cviii

“The back of yo’ head is ridiculous.”

-MadTV

            I’m becoming too distracted, during class or during conversation or, here, during mass, as I can only pay attention to the back of people’s heads, figuring out whole life stories from only the way certain strands of hair are pulled together or the number of bobby pins stuck on the sides, or the overuse of gel and other statue-ing products.

            I’ve become sort of an expert, I guess.

cvii

“Remember what Bilbo used to say: ‘It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.’”

-John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, from the mouth of F. Baggins

            I am driving around in the leather backseat of a new friend’s pick-up truck, driving on the midnight road in a slow circle of repetition, of a constant search for just something better than what we are doing right now. We do this for hours, stopping only for short pit stops at parties or dancehalls or houses that we think will be better than what we are doing right now.

            It is only later that night, lying in my bed as the sun comes up, unable to close my eyes on the truck and the costumes and the adrenaline, that I realize that we could have just pulled over on the side of the quiet highway, carefully piled out onto the light-glistened street, and had the best night of our lives.

cvi

“Never put off until tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow.”

-Mark Twain


It is 2:28 in the morning. And I have yet to start studying for my two tests tomorrow.

            There is no time to write tonight, except for half-awake scribbles on notecards and bullet-points, the day hours slowly creeping behind my chair.

cv

“A poet is a man who puts up a ladder to a star and climbs it while playing a violin.”

-Edmond de Goncourt

            I’m running out of these poetic fillers from my past, these cloggers of space with discordant, inapplicable nonsense. And, while I want to promise that this will be the last, this ten-month-old ode to a dusty violin (spoiler alert…), it will not be.

Old Friend

She looked just like she did three years ago,

Just like the day when you put her away

from your mind and went onto “better things.”

The day the music stopped.

Her red blushing skin still curves its way around

your fingered memories of ten years.

The only thing different is her voice:

discordant,

out-of-tune and

out-of-place.

It’s strangely satisfying, though, knowing that

your absence in her life affected her

some how.

And so with a sigh, you'll just close the

case, leaving the violin glistening in the dark mustiness,

and the music echoing between walls of

plastic and faux-leather.

civ

“True country music is honesty, sincerity, and real life to the hilt.”

-Garth Brooks

“Country music has always been the best shrink that 15 bucks can buy.”

-Dierks Bentley

            Ever since I have started college, I’ve made it a point to listen to more and more country music, shuffling 278 shadily-obtained Nashville-recorded songs into my daily playlist, trying to learn the new culture that I have been thrust into through the music of four basic chords and a Southern twang.

            I’m a classic rock guy, letting my days before this defined by The Beatles or The Eagles or The Who or The Commodores, by guitar solos and impossible-to-understand lyrics. So this is new.

            I’ve been slowly trying to ease myself into this, wearing the only two plaid shirts that I own on a fairly-regular basis, letting myself grow used to the heartbreak and comedy and slow polkas of these new artists, trying to put myself in their inspired position, trying to find something in common with the surrounding, boot-wearin’ student body.

            I was surprised by the relatability coming from the words streaming out of my dinged-up iPod, the lyrics giving new heartbreak to old wounds, transposing whatever mostly-imagined problems I have had in the past into a chorus or bass riff.

            And amid the bustle of the still-newness of the crowds around me, my hands jammed into my new jean pockets, sometimes the songs remind me of the past. It is terrible and sad and, again, mostly-imagined. But I just can’t stop listening and singing along.

ciii

“Welcome to the Church of the Holy Cabbage. Lettuce pray.”

-Author Unknown, (fortunately)

            If there is one thing that I’ve learned since I’ve been in college, forgetting the stacks of text books and hastily-scrawled notes, it’s how to eat by yourself.

            I’m not complaining or making a veiled cry for help, I’m merely relating that I just don’t have a “lunch date” every single time I sit down to eat whatever unhealthy concoction is on my plastic tray. And I love it.

            I’ve mastered the beautiful art of eating alone, decaying ear-phones plugged into my cold ears, listening to a new indie album while tackling only the most messy dish possible (barbeque baked potato or roasted corn or an onion melt double cheeseburger). And I have time to think and to write and to think and to just have some time alone for the first time all day.

            And to think.

cii

“Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary.” 

-Kahlil Gibran


            I found an old scrap of paper, tucked into a old scrap of folder, wielding a flurry of short poems that I jotted down probably two years ago. And I was relieved to find that they were still applicable to my life, they still could have been written by me last night or two weeks ago or two minutes from now.

            And that is very relieving.

Untitled 1

The sky fades

but I still run,

my shoes caked with mud;

the road caked with dusk.

Untitled 5

The radio blares

a first-rate song

on a third-rate station.

I’ve been asleep for hours.

Title 3

The rain is dying on my window pane and
I’m counting sheep, even though

It’s only noon.