fallen leaves

[lady philosophy will not be pleased with me for my continued association with the Muse - but he's a handsome devil, and I swear he makes me better, even as the syndrome worsens.]

Someday you will visit me
in this gated academic community.
Foghorn bellows will fire my heart
like kisses from your lips.
I will spin you ‘round in circles
when you step off our two-car train
and show you slowly down the lane:

“Suitcase wheels spell iambs here
and there flowed the river of mud
just hours before I stepped onto the
cold gray sidewalk and, looking up,
saw you, like you saw me
just now.”

You were so warm and sudden there,
the fall wind drying your ruffled hair.
My bare legs loved the touch of autumn,
crisp yet kissing cold, no bite ––

I think of you on frosted nights
when I hear a brightly orange rustle,
when I catch the subtle fragrance of lately
fallen leaves.

Say you were to rebel against your calculus lecture
and come to me warmly, late in November:
alone but for some six thousand or so
we could love unconcerned,
and at sunrise I
would lead you, yet wrapped in dreams,
gently to lie on a fresh-laid bed
of golden ginkgo leaves.
If you must know what it means:
Yellow is a color where we could find peace.

When you visit me
in this gated academic community,
I will show you sights along
three long, straight paths.
You won’t remember the names
of the buildings, but you will
fall in love with me
one more time,
which, in any case,
is all I really had in mind.

would've been easier to send them "to conquer Asia," however:

[a view of the sufferer as supplicant, begging entrance to a ward for effective treatment.]

My acceptance into your University was not the beginning of my family's reverence for black and orange. Cassie, my older sister, wore these colors in 1999, but she was not headed to Princeton. She went instead to St. John's College in Annapolis, and for four years, her academic world was defined by the seminar and by Great Books. Through my sister and my high school classes, I have acquired a taste for this kind of education.

That's the short version of why I am interested in the freshman program in the humanities –– or, as I explain it to those unfamiliar, the crash course in Western civilization the familiar know as HUM.

I feel like college, especially at a place like Princeton, should be humiliating (no pun intended) –– not in the sense that it breaks one's spirit, but rather in the sense that it builds one's character and makes one more self-aware and open to development. I know my academic self well enough to realize that, despite my glittery transcript, I read slowly, and I intend to ameliorate this problem during my undergraduate years. It has occurred to me that four hundred pages of classical literature, thought and history a week may help. My array of talents has never included the ability to brush off schoolwork I care about.

That being said, no, I don't care about all schoolwork. I find most theoretical mathematics to be abjectly dull, and I have no head for memorizing dates, although I love history; raw philosophy, without good writing or theological components, likewise bores me without a context for discussion. The type of study I anticipate in this sequence will not bore me. Most any literary exchange interests me merely for the opportunity to consider the points of view of my classmates –– still better if the subject matter is worthwhile.

HUM is worthwhile. I care deeply about the deeds and ideas of my cultural ancestors. Books assist in the fleshing-out of one's own thoughts and beliefs, but they are also spiritual objects: within every text lies a portion of the author's soul, left for me to mourn and celebrate, to remember and revive, all just by reading and understanding the words on the page. I make it my business to adopt the souls of authors, old gods, and historical figures –– for example, Franz Kafka, Abraham Lincoln, Odin, and Genghis Khan –– and give them a kind of cushy cultural afterlife as I cherish their memories and exalt them to others.

Literature, mythology, and history, entangled as they are, are not so much a hobby or an academic interest of mine as they are my religion. When I found out these classes were offered at Princeton, I didn't really consider them an option any more than a practicing Christian would consider Sunday church an "option." It's just what I have to do. I will come to your classroom to find my literary ancestors, I will read them to know them, and I will return the next day or week to honor their memory –– so long as it's okay with you.