true story

today I opened

my copy of

Ulysses

that I bought used somewhere

an old Penguin paperback with black cover

originally sold for $1.95

paged through it

and it opened to a page

where a pressed

four-leaf clover

rested                   pale green

brittle

near the spine

don’t know how long it had been there

but I lifted it out

and felt a strange lifting of my mood

rising notes of a flute

like I had cheated death

or something

maybe I did