-Meckelberg Requiem-

I have a stake in the life

Of Edward Meckelberg.

Now I owe money to all the right people.

I can’t afford my car or my house.

I can’t go to church because it’s not the same.

I’ve been around the block and

Went to school to be told

I could be anything if only
I'd want to amount to something

And simply apply myself like Edward Meckelberg,

One row to my right and two desks down.

I was good-looking

And can prove it if I have to.

I had girlfriends and they were nice.

When asked: “is she nice?”

I’d answer: “yes, she’s nice.”

"nice" meaning "she got a good body?"

Edward Meckelberg?

I don’t remember him with girls.
I remember him as a kid with brains.

What I wanted to do was lean

Against the back-row wall
In the chair of my desk

Being inattentive with the tough guys.

Sitting at the desk in front of me,

Barbara Amaral was a daily distraction,—

One of those dark-haired Azorean beauties

I’d mine from the nuggets at the riverbank

Down by the Housing Project, restlessly
Preparing itself at the faceplate of the setting Sun.

It might have been interesting had I taken

Edward Meckelberg along in my travels

Below the Hill, just once,—

Me on the red working-class Schwinn,

Edward on his snazzy

Black English Racer, to have him

Experience a sweeter definition,

If not in the process of amounting to something,

At least in the art of simply applying oneself.