****EXTRA**** Horizons

If you've been following the daily blog entries, you'll know that I had been asked by My English teacher, Mr. Spurlock--in 2011 a recent Facebook friend--to submit a few poems to HORIZONS, the school literary and arts magazine. In spite of my aversion to participating in anything to do with the school, this was a chance to be published! So i did. I don't recall how many I submitted but I copied them from various notes and papers stuffed in drawers on this date in 1976.

The two that ended up being published follow.

ALONE IN THE SHADOWS

...And when Amber times have flown,

The drifter will be all alone.

Forsaken in sunlight, joyous and bright,

Regretted by the tunnel-like darkness of night.

And all the young swallows,

Will be on their way.

Maybe they'll come back on Memorial Day,

To remember the drifter,

and good times now past, or perhaps they'll stay away,

And let graven silence last.

END

LINDA

Linda is a star and she doesn't know me.

Walking past the newsstands I see her smile,

As she stares blankly at me,

From all the magazine covers.

I buy her faces and take them home to treasure.

I paste them in scrapbooks to look at every day.

Her long auburn hair gives her a gracious look,

Known to very few.

Linda, oh if dreams were real...

But I awaken to the reality of pulp paper photographs,

And a single, silent tear.

For I am just a man,

And Linda is a star.

END

When read today, HORIZONS is a hotbed of teenage angst. Some good writing, though. My own first poem above is one of my typical WTF? ones of the period. The second is a bit more personal, being about my teenage obsession with EXORCIST star Linda Blair. It was a bit embarrassing as is but more so when many of my peers interpreted it as an ode to DEEP THROAT star Linda Lovelace.

The whole experience--in the vernacular--didn't suck. Thus, when asked, I agreed to join the staff of the following year's HORIZONS. When it came out, I had even more poems, an esay and even some artwork published! Unfortunately, due to various glitches, MY issue never came out until the year AFTER I graduated. I, of course, went back to pick up a copy. I doubt many other students bothered.