Tidewater

—Southampton, 2004

That night I saw my teacher in the bar

The summer students partied in the bar

The jukebox roared an Otis Redding tune

My teacher stood his back to me, his elbows on the bar

Around him sang a dozen drunken girls

A line of laughing sirens at the bar

I ordered a pint, I took my first drink

I, too, would soon be wasted at the bar

My teacher, turning, swigged from his own beer

He caught me watching from across the bar

He turned to the girls, then turned back to me

He shrugged, rolled his eyes:  His grin lit up the bar

By day, he lectured on the English bard

But I learned more that hot night in the bar

Southampton Review, 2009