Secondhand High

So I’m still trippin’ on this secondhand high

from under my covers to the painted sky,

and all around my buzzed head I’m feeling dead

because the ceiling has become my sky instead.

And it’s as if I’m in the insane generation

of lonely innocence and keyboard fame

now revealing the ceiling in my deprivation,

floating in my space capsule isolation,

and I’m finding no fool to cast it blame.

Getting sick in the dorm all stuffed nosed,

steam-bathed, hot flashed, and a little time lapsed

with the heat on blast (‘cause it can’t be changed),

so I opened wide winter’s window outside

and soon had myself a snot buffet

and a burning head in bed where I hide

grasping the Dayquil all the next damn day!

Still I’m prancing in the internet hoedown of

videos, crank calls, and no downtowns—

downloads, prank pics, macho breakdowns,

all laughing, spamming, shooting, dreaming,

unchanged by the anon OP scheming.

And when headphone clad I’m feeling glad,

alone, home grown, there’s no solution.

Radical to the bones without dilution I went

unknown and still not a college grad.

So all week decked in my coat and tuque,

my umbrella in the rain, while the students go nuke

about the lecturer who’s coming to speak,

but they’re pillowing up the hallway once clean

with feathers and hanging a big white sheet

so they can sled through that “snowy” scene—

and I’m just a brain who’s trying to cheat.

So I’m still healing at my hangover bedpost

when the fire drill sends us outside like ghosts

at four in the morn when dead almost!

But there are “kids drinking out of paper bags”

all “over the shoulder” to show off the scheme.

“Be keen to sex buying off a nark teen.”

But the RA gives out handshakes, folded unseen,

and pins up notes on the usual theme

of the common room being a messy scene.

So I’m laughing sick all inside and out

and cross-eyed at the protest rally, feeling like

the guy who got nut-shotted back in the alley.

I’m coarse from shouting in the cold with a

frost-bitten finger on the microphone—

not counting the costs, but freezing outside,

too strange to last or do what I’m told.

But down at the Campus Center complex

we still gather there for warmth and subjects,

where they’re throwing petitions wherever you go—

“Legalize pot!” “Bring the troops home!”

“Make the wealthy pay their fair share!”

“Free Hat!” “End the Y chromosome!”

“Cut down on carbon!” “State Healthcare!”

And even faith from the guy who was made sane

preaching the religion of Ibogaine.

“Marijuana should be legal man, you see,”

says this guy on the couch behind me,

“It’s a natural herb, it’s all just evolution—

it provides, so it survives!” (its exchange),

“it heals, so we deals it,” (its solution—

all sacred and symbiotically arranged)

“but deforestation kills it on the Columbian range.”

“Gotta think about sustainable copulation man,

or else risk the evils of overpopulation!”

“Safe sex!” (as if there was such a thing).

But I swear this ain’t no apex of civilization

when even the cults of Martin Luther King

and John Lennon are seen duking it out in the ring,

as if “Gay is okay” is the final revelation with

Nietzsche-lovers lobbing God with bombs

while the other side quotes the Book of Psalms.

Throwing out words like “Dig the Utility!”

“proletariat,” “dialectic,” “hedonic necessity.”

But as far as I can see, Epicurus can suck it,

Plato’s where it’s at, and Hegel—well, fuck it.

“But I think Marx made some good points,”

says this girl (and thank God she’s cute),

“So did Conrad,” I’d say, but then I’d be a brute.

“John 3:16!” and yet “God is dead!” and

“No he’s not, he never was!” but then instead

in pops this chick singing about witching

while the atheists are worshipping St. Dawkins

and St. Hitchens, and go right on bitching

until someone brings up Sagan and Hawkin’s—

but Rawls and Nozick are still seen balking

with Russell and Quine, and they won’t stop

because there’s always more to namedrop!

So I get out of there to go somewhere

if just to grab a bite at the dining hall there,

and it’s sandwich wrap day and tomato soup,

and it’s grab a seat and wait in the lines

because it’s all packed in like a chicken coop—

get up for a second, leave the confines, and

a million settlers are waiting to swoop!

So I sit with my Collegian, reading the page—

“That’s out of context!!” a guy shouts in rage.

The Opinion section—take it or leave it,

with the headlines: “Farewell Frat Row,”

“New Art Installation” and “Can you believe it?

Construction Abounds!” and “Chance of Snow.”

And the ads: “Does your dorm smell like ass?

Call the cleaning service! Quick and cheap!” and

“keep your hands off the Quad’s grass…”

So I “make it like home,” to sit there alone,

as everyone’s plugged in, all in the zone,

fearing they’ll hear something too unclear

that doesn’t fit and gets their minds blown—

while some are protesting on the offensive,

and staging their “Die Ins” and “Lie Downs”

because textbooks are too expensive.

Some are throwing Frisbees on the grounds

‘cause the S-U’s a construction zone.

Some will be hitting up the ABC tonight in town

to get on with one of the “female drones.”

But I’ll be running back up to the dorm,

‘cause I’m sick and tired, checking for mail.

Having breakfast for supper is now the norm,

staying up all night, trying not to fail
my Pre-Cal final or my chance to transform.  

NEXT

--Farewell Frat Row