"Mistakes" [by Angelo Verga]

I never should have sat next to
That Canadian blonde
During the blizzard of ‘77
Marooned at The Cloisters
After sledding through Fort Tryon Park

You asked me in 1995
And I answered then as now:
You should have gone
To NYU Journalism School
Not the Jewish theological Seminary

That tall gorgeous stage actor
You were so much in love with
You should have married him
Had beautiful children with him
He would have found a job

I should have gone to law school, you say
I say you should have gone
To Tel Aviv, Cape Town, or Miami
Three towns we could have lived in happily

Digital destiny got away
The high-tech boom, dummies made money
Why didn’t I buy in ’96, sell in ’99?

I needed corrective lens in the third grade
You should have studied French, not TV
I mistakenly bought a Chevrolet, not an Audi

What were you thinking?
What were you thinking when you bought that dress?
Coloring my hair black was an error

I could have been a slick fielding third baseman
And batted second for the Staten Island Yankees

You picked inadequate parents
Somewhere there was a professor’s chair
With my name on it

Someday, someway
You may yet advance into an heiress
I might write ads for large feel-good-about-yourself mags

-- Angelo Verga
From Long & Short, New & Selected Poems (1995-2015)

(YBK Publishers, New York, 2016)

Comments

[Terence Winch]

Angelo---nice work!

[James B Bruno]

Angelo you are too much. You should have gone to Fordham. Not A H. LOL