Notes About The Poem
Although this work is based only my memories observing the plight of a ‘60s’ inner-city education, those unfortunate people had their lives riddled with obstacles, some of which continue today, especially with the number of frustrated undocumented immigrants flooding our urban areas. Even with immigration reform, most of what is bleak in this piece will remain so. That is just how history seems to repeat itself in the cities.
Window Teacher
Window Teacher
by Odin Roark
As teacher
She was petite
Unassuming
Framed in layered paint
No make-up on her
Save occasional steam facials
Winter cold
Apartment hot
Patiently she granted access
Permitting learning through her
Worn but faithful eyes
Rectangular lenses
Forever dilated for 24/7 study
Across the street
Other windows
Same opportunity
Different lessons
Pulled blinds
Hiding fear
Glass with cracks
Glass turned cardboard
Innocent children
Faces of confusion
Above the street
Pigeon-lined roofs
Poised like sentinels
Destiny marking time
Standing guard
Here yesterday
Today
Tomorrow
Below the street
Tunnel-sounds of motion
Fathers
Mothers
Singles
Junkies
Suits
All riding to anywhere
But here
Down on the street
Few pedestrians
Some exploring a dumpster’s overflow
Dollar Store breakage
Bodega fast-food wrappings
Liquor store sadness
Nighttime festivities of the block
Broken bottles as glitter
Wet and dry
Dead or alive
Kicked
Smashed
Stacked
Bagged
Forgotten garbage
A growing city’s collateral damage
Beneath my building
Express train speeding
Rattling eyes of my teacher
Time for school
Real school
The kind only un-papered immigrants know
Learning what textbooks cannot teach
For you have to be blessed
With a window like mine
The glassed portal to what harsh reality
Bestows on many
Here where there is no graduation
No cap and gown celebration
Or Mom and dad accolades
No sweetheart promises forever
Only survival
And for the window-school drop outs…
A future of smaller classrooms
The kind with no willing and generous
Window teachers
The kind with bars to the outside
Where all the garbage walks the yard
Where subway vibrations become
Steel Sliding
Locking doors
Torturous echoes
Before lights out
Memories become dreams
In these dark classrooms
Where fear laden eyes
Once behind windows to the outside
Now reside in solitary regret
To return to condensation on glass
As the only obstacle to learning
To be free of eyes forever moist and blurry
Clouding remembrances
Of the petite unassuming window
Framed in glorious layers of paint
Oh…if only to return
Post Comments
Poetrysoup is an environment of encouragement and growth so only provide specific positive comments that indicate what you appreciate about the poem. Negative comments will result your account being banned.
Please
Login
to post a comment