ON MY SHELVES

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Snow & the City

It snowed on campus today.

James McGill's coattails,

Covered in white fluff,

Were poised

Like wings

In the bronze wind,

And the students

Through the softly swirling snow

Trudged along with cold, wet feet

Thinking of chemistry, literature, psychology, education, history, physics, and sex.

Half-molten flakes

Clung to their lashes.

Later

When I emerged from Burnside Hall

The City was dark and white.

Like in Joyce

The snow fell

Upon all the living and the dead,

Upon the streets, the sidewalks, the cars, the billboards, the buildings, and me.

Great gusts of wind blew up

Mighty eddies and sheets of sleet

That fell into

And folded upon

One another

Hushing the sound of traffic.

My mind grew quiet.

Mantel Won the Booker

Mantel won the Booker tonight

But all I can see

(I'm shallow, so shallow, I know)

Is her shape --

The shape of her body, that is --

Somewhat like a pear

Under her poncho-like costume

In short: she is fat.

Successful novelists are rarely good-looking.

Except when they're really old

Like Alice Munro or John le Carré

WILFs in their own right

(WILF = Writer I'd Like To Fuck)

But that's just because

Old people are endearing

Successful novelists are never good-looking.

What does that say about my aspirations?

Am I bound to relinquish my good looks

For writing ability

And become a Hemingway

Except fat and ugly and unpopular with women

(Not a Hemingway at all then, really)

Or shall I live forever handsome

And anonymous?