Page 4 of Rhymes with Metaphor

R eg was enduring a vexatious meeting with his new thesis advisor, in which he was unsuccessfully trying to lay a veneer of self-assurance over his complete lack of productivity.

Reg had had a reciprocally enabling relationship with his former advisor.

Their meetings usually began with the advisor pulling a bottle of sherry out of his desk drawer and pouring a glass for himself and Reg (most civilized of him).

He would then regale Reg with stories of his disreputable adventures in Morocco and Scotland.

Then, in the last thirty seconds of their meeting, he would ask, “How’s the poetry? ”

And Reg would say, “Splendid.”

They would shake hands, and Reg would be left to spin his wheels undisturbed for the next few months.

Unfortunately, that felicitous relationship had ended when his advisor had been placed on administrative leave and was replaced by the chair of the department, an imposing, diminutive woman, who wore red tortoiseshell glasses on a clattering chain and whose thin lips vanished entirely whenever she disapproved of something.

Her lips had been invisible for the past half hour of her meeting with Reg, as she had the unaccountable expectation that Reg produce evidence that he’d been writing.

His collaboration with Flat Mary was viewed with scepticism.

“Those poems are from the chapbook you submitted with your application to this program,” she said. “What have you written since January?”

“Well...,” said Reg. “I’ve made some notes. I’ve been musing, you know?”

“You’re due to defend at the end of August. If I were you, I’d stop musing and get to work. You’ve got no teaching responsibilities this semester and no coursework. You don’t have a job or a wife—”

Reg winced.

“—or children, or infirm parents to look after. You have no responsibilities, except to complete the requirements of your MFA. Send me something in two days.”

“Two days?!”

“I don’t care how rough it is. You can’t revise what you haven’t written, and you can’t submit what you haven’t revised. I want you back in my office in ten days, at which point I expect to see evidence of your progress. Good morning.”

She’d dismissed him like an errant schoolboy. When your sleep schedule has been subverted far enough, you feel like you don’t belong in the world, and the rules don’t apply to you, which was one reason why the chair’s lecture had jolted him.

On his way out of the building, Reg purchased a cup of what he predicted would be substandard coffee.

In contrast to the chair, the weather was humane.

Not only could he see the sun, he could feel it too.

On his way to the car park, Reg found a bench to sit on.

He’d managed to locate his phone charger the night before, but now his phone was charged, he’d forgotten to check if anyone had called.

Which Martin had. Seven times, to be exact.

So had Flip, who was, if Reg’s memory served, playing a tournament in Monte Carlo this week.

Reg opted not to call the latter back. He wasn’t in the mood for a second difficult conversation in one day.

The bench where he was sitting faced a concrete fountain that burbled like a stream.

He tried his coffee. “Substandard” was generous.

He dumped it, cup and all, into the bin beside the bench, then he lit a cigarette.

As he huffed out the smoke, he noticed someone sitting on the next bench over, watching him.

Reg recognized him as Juliet’s kid brother, Joel.

He was wearing slate blue scrubs today. Under natural light, he looked smaller and thinner than Reg remembered.

A textbook lay open on his lap, and he was holding a small, opened carton of milk.

The smoke from Reg’s cigarette wafted past him, and he made a face.

“Hello,” said Reg. New Bug.

“Hello,” said Joel.

Reg was startled anew at how deep and grown-up Joel’s voice sounded, in contrast to his youth and slight build. There was something in his expression that unnerved Reg, a remoteness in his eyes, restrained sadness.

“Still studying for your QDOG?” said Reg.

“My what?”

The fountain chose that moment to spit out a jet of water, which hung in the air a moment before clattering to the fountain’s basin.

When the noise died, Reg said, “You were studying for your QDOG last I saw you.”

“MCAT,” Joel corrected him. “Medical College Admission Test. I wrote it last week.”

“And how did your QDOG go, then?”

“Fine,” said Joel, but there was a tremor in his voice.

“Looking up the questions you missed?”

“I have two exams today,” said Joel.

“You ought to be drinking coffee, then.”

“I don’t drink coffee,” said Joel.

“You should learn.”

“Are you going to confiscate my milk?” said Joel.

“No. You look more than young enough to drink it.”

Joel’s expression made Reg feel like he’d kicked a puppy.

Joel finished his milk, tossed the empty carton into the wastebin, tucked the textbook into his backpack, and pulled the straps over his shoulders.

“Good luck,” said Reg. New Bug.

“Thanks,” said Joel, and he walked off, looking fragile in the sunlight, like a paper doll being marched towards a bonfire.

Reg watched him go, feeling strangely moved. On his way to the car park, Reg called Martin to talk about the chair.

“She doesn’t appreciate my creative process. She believes that if she winds my handle hard enough, I’ll extrude poetry. She doesn’t understand that my creative brain is a delicate instrument. It doesn’t respond well to being womanhandled.”

“You’ve got to write something or you won’t graduate, Reg. She’s just trying to make sure you finish on time.”

“Maybe I don’t want to finish on time,” said Reg peevishly.

“You could always transfer to Engineering.”

“Now that is completely uncalled-for,” said Reg. “Speaking of uncalled-for academics, I ran into New Bug again.”

“Did he say anything about Juliet? Has she mentioned me?”

“I didn’t ask. I was too distracted by him being a pill.”

“What’s he ever done to you, apart from being young in your presence?”

“He’s so... so... You know the type. New bugs that think they know everything, and they’ve got no respect for their elders.”

“You weren’t rude to him, were you?”

“Not particularly. I showed remarkable restraint, entirely on your account, I might add.”

“I don’t believe you,” said Martin.

“I didn’t telephone you for a lecture,” said Reg. “I’ve had one of those already, and that’s more than enough for one day.”

Reg hung up. Martin didn’t usually get under his skin like that, unless something else was under his skin already.

He thought about Joel all the way home, and after he got home, still ruminating, he found one of his notebooks, and for the first time in months, he wrote a proper poem, one about a soldier marching resolutely towards oblivion.

Too young to burn . He finished the first draft in twenty minutes.

It wasn’t something , but it was “something,” which was what the chair had ordered, and it was the first tangible thing he’d managed to produce in the entire semester.

Over the next hour, he revised it, titled it “Paper Soldier,” hunt-and-pecked it into his laptop, and emailed it to the chair.

That should get the irascible little monkey off his back, at least for the next ten days.