By Ronald Koertge

He goes back to his hometown after two tours. Nobody calls him
a baby killer. Mostly, “Hey, man. Where you been?”

He takes advantage of the G.I. Bill, imagines Uncle Sam reaching
into his red, white, and blue pants for tuition.

He signs up for Folklore 480. He makes the counselor smile when
he asks if he needs to take the other four hundred and
seventy–nine classes first.

College is harder than high school. The people are smarter and
serious. Now and then some of them go out after class for beer in
the patio of Lighthouse Pizza.

They can smoke there under the fairy lights and plastic grapes.
The place closes at ten. They’re the last to leave, milling around
in the parking lot sharing a joint.

He writes a paper about the war: “My Home Is In the Dark
Forest.” The teacher praises it. Classmates start asking him for
help.

He goes to their houses like a country doctor. He likes seeing how
they live. Meeting their husbands or parents.

Compared to what he’s been through, college is like following a
trail of bread crumbs leading to a gingerbread palace.

By Ronald Koertge

At first the women think he’s funny. A breath of fresh air
compared to the hogwash peddlers with their walks on the beach.
They tease him about being a mad scientist. They ask for sexy pics
of him in nothing but a lab coat. They text LOL when he says his
goldfish Finny disappeared swimming in [Cr(NH3)6](3+)[Cl(1–)]3,
H(1+)[AuCl4! When he wonders if the formula will work on
humans, they add Rolling on the Floor Laughing emojis.
Disgusted, he’s about to delete his account when out of nowhere
Hotasabunsenburner responds with a suggestion about
C24H30N203. A few feverish hours in his basement and Success!
He replies immediately. Great minds should meet! Boards a bus
for free. Makes a bank teller faint when fifties float from the cash
drawer. Then at Le Club there’s that small booth she told him
about and — his heart is pounding now — a coffee cup rising on
its own, smear of scarlet lipstick on the rim.

By Ronald Koertge

A hundred of my closest friends and I are working
on Earth Day. Shopping carts, Big Gulp cups,
tons of plastic, more than one mattress.

I’ve got graffiti duty. Gloves, safety glasses,
TSP in a five gallon bucket.

All over the walls of the L.A. River:

MICKEY LOVES SYLVIA.

“Love is Strange” plays in my head,
the great Mickey & Sylvia hit from the 50s.
Come here, lover boy.

They’re gone now, but this new kid has stepped
up to tell the world

about spray can love, clean sheets love, blast
furnace love under a swollen moon.

Mickey out here at night. Scrawling a valentine
Sylvia can’t help but see on her way to school.

No matter how hard I scrub, the letters show
a little. They’ll be here after Sylvia graduates,
after Mickey goes in the Army or doesn’t.

After they forget each other and a couple
in a red canoe enjoy the refurbished river,

him with a paddle, her thinking of last night,
one hand trailing in the cool water.

By Stephen Bett

Li•ddle surfer, li•ddle one
Made my heart come all Undone

(Sailor’s gurl, heart’s a twURL)

Teeny–tiny itsy dot fitter–upper
reeled in, bought you by Rreal men
(In my Woody them’s would take you . . . )

Diss ol’ Miss O’ Ginny RE•verse flipped
chic–o–layin’ cutie pie voice print
all over our gooey screens

Do you wuv me, do you wi’dul star–twick one?
(jes’ me & mah Woody)

’N don’ go DISappearing in the gap
there’s have all Rreal womyn gone

Whoa, oh, mercy mercy me
things aint what they used to be . . .

On stage now #FiveSeconds Get•It & Forget•It
please identi•size Rupi Kaur
for Po•it Laur•E•ate
(made 30 mil las’ year!)

Infra–Mincing our way to you,
dear insta read’R . . .

Lie–la–lie
Lie–la–lie–lie–lie–lie–lie, lie–lie–lie–lie–lie
Lie–la–lie–lie–lie–lie–lie
Lie–la–lie
Lie–la–lie–lie–lie–lie–lie, lie–lie–lie–lie–lie*

*Beach Boys, “Surfer Girl”; Paul Simon, “The Boxer”; Marvin Gaye, “Mercy Mercy Me”; as good an estimation of these ‘identity excl’ Instagram poets as I can see (& time–honoured too): ‘“stop deceiving the uneducated crowd / with empty sweetness’ (Metamorphoses 5.308–9) / aesthetically superficial / ethically dishonest” — Joe Safdie, Scholarship, p. 44