Gale Acuff

except my parents and my dog and my
favorite professional sports teams and
favorite wrestler, Ricky “the Dragon” 
Steamboat, and Batman comics and pizza
puffs and my dog—oh, I mentioned him—and
I guess my sister and dinosaurs and
the new bike I’ll get for Christmas and
clams with mashed potatoes and coleslaw and
when we have corn dogs in the school lunchroom
and that Phantom movie that nobody
else ever saw, Hell, it wasn’t that bad,
and monster truck rallies and skateboarders 
falling on their butts—that’s pretty funny
and they always rise again anyway.

GALE ACUFF has published hundreds of poems in over a dozen countries and has authored three books of poetry. He has taught university English in the US, China, and Palestine.