I was bored and looking for some tradition to lampoon. I had never written a sestina before and it is a old form (dating as far back as the twelfth century according to the Sestina web site), i.e tradional, a smoking ban in Italy, of all places, was in the news, and high schools? Well I remember a book title, Is there life after high school? that an internet search says it was written by Kelli B. Trujillo and you can buy it a Wal-mart. That was good enough for me.

As it turns out I may have broken the tradition of the word order in the envoi (concluding triplet), but then no one seems to know the rules and it certainly was not intentional on my part, it just turned out that way because I am but a student in one of those universal CR.

The Promise of Life after High School


Tobacco and smoking has gotten to be society’s drag
Mister Butts is on the train for a ride to the death camp
A victum of the march to the universal high school
The uniform world— where only the principle rules
To begin with, there will still be illicit wash rooms
Where males will go to smoke and masturbate

A place to think and dream while they masturbate,
Smoke, stink and enjoy what might be their last drag
Just like the old days when we did it in the bath rooms
It was a place everybody went, life’s boot camp
Boys longing to be men with, “No damn rules.”
A delusional haven state– a real learning school.

An experience everyone had before leaving school
You could be fool, nerd, jock: they all masturbate!
It’s the one thing everybody shared--common rules
To be preserved, something to wrestle and drag
Into a dusty future of unexciting ideas– a camp
Motto with an engaging ring; good enuf for board rooms

Outside the pecking order of traditional class rooms
Where real life is learned in the universal high school
Not along straight, narrow halls with pictures of camp
Failures and success, i.e. losers admitting, “Yeah, I masturbate.”
For those who get caught for what everybody does, they drag
Out the facts, and punish them for breaking the rules.

It just the way life goes, when power and control rules.
Only fools would think to mention the game rooms
That teach team work with morals in disguise drag
Hubris is equated to honor with sophomoric school
Cheerleaders who eliminate the reason to masturbate
And depict a glamorous future adventure camp.

With songs and mascots, priming them for military camp—
To keep order, sanction activities and set dress rules
It readies men for a life-long mission as Master Bait
Chairman of a-a-a “fishing extravaganzas.” They meet in rooms
At the high school, with officials of the Christian School.
It portrays honesty. “After high school, life really is a drag.”

You may look forward to a business retreat camp in the rooms
Where you thought English was a drag and high school
Was only a place to masturbate and break the stupid rules.

Plus I had a bit of fun doing it.