for Charles Cornelius
When I remembered what happened
tomorrow I figured it was all over.
Ship me off to the psych ward, feed
me blue pills in little white paper cups
as I watch re-runs of shows not yet
broadcasted. Chalk it up to evolution.
Everything is the past, even that baby
born twenty years from now.
The future catches up with us sooner
than we think or desire. It’s no
tortoise that wins the race.
It’s a wishbone you swallowed
and nearly choked on.
Don’t ever think what’s done
is done. You’re only here
when you aren’t. This I learned
from Lao Tzu who was born an old man
and rode out of history on an ass.
And what once I learned I foresaw
and remembered backwards.
I thought therefore I was.
Thanks for the last line, Charlie.
Author Bio:
Louis Gallo’s work has appeared or will shortly appear in Southern Literary Review, Fiction Fix, Glimmer Train, Hollins Critic,, Rattle, Southern Quarterly, Litro, New Orleans Review, Xavier Review, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Missouri Review, Mississippi Review, Texas Review, Baltimore Review, Pennsylvania Literary Journal, The Ledge, storySouth, Houston Literary Review, Tampa Review, Raving Dove, The Journal (Ohio), Greensboro Review, and many others. Chapbooks include The Truth Change, The Abomination of Fascination, Status Updates and The Ten Most Important Questions. He is the founding editor of the now defunct journals, The Barataria Review and Books: A New Orleans Review. He teaches at Radford University in Radford, Virginia.
When I remembered what happened
tomorrow I figured it was all over.
Ship me off to the psych ward, feed
me blue pills in little white paper cups
as I watch re-runs of shows not yet
broadcasted. Chalk it up to evolution.
Everything is the past, even that baby
born twenty years from now.
The future catches up with us sooner
than we think or desire. It’s no
tortoise that wins the race.
It’s a wishbone you swallowed
and nearly choked on.
Don’t ever think what’s done
is done. You’re only here
when you aren’t. This I learned
from Lao Tzu who was born an old man
and rode out of history on an ass.
And what once I learned I foresaw
and remembered backwards.
I thought therefore I was.
Thanks for the last line, Charlie.
Author Bio:
Louis Gallo’s work has appeared or will shortly appear in Southern Literary Review, Fiction Fix, Glimmer Train, Hollins Critic,, Rattle, Southern Quarterly, Litro, New Orleans Review, Xavier Review, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Missouri Review, Mississippi Review, Texas Review, Baltimore Review, Pennsylvania Literary Journal, The Ledge, storySouth, Houston Literary Review, Tampa Review, Raving Dove, The Journal (Ohio), Greensboro Review, and many others. Chapbooks include The Truth Change, The Abomination of Fascination, Status Updates and The Ten Most Important Questions. He is the founding editor of the now defunct journals, The Barataria Review and Books: A New Orleans Review. He teaches at Radford University in Radford, Virginia.
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