Because it's Tuesday and there is no issue in my mailbox. This is the issue (Specter, Rudnick, McGrath, Bass, Tomkins, Franzen, Thurman, Marshall, Franklin, Lane, Moore, Tanning, Blitt, Smaller, Kane, O’Brien, Vey, Lewis, Gregory, Kaplan, Crawford, Chast, Sipress, Sempé, Koren, Cotham, Cullum, Dernavich, Mariscalto...) to which I refer, but I do not have it in my hungry hands. Why, circulation dept., why? I thought we were friends, or had at least reached a détente.

To console myself, I plan to read Maureen Thorson's fabulous monster poem, which I heard her read last night at Pete's Big Salmon just before a performance by the irresistable Paul Muldoon. If you too live in one of the pariah boroughs and are suffering from empty-mailbox syndrome, I suggest you read it too. It will help. Here's a wee taste:

We also learn that all the earth's monsters
Have been collected and put onto one island.
The monsters will fight for you, if you've got
Cash. You and your buddies can relieve yourselves
Of whatever assumptions of complexity and just
Go in pounding each other with monsters. "Arggh!
You will pay dearly," yell the monsters when
They lose. Their monster teammates yell back,
"Arggh!" Go on...