Writing Hinton James in Verse Does Not Make It Less Worse

Instead, I'm dedicating this column to giving thanks for something that I share with thousands of past and present UNC students -- the wonderful and horrible experience of having resided in the best and worst residence hall ever constructed, Hinton James.

After long reflection, I decided that prose wasn't good enough for my favorite South Campus paragon of a palace. Only verse would do.

So, without further delay, here is -- ahem -- my "Ode to Hinton James."

O Hinton, sweet Hinton, for you is this fine ode./For two years you served as my very humble abode./Over all you tower with 10 stories of height./Even Durham city from you one can make sight./From your windows more than one beer can has made flight.

A nervous college neophyte I came to you,/My future four years shaded Carolina blue./As my parents and I drove along Manning Drive,/My father said: "Jim, you're going to live in a dive!/"The walk upstairs to your room I could not survive!"

Into my sweltering eighth floor room walked I,/Owner of a cinder-block bedroom in the sky./While your lack of cooling A/C drove me insane/And I swear my suitemates probably sold cocaine,/At least at last from my parents I had free rein.

To explore my new surroundings I set out,/My new home I became knowledgeable about./Around your mighty perimeter I long scoped,/Wondering what substance your architect had smoked,/A bleak housing project your X-shaped frame evoked.

On your lofty balconies and between your walls,/On basketball courts and even in bathroom stalls,/Liberated young adult libidos ran wild;/The sins and excesses made Las Vegas seem mild./What I saw, Ozzy Osbourne wouldn't show his child.

PBR, MP3s and still more PBR,/This is the brilliance that your suite parties are./"Who will be president and who will be asshole?"/"Hey, Stu dog, where did you hide the stash and my bowl?"/ These are the deep questions your residents extol.

Pokey Sticks and bowel-turning Chase afternoon brunch,/These are the delicacies on which your kids munch./Tyrone and Stephanie, Joseph and Mary Sue,/Enrique and Beth, Ann and that State student Chu;/ These random hook-ups occurred only because of you.

But when does this perpetual revelry stop?/When into their comfy beds your residents drop?/But short is their respite from Bacchian delight,/They're always awoken by your fire alarm's might/At every conceivable hour of each night.

Sleep-deprived, hungover, homesick and even worse,/Rarely do your students in their studies immerse./What can one expect when between students and class/Lies an uphill foul hike that may even surpass/Twenty minutes by any good freshman's forecast.

O Hinton, sweet Hinton, for you was this fine ode./For two years you served as my quite humble abode./May your elevator always scale the blue sky./May your architecture always bring a glum sigh./May your name be always a frosh rallying cry!

Wow, talk about a flawed poem! Where was the meter in some of those verses? Did I forget that "scoped" doesn't rhyme with "smoked" or that "surpass" doesn't rhyme with "forecast?" Was I so lazy that the only word I could think of to rhyme with "PBR" was "are?"

Oh well, perhaps it's fitting in the end. After all, what could a flawed residence hall that administrators wanted to implode deserve more than a flawed poem?

E-mail Jim Doggett at jdoggett@e-mail.unc.edu.