Chicken
Here’s the trick
To playing chicken:
You don’t swerve,
Ever.
You just keep going straight ahead.
The other guy
Will always swerve first.
Always.
You have to be
Crazier than him.
And if the other guy
Is crazier than you,
And doesn’t swerve,
And you wind up killed
In a fiery crash,
So be it.
Frank S. Robinson is a graduate of NYU Law School (1970), and served at the New York Public Service Commission as staff counsel and then administrative law judge (1977-97). He is the author of eight books including Albany’s O’Connell Machine (1973), Children of the Dragon (a novel), The Case for Rational Optimism (2009), and Love Poems. Robinson is a professional coin dealer. He is married to the poet Therese Broderick and has a daughter, Elizabeth. Robinson was appointed to the U.S. Assay Commission by President Nixon in 1972. In 1969, he was the first man to walk on the moon.