There’s something about a college town

Ivy covered refuge for growing minds

Pristine greens squared between classroom buildings

Frisbees, guitars, books, abandoned papers

Bicycle racks strewn around campus

Hope riding on young shoulders

Mine was Ann Arbor, decades and miles away

And like Berkeley, Granville, Princeton

Shares promise, desires, memories

Minds open and closed, independence

Lost years, futures found, old rhythms fade, new paths appear

Alumni far and wide, alma maters in their hearts

Each fall the pull of renewal stirs inside

The rush to classes, yearning to learn

Explore the inner and outer mind; expand the boundaries

Young and old, afraid and fearless, teachers and students all

Reach across the divide to probe, to seek, to find

And when I near a campus

I’m that co-ed once again

Passing years fade away

Prospects beckon anew

And yes, I feel I’m home.

A professional writer and actress and a Hunterdon Country resident, Kayle has published two novels with the Berkley Publishing Group and currently reviews fiction for Publishers Weekly. She also interviews writers and publishing executives who appear at the annual BookExpo convention and writes up the interviews for PW’s convention newspaper, Show Daily. She performs regularly in murder mysteries with the professional company Without A Cue Productions, LLC.

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