the professor

All the students were
deep, half-mad in love
with the tweed-wearing, swearing
bespectacled Greek professor.

He slouched forward from the edge of the desk
roaring "lie to me!"
while he lectured them on
international humanitarian disasters.

Invited the students to his house
beguiled them with imported scotch.
Later, after the locals went home,
sang Greek love songs and fingered his guitar.

The students got into taxis
smelling his cigar on their lapels, hearing
waves come up past the garden
of some implausible Greek isle.

One night I joined them in Odeon
he disdained international courts
sneered at the tribunals, and all the students
tried desperately to match his derision.

Went to his house to catalogue his books
shelf after shelf, while he
brewed the finest espresso and shared
his beloved cigarettes with me.

He had turned on the radio and he moped
while a voice read fairytales in Greek.
Looked out the window at the Nile
and let off a congenial stream of curses.

All the students, he said. I am,
always will be, a professor. Like he read
my mind, the words I didn't dare say:
Why haven't you gone back home?