Open Mic, at Hotel Utah

On the twenty-third night of gloomy June,
beneath the light of waning moon,
a band of weirdos shuffled through
into Hotel Utah Saloon.

Within its dark and woody walls,
and through a passage down the hall,
they found their stage, where standing tall,
Carly Beltramo made the call.

She drew their names and spoke aloud
an order to arrange the crowd.
The artists shifted in their seats.
It was the first night they would greet

dear Carly as their humble host.
She had inherited the ghost
of folks who’d led the weekly toast
decades ago ‘n th’ Barbary Coast.

The Utah’s storied open mic
is known in cities far and wide.
Since 1992, the venue’s lights
have shone most Monday nights.

Singers, twangers, crooners, crankers.
Olds with soul and kids with bangers.
The light that shines at Utah lingers,
and is no discriminator.

Utah’s gravity had pulled
Beltramo to its dusky hold
six years ago, when she was sold
on San Francisco’s heart of gold.

She’d come from NYC, to which
she gave eight of her years. Through this,
she saw its “cutthroat”-ness, and wished
for something that would bring her bliss.

She found a job, in marketing,
for a comp’ny called Airbnb
She moved out to The City
where she had few friends, no family.

She started up a jammin’ group.
They met up in the conference room
each month.  And soon, her blossom bloomed.
And like a butterfly, she flew

among the gardens, artists’ dens.
She started picking up some friends.
She found community in them.
Eventually, her feet did land

atop the Utah’s golden stage,
about two years ago today.
And then ‘bout two years later, a
gentleman named Brendan G. prayed:

“I’m looking to pass on the torch,” he
said (as memory alleged).
He tapped her shoulder; it was then
her hosting dynasty began.

For 14 years, Brendan G. had
hosted the Utah like a dad
would host a campground for his kin.
So on the last night led by him,

more than 100 people put
their names into the pitcher. Shook
and emptied late into the night,
few wondered whether Carly might

herself stay 14 years at helm,
of a place where anyone can tell,
as Carly put it, “people can be their own
weird, wild, crazy selves.”