(May 2021)

Books boxed, shelves emptied,
left like gaping mouths, every bit
of paper in the filing cabinets
boxed, too—nothing left behind
for recycling—no one to remove
it on the pandemic-closed campus.

No one to say goodbye.

Faithful iMac wiped clean
of so many documents/photos/
whole publications. Spot on the desk
where the bright red stapler waited
to perform its job hundreds of times
a week. Slender ceramic tray cradling
old-fashioned letter opener, a prettily
decorated dagger that could, I belatedly
realize, have served as a weapon, had
a student sitting in the chair by the door
decided to come at me.

But they never did.

They sat there and unfurled
their hearts like multi-colored banners,
they asked questions and cried—
oh, how they cried, so many weeping
in the days after the towers fell,
no idea why so much sorrow
leaked out of them—

they laughed and pulled the chair
close to mine so we could look at
their stories together, as I taught
editor after editor semester after semester
how to edit a sports story/news story/
feature story headed for the campus
newspaper or magazine,

as I reviewed poems, short stories,
bits of memoir with others hoping
to have their pieces accepted by
the literary journal (and often were).

They sat in that chair, in so many chairs
in a half dozen offices over 30 years,
their names now vanished, their faces
blurring my brain like a soft cloud
as I leave this office for the last time,
stealth packing during quarantine,
the proverbial thief in the night
stealing back my past and boxing it,
carrying it home to sort later,

switching off the light as I leave,
depressing the little button on the inside
of the doorknob to lock it, not looking
back, two dear ones helping, witnessing
the end,

hoping I’d done what I meant to—
encouraged writers of all ages, shapes,
sizes and colors, convinced them
that they could write, that their voices
were worthy of the page, that they mattered,
the collective whole of them—

to the world, to themselves, to me.