Smitten
The doctor’s tested me. He says I’m ill—
and critically, in every sign that’s vital.
I think I need a guidebook, not a pill
—or better still,
requital.
James B. Nicola’s full-length poetry collections are Manhattan Plaza (2014), Stage to Page (2016), Wind in the Cave (2017), Out of Nothing: Poems of Art and Artists (2018) and Quickening: Poems from Before and Beyond (2019). His nonfiction book Playing the Audience won a Choice award. A Yale grad, he currently hosts the Hell’s Kitchen International Writers’ Roundtable at Manhattan’s Columbus Library: walk-ins welcome.