Albert Einstein’s colleagues at the Institute of Advanced Study were worried. By mid-afternoon his office wastebasket would be overflowing with empty mini bottles of Tanqueray. Additionally, he had recently shaved his head and grown a wild red beard. He was even talking about getting a neck tattoo of e=mc2. They blamed it all on a radio song that pictured him going around town sniffing drainpipes and reciting the alphabet. At first he had threatened to sue the singer for libel, but now he would often just sit slumped at his desk listening with eyes closed to the ticking of the universe’s cooling engine.

Howie Good’s latest poetry collections are The Death Row Shuffle (Finishing Line Press, 2020) and The Trouble with Being Born (Ethel Micro-Press, 2020).