Frank Giampietro

After Whitman Died

a scientist removed his brain

and placed it in a jar. Later,

a lab assistant dropped it,

and his mind was destroyed.

David Halberstram's gray matter

was smashed when a student

made an illegal left turn driving

the Pulitzer Prize winner to

speak at a lecture.

The student got probation

and lost his funding. So long,

Professor Smooth Brain

is what my kids say

when I say I'm going to go

be alone with my thoughts,

when I climb the stairs.

And when they look up at me

from their leaf pile I recall

news of the moose in steep decline,

important researchers

concerned, moose deaths being

so hard to study.

BIO

FRANK GIAMPIETRO is the author of Begin Anywhere (Alice James Books, 2008) and a graduate of Vermont College’s MFA program in poetry. His poetry, nonfiction, short-short fiction, and book reviews have appeared in journals including 32 Poems, American Book Review, Barrow Street, Black Warrior, Cimarron Review, Copper Nickel, CutBank, FENCE, Hayden's Ferry, Ninth Letter, Poetry Daily, Poetry International, Ploughshares, Rain Taxi, Subtropics, and Tampa Review. He was a resident scholar at The Southern Review from 2010 to 2011 and the managing editor of Alice James Books from 2011 to 2012. Currently, Frank Giampietro serves as the interim director of Cleveland State University Poetry Center and visiting assistant professor of English at Cleveland State University and in the North East Ohio Master of Fine Arts program.