Out of a Paper Bag

Second thoughts on disbanding the Poetics Council. Change of heart so to speak. Turns out we all like it too much, and I would miss wearing the robes. Not that we actually wear robes, but we do sit “on high” and pass judgment on other mortals, determine the fate and the course of all verse written in English, and drink Bert Peel Lager in lawn chairs out behind my double-wide while we listen to the lavender insect zapper do its thing.

(We all drink the Peel’s except for charter member Jermaine Tenafly who drinks homemade wine from a bottle wrapped in a paper bag and told me about this black fraternity at Howard in the fifties where you had to have skin lighter than a brown bag in order to be admitted. They would actually hold up a brown paper bag to your arm. According to Jermaine there was a great debate about his own color, but they finally invited him to “pledge.” Then he turned them down. Joined the cross country team, who turned out to be bigger drinkers than the frat boys. I told Jermaine he should write a poem about it. Shook his head no. He writes poems about fishing, period.)