Noel Sloboda
The Mummy Matriculates
Despite the absence
of transcripts and test scores
he is given special permission
to enroll, since he can pay
his own way. “Nontraditional”
is what they call him
on his letter of admission
and it is not as bad as some
of the labels he has borne—
Scourge of the White Sands,
Embodied Nightmare, Lurking
Sin. Maybe, he thinks,
if he makes the Dean’s List,
he will recover his true name—
if only he could remember
how it sounded, rolling
off a tongue turned to dust
in an age long since passed.
_______________
Noel Sloboda is the author of the poetry collections Shell Games (sunnyoutside, 2008) and Our Rarer Monsters (sunnyoutside, 2013) as well as several chapbooks, most recently Risk Management Studies (Kattywompus, 2015). He has also published a book about Edith Wharton and Gertrude Stein. Sloboda teaches at Penn State York.
Editor’s Notes: The mummy cartoon image (Pixabay) and a photograph of books on shelves (Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library, Antwerp, Belgium) are combined.
