*GATOR SPRINGS GAZETTE
a literary journal of the fictional persuasion
WALKING ON A MOVING TRAIN(page fifteen)

RAPTURE OF THE DEEP
Miriam N. Kotzin

    He cannot contain himself.
    He sits, swaying,
    swollen with his verse.
    His hairy face is lit
    with rapture of the deep.
    Now and then a damp syllable
    bursts from his lips.
    Nobody wants to sit near him..
    We are all afflicted
    with sudden hypochondria,
    by overwhelming fear
    that it's catching,
    that someday soon, we, too,
    will sway in rapture,
    murmuring,
    crooning our poems
    to ourselves,
    to anyone who will listen.

© Miriam N. Kotzin 2004

Miriam teaches literature and creative writing at Drexel University in Philadelphia PA, where she directs the Certificate Program in Writing and Publishing. She writes poetry and short fiction. She hopes to experience the next brood of cicadas but has just about given up hope on seeing Halley's comet come around again

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