after “Howl” (1956) by Allen Ginsburg

 

I saw the best minds of my generation 

locked-in scribbling syllables at desks 

in the basement C floor of Firestone library 

covered in a lifetime’s layer of dust,

who skipped last month’s Labyrinth poetry readings

by Komunyakaa & Hayes to puzzle over problem sets 

& so missed the audience’s awkward jawdropper 

questions about race & poverty responded to but politely unanswered,

who showed for the free Chick-fil-A at Clio convenings 

to gorge on chicken strips soggy & cheese pasta 

& paper plates when the rest ran out but left 

before Kevin Roberts could tell us if we should burn it all or not,

who stopped reading even the headlines off news sites 

in favor of gleaning snatches of the rest 

of the globe in phone calls with Mom & Pop 

& in the ‘gram’s short-form drain rot & Barstool stories,

who whisper inner shouts to only closest confidants 

when they begin to doubt whether three rabbis, 

two flags, the contents of a haggadah, and Naftali Bennett

walk into a lecture hall is just a bad joke,

who swear all campus needs is for students to go out more,

loosen a little up, take Thursday Friday Saturday night 

as a break and then maybe they’ll be ready to think 

outside themselves in a non-destructive non-disruptive kind of way,

who choke on obligations as tacky as saltines

that they served themselves at a time when they had less 

to worry about now set aside to fester 

to address the paper soup & thesis salad on their plate,

who weep rivers and lakes in feral, transmorphic dreams

where they play Atlas, except Earth

has shattered and its shards slash mangle their sad hands 

& so they live their lives on mute & Shrug, 

who cannot dream anymore because they cannot sleep

anymore, so wrapped in worry that they shiver,

sharp obituary of the days’ failures to rest beneath 

their heads where there used to be pillows of wings,

who would stand at campus frontlines in defiance of their schools setting fire 

to values more flammable than endowments if not for the warning 

of Mahmoud & Rumeysa: this moment is not kind 

to counterculture, to culture, to all who counter 

the narrowing ideals of those who don’t 

have to decide what outweighs the ease of nothing.

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