The Cheerful Tortoise

Did the turtles know they had numbers

painted on their backs, with various shades of fingernail polish,

when they were placed in the polished plywood track

that circled the bar, with lanes marked with green paint,

that the turtles ignored?

Every Thursday night, when the taps hardly moved,

in an effort to sell more beer, thus providing a nutritional diversions,

to those desperately studying, those who hadn’t flunked out yet,

hanging on by a thread, in the spring,

to their deferments

It was the that same spring when Lyndon went to war

and after a stirring speech, evoking  the Perdenales

at least three times, revoked the students deferments

from those erstwhile students, who ceased studying on Thursday nights

to become turtle racing aficionados

almost three years later, in the winter, a guy came to have a beer

and watch the turtle races, just killing a few hours,

after a very long day trying to register for the spring quarter

yes he had flunked out, he told the registrar, but three years had passed

and he would be a good student now, the registrar reluctantly accepted his paper work

the bartender asked for his ID, he pulled out a worn military ID card,

all that he had, he had hadn’t been back long enough to get a driver’s license

he looked like the picture on his ID—regulation GI haircut—gaunt tired looking

the bartender looked him over pretty good and finally with grin said

the turtle racing was shut down by the state, and we don’t serve your kind here