Michael Gurnow has been published domestically, as well as abroad, translated, and anthologized.  His work may be found in Big Toe Review, Dissident Voice, The Externalist, Literary Kicks, Missouri Life, The Modern Word, The Smoking Poet, and Word Riot, among others.

Autobiography of a Scholar (December 20, 2010. Issue 23.)

Mom was light by December
and Daddy told everyone
Kate Smith waited a few days
to Bless America
because of me.

I walked home from school,
past the Cross Roads,
where “that devil Forrest”
beat Sturgis at home 96 – 223,
before heading out
to battle
carpetbaggers and scalawags.

It was here Ma’ and Pa’
ran the store
while I sat and listened,
as Bobby cracked the Shot
That Made Me Cry.

I too hit the ball hard,
but couldn’t make it
’round the base paths
fast enough.

Dejected, I left Juco
and went to State U. where
The Great Southern Pen
was waiting for me.

Making good,
I taught on a foreign coast.
I showed kids
how to lunge for the ball.
Years later,
a diving catch saved The Game,
but the home team lost.

I returned home
to a land divided
twice over.

As colors ran together,
students fled into my classroom.
Many cried rivers,
but met their duty
like my devil dog son.

I have taught The Pen
(and the Bible)
time and time again,
around the world,
and on t.v.

Time is my misfortune.
I Google myself,
and am met by
a transgender photographer
from South Africa.

As I stare out the window,
at orphaned cotton,
desperately clinging
to jaundiced stalks of Johnson grass,
wafting like goose down
in the breeze,
I catch a glimpse
of my reflection:
A myopic, half-deaf
gimp waiting for cancer.
I consider Richard Cory.