Note: This little poem was originally written way back as early as 2008, and is also collected in a piece about John and his dad the pretty famous singer songwriter Bruce Innes, and that can be found here. John and I were together both in high school and college, and had a lot of great times together.
As I’ve written about before, Innes would tell his students marginally true stories about my time at St. Georges’s school and Hamilton College. I did get up to some things, I admit, but Innes does like to exaggerate a bit. All in good fun, and good faith. In any case, one time one of his students became kind of interested in my story, and wrote me asking for information. So I wrote him this back, in verse. This poem is below.
The reason I’m re-printing this today is, I’m finally working on a book. Well, I’ve been working on it all along, and now I’m just arranging things. The book will have, among other things, some oral history in the form of interviews. I have done a few and am doing more, and would like to expand my interview scope a bit. So if that sounds like something you would be interested in, for whatever reason, do let me know. And as always, thanks for reading.
“An Open Book”
Not really in the mood
but you’ll think me quite rude
if I don’t make a reply
around me on the plane
folks eat, are entertained
no one’s writing save I
So I’ll take a look back
to days at the dog track
where I ended up by mistake
thought we could beat the odds
just silly teenage sods
there was no money to make
I know not if J.I.
has spun a pack of lies
concerning my personhood
Yes, I wrote poems for girls
who told me they were pearls
ah–but they weren’t any good
About a cold river,
and the rest of his quiver
of myths and exaggerations
well if someone was shoved
it was done out of love
or congratulations
So to upstate New York
in a trench coat–what a dork
but the world took pity
the life there was fine
but naught was on the line
should have gone to the city
I did two things quite well,
needing something to sell
I wrote brilliant excuses
‘bout ridiculous capers,
couldn’t finish my papers
I claimed aces, held deuces
My second great skill
is one I hold still
I fell for crazy ladies
locals, Russians, and Turks
they all drove me berserk
with a boatload of maybes
Four years in the dorms
and countless reforms
led to little of note
I left sans a sob
a plan or a job
and without my trench coat
Dedication: For Innes. Let’s rock this little decade baby. And for biographers everywhere. It’s an interesting genre.
Note: If you enjoyed this poem, you may also enjoy “Some B-Side Poems.” You can read that here.