Selected Work

        by Howie Good









        ON BEING TOLD
        "YOU LOOK DEPRESSED"


        Some days I just wake up sad
        as if a crow has been at the window

        watching me sleep.

        Or because the blade of the gravedigger's
        shovel rang all night against rock.

        Now the landlady blocks the stairs
        with large and tragic gestures,

        demanding to know is it true
        there's a difference, however subtle,

        between recant and regret.

        So many questions, and the only answer
        the torn envelope dawn came in.

        FOR LACK OF A SHOULDER TO CRY ON


        The girl in the front seat sobbing
        has just failed her road test -

        again.

        Someone please tell her that the roads
        are too crowded anyway,

        that there's nowhere worth going
        in America you can't get by walking,

        that there are worse things
        than high school and not having

        a best friend, or an ankle bracelet tattoo,
        or a driver's license.

        Quick, someone please lie.

        Howie Good, a journalism professor at the State University of New York at New Paltz, is the author of four poetry chapbooks, Death of the Frog Prince (2004) and Heartland (2007) from FootHills Publishing, Strangers & Angels (2007) from Scintillating Publications, and the forthcoming The News at 11 from Right Hand Pointing. (June 2008)