for a poet in need of an assistant. Where I come from, that sort of job opportunity does not often appear in the classifieds. This was like finding a listing for “sorcerer’s apprentice” or “journeyman self-pleasurer.” I called. The woman on the phone had a name that sounded like a pen name, curly and alliterative, delivered with an accent that was exotic and full of tongue, evoking desert sand and mosques and figs. She lived in a condominium development that I knew was filled with rich people, and she asked me to come by in the evening. I drove there in my secondhand 1980 Chevrolet Citation, a car that had aged so profoundly it looked as though it had wasting disease.
