13 Very Short Ones By Billy Collins (From his Musical Tables)

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Trouble was not

his middle name.

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Reflections On An Amish Childhood

I was a little square

in a round hat.

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Adolescence

The gulf widened between my parents and me

but that doesn't mean they lived on a houseboat.

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Another Hotel

Unlike the breakfast menu

I have no desire to be hung outside before 3AM

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Corridor

I've grown old.

Now my own name

rings a bell.

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Elegy

I have turned over

all 52 cards

on the kitchen table.

Still, I think

you must be hiding

somewhere in the deck.

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Carbon Dating

He tried it once

as a last resort

but most of the women

were a million years old

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3 A.M.

Only my hand

is asleep,

but it’s a start.

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Flaubert

As he looked for the right word,

several wrong words

appeared in his window.

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Dog

When she runs in her sleep,

eyelids twitching,

legs churning sideways on the floor,

I wonder if she's chasing a squirrel

or being chased

by an angry farmer waving a rake.

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Morning Walk

The dog stops often

to sniff the poems of others

before reciting her own.

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The Exception

Whoever said there's a poem

lurking in the darkness of every pencil

was not thinking of this one.

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Children

There’s a movie out

titled Children

I don’t know what it’s about

but I like the voice

on the radio

when it says:

“Children now playing everywhere.”