It seems I always get inspired to write poetry at the most inopportune moments. I often become pensive and over-flowing with emotion when I'm grading or doing office work. Countless times I've scribbled poems all over the back of some student's old homework or an old department notice as I work. Ironic-isn't it? That I get inspired while I'm doing something I despise and that is totally contrary to my nature. I'll be working away and then unexpectedly I start sinking into some emotion that I haven't had a chance to dig into. Then suddenly there's a direct line to my heart and I can try to squeeze the juice out of that feeling while it's in me or I can go back to correcting grammar. So often I end up grabbing a piece of paper and jotting down what comes out. Case in point. Here's today's spillage from grading boring paragraphs...

E G H
I once knew a man
what a conundrum
a stern, illegible face
unflinching stability
the absence of emotion

but in his eyes you could see the secret
eyes that smolder like coals
giving away an intensity well-hidden
under layers of cold, sheer rock

a fountain of surprises
perched in his tower
surrounded by ever expanding green rice fields

can you see the warm light flooding out of his round window?
he's pouring over his books late into the night, no doubt
grasping for his image of stability, of approval, of success
with his unquenchable, quiet passion

can I climb the never-ending spiraling staircase
up and up to where you are?

there you are in your white tower
studying in the golden light of your womb
immersed in the black ink of the sky
in your solitary tower

putting out the fire that burns in your soul
throwing sand on the unpredictability of who you are

you are E G H

oxymoron, contradiction, paradox

the one I always wanted to reach
but still I stand alone
in the echoing darkness of the rice fields below you
always outside your tall tower
gazing up at the warm light of your window