Off To School

OFF TO SCHOOL So you're off to boarding school, It'll be the making of you, my lad, Muses the bespectacled gentleman, Sat behind his morning paper, The commuter train steaming Its trundling way Past opened curtains Of genteel suburbia. Familiarly hypnotic rhythm From the clickety-clacking track Continues, scarcely heeded By the carriage's motley clientele, Disturbed from comatose reveries, Enduring the drilled strains Of unwelcome conversation. Hostile eyes look up in Bristling annoyance At a shy, enclosed boy, Who keeps locked-in silence On his first uncertain foray Into the strange world beyond The comfortable boundaries Of his homely playpen.