HOME / poem: A weekly poem, read by the author.

For You

By Bruce SmithPosted Wednesday, May 2, 2001, at 3:00 AM ET

There is always a kid who struggles to be not
last, so not so thoroughly resentful as the pathological
hero of the back row whose anger is utter.

No, this kid flutters between the blessed ones in the hot
bright light of the teacher's attention and the dolls
whose voices are the string and pull of the powers

and whose faces are the poker faces of the misbegotten.
Around them there is a fragile kind of bliss. All
formed in the phenomenology of school's bad hair

and gym and jungle, all the plots and counterplots
of sleepover and dream, the biochemical
meshuga disorders of those years.

There is always one unraveling the knot
of the self, at 11 or 1 o'clock to you, in thrall
to the superficial and spiritual, passenger and messenger.

This is for you, LaShawna or Mark or Dot,
for your imminent arrival.
Get over yourselves you others.

E-MAIL

RECOMMEND... Get Slate RSS Feeds

Bruce Smith's book The Other Lover was a finalist for the National Book Award and a nominee for the Pulitzer Prize. He teaches in the graduate writing program at the University of Alabama.

To visit Robert Pinsky's Favorite Poem Project site, click here.

What did you think of this article?

Join The Fray: Our Reader Discussion Forum

POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES