Spring 2018, Volume 24

Poetry by Kareem Tayyar

On Teaching The Wind in the Willows

We speak of the beauty of rivers.
We laugh at the wild-man antics of Mr. Toad,
For whom a fast car and an open road are proof that grace is more easily found
            At 117 miles an hour.
We compare ourselves to the Mole,
And exchange stories of what it is we would miss most about our homes were we ever forced
            To leave them for good:

Someone says, “bagels with cream cheese.”
Another says, “late night swims in the pool.”
A third says, “the voice of my mother, singing in the kitchen.”

Walking home later on that night,
I think of the stereo we owned when I was a boy,
And how Bruce Springsteen used to slip through its speakers
            Like an older brother returning from the larger world
                        To tell me about everything he had witnessed on his travels.

 

 

 

BIO: My most recent book is Magic Carpet Poems (Tebot Bach), and my poetry and fiction has been published in a number of literary journals, including Alaska Quarterly Review, Brilliant Corners, and The Santa Monica Review. I am a Professor of English at Golden West College in Huntington Beach, California, and I hold a Ph.D. in Literature from U.C. Riverside.