By Daniel Sklar
PROMPT — Who am I today?
Did you know that Daniel Sklar likes drifting
in a canoe on Chebacco Lake?
He also likes riding a bicycle, especially
to the library. And he likes
that little beach just outside of Rockport.
Likes Halibut Point and Jalapenos Restaurant.
Likes walking around old New England towns.
Likes ice cream sandwiches--he's addicted to them,
(don't give him any).
Likes cold days, a fire in the fireplace.
Likes Henry David Thoreau, Louisa May Alcott,
Walt Whitman, Pocahontas, and Puck the cat,
"that merry wanderer of the night." They talk to him.
Likes hotel coffee, blank notebooks,
and ones filled with words and drawings.
He likes writing in notebooks
and tearing out the pages
and folding them
and putting them in his pocket.
Likes mowing the grass, raking the leaves,
climbing ladders, and wrestling with his dog, Happy.
Likes hearing kids playing baseball in the park
in the distance.
Likes hiking in the Massachusetts woods and fields.
Likes French toast, French fries--anything French.
Likes the word moccasins.
Likes the mystery of oceans and bones and stars.
Likes nuts, but not in things.
Daniel Sklar teaches creative writing at Endicott College in Massachusetts. He rides a bicycles to work. Some of his writing has been published in New York Quarterly, The American Dissident, Beat Scene, and the Harvard Review.