Twenty-Two

I walked to the baker’s

and thought about the bread.

And at the corner store

the butter. Four kinds of butter!

I bought them in order

of saltiness. I studied slang

in secret. I said little.

And my students were

so beautiful

I couldn’t teach a thing.

Instead I made them sing.

Twenty-two. Nothing to do.

New York had vanished,

Connecticut, too.

My students grew hair

and got haircuts, grew hair

and got haircuts, and sang.

I’d lie in bed and masturbate

and wonder why I’d come,

and come and come again

and then rise for some bread and a run.

Does the village persist? It must.

Right now, someone hums “Nowhere Man”

and thinks of that shy teacher from—

Manhattan? New Orleans? Bel Air?

And she brushes her lengthening hair.