Global Comment

Worldwide voices on arts and culture

Words from a Bum Alum on His Distinguished Debt

This one is for everyone who will NOT be smugly ‘starting out 2008 debt-free’

(I hate people who can actually say that – don’t you? Oh, it’s a jealousy thing? Really? Fancy that.)

Considering the schizophrenic economy in the U.S. and elsewhere, I imagine that many of you will be able to relate to this piece.

Sim Stafford, meanwhile, is a poet, musical genius, and guru to yours truly (and a great deal of other people as well).

Please look for more of his contributions this year.

– The Editor.

Please, look away! I am a hideous

sight, undeserving of your attention
to my diction. It is insidious
of me to crawl from my hole to mention
how stellar study in the liberal arts
plunged me into an infinite abyss.
Sallie Mae, that witch, has stolen my heart,

Leaving me a beast that no one will kiss.

Her letters are stacked beside that jar by
the door, but I pretend not to know who

they are for (after flinging them they fly
across the universe). Then she calls me to
recollect my promise in various
voices hissing, “We are legion…” Mistress Mae
possesses me—head-spinning, nefarious,
Class-skipping (off record)—but will I obey?

Please hear me out through the song and the dance
I perfected at many a party.
Just one more forbearance—give me a chance!
I swear I’ll work hard instead of hardly.
Eyes glazed over, I look ahead with interest,
Fearing I’ll be left alone with this knowledge.
By default I have chosen indifference,
But still care for that wild daze of college.

7 thoughts on “Words from a Bum Alum on His Distinguished Debt

  1. I used to watched them,
    through the rose-colored glasses
    of a Presidential Scholar.
    How they reached for stars
    (aren’t they just balls of gas?),
    chased their dreams
    (too many sleeping pills),
    “took it all in” –
    But please don’t make me tell
    the exact location
    of the insertion . . .
    So much hope/
    Dillusion, mixed with gin & juice,
    a cocktail for the masses.
    They swarmed like the proverbial bee!
    That is if they studied enough
    to pass with anything higher than a D+.
    Didn’t anyone tell them?
    No one told you?
    The piper draws you in,
    plays you a song,
    puts you in a line,
    and then leads you to your
    DEBT

    It’s not over, yet.
    Sallie Mae and her minions,
    Like Dr. Phil’s opinions,
    Will haunt you
    taunt you
    until they leave a gaunt you
    Out on the street.
    I hope you get enough to eat
    when your cardboard name-tag,
    scratched with the saliva of a Sharpee,
    proclaims to the world
    (at least anyone leaving the interstate at your particular corner)
    “I have an education!”
    Three cheers
    for the youth of the nation
    God bless my generation

  2. Hell—oooo
    Current mood: crunk
    Category: Dreams and the Supernatural

    My new poem,,Im so excited about it. I nourish my mind thats why I am able to write such poems,hahhahahaha…….

    Title—Greedy Deeds,,taking turns

    Its alright

    if not a lot of people

    have enough money to give me to write.

    Its time that we realize

    life goes on

    and on

    and on

    into infinity

    The causes we make in this life

    will come back to us again

    Karma is imbedded

    deep into our core

    Americas been a money whore for way to long

    where was I when the Roman Empire fell?

    Did the Egyptians actually think their system would fail?

    Probably no.

    So stable enough

    for a while

    Now take one person

    whos initial life condition is to act like the victim

    well the other persons innate willingness to bully them comes out.

    On a macroscopic scale

    America has an innate victim type feel

    Are you for real

    wake up America

    Its time to feel

    take your prescriptions and do what you will

    a medicated nation makes it that much easier to steal

    Do what you will

    Do what you will

    Time to sober up now and get real

    Reality bytes

    Iran will play hard to get

    It knows how to play with America

    America is the boy who cried wolf

    being across seas

    I can see things I never saw while living amongst it all

    Other countries, they dont need you anymore

    you were just a dirty money whore

    All used up now

    the strict law of cause and effect doesnt lie

    But please dont cry

    just be patient

    I promise once again

    the strict law of cause and effect

    will strike again

    to the next glutonous country

    the next country

    the next country

    the next country

    the next

    money

    money money money money money money

    money money money money money money

    Thanks for reading my poem Hillary Harrison

  3. And yes I am also a victim of this fatal company sallie mae. Everyone that reads this that is in the same situation just know you are not alone! They want me to pay 1,000dollars a month, I have actually never seen this much money at one time, until only once in my life when I bought my plane ticket to New York! Thats the only time, It would take me 6months to save up what they want me to pay in one month. If anyone wants to talk about this issue with me please feel free to email me at harrisonhillary@yahoo.com I would like to hear from some other person that is suffering! Thanks

  4. I appreciate all your comments and readership and poetry and such…

    Hmmm…I don’t feel like I’m a victim of the lending practices of my three lending masters, though all you may. Mine was a failure in pre-planning and a youthful indifference to my adult responsibilities. I threw caution to the wind and at times I’d even shout an apology to my future self. I would envision him in the midst of an ominous orchard sprung up from the seeds of self-destruction I was planting during those wild, opulent, and indulgent days of procrastination, hesitation to step into the world outside the stones walls of Duke University, and a mad search for experience and sensation.

    In the words of Officer Daniels, my first site supervisor at my first post-collegiate job as a security officer, I have “done stepped in a pile of doo doo!”

Comments are closed.