Poetry Monday: What I Wanted

What I Wanted

In college, I do not recall casting
for a mentor, but obviously I did.

I wanted to be like my professor,
but he was much smarter than me.

I reasoned without any reason,
why not try philosophy?

Did I celebrate using Ibid in a footnote?
Did I smile while using prima facie?
Did I understand logical positivism?

Who knows? Obviously,
it's not exactly
like a theorem,
like a postulate,
like an equation.
But on the one side there was me
and on the other side there was
nothing
to equal
what I wanted.

--Jay Matson

From his new book of poems, Carved On Trees, available (for instance) at Amazon.