Donut

O, Benjamin P. Lovell, 19

from Oneonta, New York State

who appears in the police blotter

in Thursday’s Daily Star for

unlawful possession of marijuana.

The police blotter hangs just

below the cast of Hairpsray

rehearsing at the suny oneonta

where the girl playing Tracy

Turnblad looks as if she’s been

helping herself to donuts:

maybe the donuts we were eating

at Barlow’s General Store, Treadwell.

Do you ever get an upstate rush?

I’ve never been crazy about donuts

but these are the aristocrats

of the donut world and I salute them.

And I hope, Benjamin, your mom

isn’t going to be too mad as she casts

her eye down the police blotter

and sees your name there, You little shit!

and I hope the authorities remember

being young when the whole world

sometimes seemed somehow like

a gargantuan donut that either pulled

you to its bosom (O Tracy!) or kicked

down — somewhere — to the bloodstream.

Sweet donut, do I love thee? I haven’t

mentioned Brando K. Goodluck, 18,

from Manhattan, charged with seventh-degree

criminal possession of a controlled

substance. O Brando, O Brando

what were you thinking?

As I put a donut in my mouth

I’m thinking I wouldn’t mind

a joint, and, in any case, maybe

all these donuts are pretty dangerous

and I wonder what would happen

if the rules got jumbled up

and the girl playing Tracy Turnblad

slid down the page

and found herself in the police blotter

charged with unlawful possession

of a donut. Suddenly America feels

different and I like it.

Police blotters throughout the nation

packed with donutheads and half the country

on the run as college girls make

secret calls and meet their dealers

in dusty ghost towns, sweet

vapors drifting through the trees.

O America, where even the robins

are bigger, where every car that

slides into the forecourt of Barlow’s

General Store is a Dodge, where

half the population is chasing

the perfect donut. Let’s imagine

that Benjamin P. Lovell and

Brando K. Goodluck, nice slim boys,

who never touched a donut

in their lives, wander into Barlow’s

and roll a joint and talk about those

losers who kneel down before “the big one.”

They know the girl who was playing

Tracy Turnblad. She was sweet, they say,

who went and threw it all away

for a sleazy bun with a hole in it.

They pass the joint to me and I can

feel the donuts I stuffed in haste

somewhere down my slacks. I blush.

Real shame, I say. Mrs. Barlow says

The donuts on her shelves have gone.