I don't want to die, now or later, im

by Gale Acuff

-mortality's my aim and I mean here

on Earth, not in some no-body After

-life—I want Eternity in my home

-town, where I can buy comic books and ham

-burgers and peanut brittle and Mallow

-mars and ice cream with a free second scoop

on Friday afternoons after school but

I have to run like Hell to make it to

the order-window on time and when I'm

late I curse good but when I make it on

time I'm a believer and when the girl

opens up again for me it's mercy

and I'm in love with her except that our

kids might have red hair and I'm scared of fire.

Gale Acuff has had hundreds of poems published in a dozen countries and have authored three books of poetry. His poems have appeared in Ascent, Reed, Arkansas Review, Poem, Slant, Aethlon, Florida Review, South Carolina Review, Carolina Quarterly, Roanoke Review, Danse Macabre, Ohio Journal, Sou'wester, South Dakota Review, North Dakota Quarterly, New Texas, Midwest Quarterly, Poetry Midwest, Adirondack Review, Worcester Review, Adirondack Review, Connecticut River Review, Delmarva Review, Maryland Poetry Review, Maryland Literary Review, George Washington Review, Pennsylvania Literary Journal, Ann Arbor Review, Plainsongs, Chiron Review, George Washington Review, McNeese Review, Weber, War, Literature & the Arts, Poet Lore, Able Muse, The Font, Fine Lines, Teach.Write., Oracle, Hamilton Stone Review, Sequential Art Narrative in Education, Cardiff Review, Tokyo Review, Indian Review, Muse India, Bombay Review, Westerly, and many other journals.

     He has taught tertiary English courses in the U.S, PR China, and Palestine.