late october

A career fair on campus yesterday. I walked by booths for UCLA graduate studies, for USC graduate studies, UCI graduate studies—came upon one for University of Glasgow graduate studies. A woman with a rag of blond hair sat alone on her iPhone at the table. Why is nobody at this table? I walked slow to look at the pictures of the Scottish Highlands on the flyers. Glasgow, of course, is not in the highlands. Glasgow is a dark city of rain and a hunching urban populace and old churches and buildings whose absolute upward force opposes the down-slope of tired shoulders. Glasgow is an old city, beautiful in its dank austerity. But I like the pictures of the grasses and shocks of small white flowers, the clouds and surreally blue sky. I walk past a table, also empty, of University of Dublin graduate studies. Do you know I wore this exact shirt in Dublin about a year ago? There’s a man standing alone with his hands behind his back. I offer him a small smile. Can you believe it either, there’s nobody by your table. 

Past the fair now and headed up the stairs into the library, where I’ll sit for an hour to finish an essay, I think about turning around—heading back to the Dublin table, asking, so—what if I’m broke. What if I’m in debt. And what if I just have lost the plot. What if school doesn’t matter to me anymore. What if I’m looking to your school and your dirty dark urine-scented-cornered city to make something matter to me again, what if I’m looking to your school because I just don’t know where else to go; what if I’m broke and I don’t want to work, what if I want to be the world’s biggest dreamer and I think it’d be great to do it with you. What if University of Dublin can help me to not be tired. What if I tell you that I’m using this graduate program to be close to The Book of Kells, over which I teared up last fall, my breath misting the display case, obscuring my own reflection. What if I told you that that was one of the only moments in the whole of my life that I remember being surrounded by people but feeling totally, peacefully alone, just me and that illuminated manuscript and the cold city. What if I said—hey, about Irvine. I’m afraid to leave my home—I’m afraid to stay. Do you still want to see my resume. I bring you with reverent hands the books of my numberless dreams