BART EDELMAN

Fraudster, Huckster, Jiver

You’re glad it went well.
Never expected such success.
Certain they’d find you out:
Fraudster, huckster, jiver,
Purveyor of fake pedigree,
And who knows what else,
Hidden behind mediocrity’s mask.
But you dazzled them all.
Bamboozled the entire lot.
They even asked you back—
Same time, next year.
What, good lord, is that about?
Perhaps, you’ve underestimated fate,
Sold yourself short, again.
And the bill of goods is worth
Far more than you thought.
Now, the hour grows late;
You can ponder your future
When you awake at dawn.
Somewhere, in foreign space,
The happiness bell pings twice,
Yet your night remains sleepless—
Reign of terror ever-present.

Bart Edelman’s poetry collections include Crossing the Hackensack (Prometheus Press), Under Damaris’ Dress (Lightning Publications), The Alphabet of Love (Red Hen Press), The Gentle Man (Red Hen Press), The Last Mojito (Red Hen Press), The Geographer’s Wife (Red Hen Press), Whistling to Trick the Wind (Meadowlark Press), and This Body Is Never at Rest: New and Selected Poems 1993 – 2023 (Meadowlark Press). Most recently, he has taught in the MFA program at Antioch University, Los Angeles. His work has been anthologized in textbooks published by City Lights Books, Longman, McGraw-Hill, Prentice Hall, the University of Iowa Press, Wadsworth, and others.