This is a thank-you to everyone who reads this blog,
because you do, and it makes me feel thankful and surrounded and known and relevant. Because you google “panache taylor katz” or “taylor mardis katz” and you get here. You read it and you text me about it. You read it and write me an email. You read it and cry and tell me about it. You”like this” on facebook. You refer to something from here in a conversation. You secretly, you in your house with your mug, you in your house with your dog, with your nothing on at all, you read this thing I write.
I write this thing because I love people and I like people and I believe that a person who likes or loves me would like to end up here. Because all of you have jobs, or you are trying to have jobs, and you are walking around, taking public transportation, shaking hands, heating up a lunch, you are talking on the phone or you are completing projects or having a drink with new or old friends, or you are in law school or you are in Berlin, and you like poetry, somewhere. If only because you know me. Poetry is a thing that I love and people are a thing that I love and to me, the two are connected.
And then there are the people that end up here accidentally, because I typed up a poem they searched for, or I compiled photographs they were curious about. They don’t know me but maybe they click around. I am not famous and I am not invincible and I know only a small amount. I don’t know who ends up here, I only know the numbers, when I check them.
When I write about something having to do with love, people click. That, alone, is fact enough to thank. I have things to say and I like to sit down and say them, and I do it, and you read. This blog is not one thing, it is many; it’s here to say: I like poets. I like photographers, especially when they photograph people. I like Misha and my friends. I like to feel like I am living the life I began imagining for myself at a very young age. I miss people, and I care for them by writing a poem that will make them laugh. I love my sister, and she moved to Texas. I like to think of my parents when they were young. I have a sideyard, and you should come to it. I am questioning and sometimes a poem surfaces to answer. I drew something, and it’s unskilled but you can see it. I wrote a little ditty and why not put it out there.
I am multiple and I am grateful and I am predisposed to joy. I make poems as a way of staying here. If you read this, it is very likely that we get along. And so: hey guys. Thanks for clicking on this site, this someplace on the internet. It really makes me happy that you do.
With love,
Taylor Mardis Katz
(Edward Hopper’s “Freight Car at Truro”)
panache, perhaps 
And we are so glad you are here.
Taylor, you don’t know me because we have never met, nevertheless I am fan of your site, having got here in a roundabout way via my cousin Ryan Luz’s “The Surrounds Me.” I really enjoyed your “A Giving of Thanks” poem because I can relate completely, not only as someone who visits your site, and I do indeed with my mug, but also as a self-taught poet that has my own site and gets excited when I see page views that I know aren’t mine.
Poetry is an amazing art because it makes one realize that we are not alone in the way we feel about certain things. I am just glad that there are other people out there that take the time to think about what they have experienced, and then with their mugs, sit for long periods of time in front of a computer typing, deleting, thinking, typing, deleting, thinking, typing, and deleting, and then typing some more, until they get it just right.
Lets all keep writing and giving thanks!
Tony Jesse
Hi Tony Jesse!
Thank you so much for writing to me. I’m so glad you found my site, and Ryan Luz isn’t a very roundabout way to find it–he’s one of my closest friends and we seem to do a lot of promoting of each other, albeit in an offhand way! People have come up to me and confessed that they really enjoyed HIS blog! The blogosphere is such a great way to keep in touch with people–I’m from NY, and most of the people who read my blog and talk to me about it are people I’m missing on the east coast. It’s a really nice way for me to express myself and also for my friends and family to feel like I’m talking to them (and to the whole world wide web!)
I checked out your blog and really enjoyed it–your poems have great imagery in them. I’m envious that you’re able to play an instrument as well as write–I’ve always yearned to be able to create music, but as it turns out I am a word girl, through and through.
I hope you had a warm and family-filled thanksgiving, and thank you again for reaching out to say something to me. One more mystery solved in regards to who is clicking on my site!
I have bookmarked your blog and will continue to check it out.
wool & warmth, Taylor
no, taylor katz, THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
enough said.