JOHNMICHAEL SIMON POETRY

Every morning the school bus

comes gathering down the road

like a carpet sweeper

 

Think about it, twelve long years,

ink stained pews, corridors of boredom,

wheels spinning round in neutral

 

Harvesting particles of presumptions

about the world —according to Euclid,

Miss Fairpenny, Mr. Chalkdust

 

Outside, dust motes dance with butterflies,

the sun performs four thousand overtures

on themes of fishing rods, haystacks, tree houses

 

As over horizons to the east, under-tens

fill matchboxes, sort rice, pack sardines

and bind firecrackers into strings

 

Little fingers growing calloused learning adult ways,

little minds wrapped, as if in foot binding

protected from the wild sun-strewn days outside