(Nicole McFeely)

It only 6:15, and there’s already a line stretching down the block toward Mission Street. A guy walking by stops and looks up at the sign over the Makeout Room, then at me.

“Who’s playing?” he asks.

“Um. No one, really. It’s Writers With Drinks,” I reply, waiting for the inevitable confusion to ensue.

“Who?”

“No one. It’s Writers with Drinks. It’s a reading series.”

“A what?”

“A literary reading series,” I say, “its the ten year anniversary of the show.”

He pauses for a minute and looks at the line again.

“Whoa. I didn’t know there were lines for poetry anymore. Well, since that one guy, he died, you know, that guy who died who wrote that book…”

Right.

Well, it wasn’t just poetry, though it was definitely worth waiting in line for. Watch the whole show below (complete with intros by Charlie Jane), including performances by:

Julie Thi Underhill, Sean McLain Brown, Joanne Palamountain, Lee Swenson, and Scott Morrison (Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace)

Maxine Hong Kingston

Monica Youn

Regina Lynn

Keith Knight

and Rick Moody