Best Schoolroom Poems
Today, meandering through the clutter of the local antique store,
I almost tripped and fell over an object partially hidden on the floor!
My hands came to rest on an old-fashioned school desk sitting there.
It reminded me of the one I occupied in my school days, I do declare!
My thoughts drifted back through the misty past to reminisce and ponder.
As I caressed its oaken surface with my fingers, I began to wonder.
Did it once grace a simple one-room prairie schoolhouse in Indiana?
Might it have come from a rustic schoolroom in the state of Montana?
The slanting top of the old desk was scratched and with ink was stained.
I saw faint initials carved by an idle lad whose attention span had waned!
The varnish was worn off the folding seat by many a squirming kid.
Wads of chewing gum still adorned the underside of the folding lid!
I recalled sitting at one of those uncomfortable desks trying to stay awake!
As Miss Ruth droned on and on, all I could think of was the recess break!
The room reeked of oranges and fried egg sandwiches we'd bring to munch.
Kids of means paid a dime to eat finer fare in the lunchroom for their lunch!
I recalled the thwack on my knuckles of Miss Ruth's ruler to get my attention,
And what awaited me at home for misbehavior with growing apprehension!
(A clerk noting my glazed eyes asked, "May I help you sir? Is anything amiss?"
"Nah", I replied. "If you please, I'd like to stand here awhile and reminisce!")
Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired
© All Rights Reserved
Categories:
schoolroom, nostalgia, school, school, me,
Form:
Rhyme
Yesterday I caught the drift of a word
Almost at the end of Dr. Ram?s words
That I had it all, three in one, with music and no regrets
Stirred my mind and made me think
What regret really means
I suppose Regret is the truant of history
Often sneaking out of the schoolroom of the past to torment present time
...seeking a meek heart to mess with
But time has taught me to be wise
Hence I now know how to turn Regret into a good child
The secret is in offering him the candy of time
The present is just what it means
A present to be justly cherished
If I share it?s gift with the regrets of the past
Sure, Regret will turn into a good child
And Regret?s deeds will fill my heart with pride
The power is in time
Each a new opportunity eager to be of service
As soon as yesterday bids bye, today arises to take its place in haste
And it brings in its wake
...the promise of forgiveness, reconciliation and reconstruction
In each day I find a newer canvas to repaint my dreams
And since yesterday I tried another style and failed
Today I?m that bit wiser
So I will try again with better skill...
To redraw the masterpiece of a life I dream in colours so beautifully vivid
So yes Dr. Ram,
Thanks-a-ram for reminding me how lucky I am
I owe it all to time
For teaching me how to turn Regret into a better child
Filled with lessons which I study
Tomorrow in my life there?ll be less like his kind
Hey Doc! Thanx-an-awesome-lot 4 the kind words u post of my poems!
This is especially 4 u!
Categories:
schoolroom, life, thank youme, heart,
Form:
Narrative
Another dead from injuries
In this latest mad attack.
Gun-downed by a supposed friend,
She had no time to fight back.
The fifteen year old gunman
Has died by his own hand.
Because of him, two others dead.
No one can understand.
Four children injured badly
Upon the schoolroom floor.
But for the heroic teacher,
There would have been some more.
We find this in the paper
And with a shrug of rage,
Keep reading other items
Then turn to the comic page.
But this one came too close to home,
Just another town away.
She could have easily been ours,
That lost grandchild today.
He didn't fit the pattern,
A well adjusted child.
No one can say what happened
To make him go so wild.
Experts as well as amateurs
Will have pet theories why
A cared for, beloved child would want
Someone's loved child to die.
By: Joyce Johnson
(This happened this Friday at a town near my own. )
Categories:
schoolroom, death, student,
Form:
Narrative
Bright white streak like chalk
across a schoolroom blackboard
makes us gasp in awe.
Categories:
schoolroom, space
Form:
Haiku
A restless night, another hum-drum day,
Resolve to take a pleasurable walk;
I make my way towards St Mary’s church.
Across the street, a sixteenth century home –
Maltravers Manor, testament to time.
I’m heading for the ancient Hollow Way
Where towering beeches shade the wagon route.
“The Hatchet” standing at the crossroads, empty !
Bereft ! No pints are pulled here any more.
Along the High Street, past the Corner Cottage
Perambulating slowly now I pass
Refurbished “Childrey Stores” and Chapel House,
The Primitive Methodists’ former home.
And next, the Childrey pond comes into view --
It’s guarded by a dozen angry geese
And to the right the Old Post Office stands –
No stamps or letters, now a family home.
Beside the bus-stop here’s the “village” hall
In red brick builded by Victorian hands :
The Working Mens Club And Reading Room
Where farming labourers were wont to meet.
Next a modern non-conformist chapel
On the site of earlier Methodist Hall.
Then looking West a high brick wall contains
A cedar, vintage, sixteen forty six,
As high above a noisy rookery sways.
We now fork right by Rampanes Manor House.
Set in the wall, a dedication plaque
Records the founding of the Old Schoolroom,
Of seventeen thirty two, for local boys,
Established by the knight George Fettiplace.
Along Church Row we pass Cantorist House,
Originally the Chantry House for priest,
Three almsmen, to assist in singing mass
For the soul of Sir Edmund of Childrey.
Enter St Mary’s by the southern door,
Then down the aisle, I’m heading for the chancel
Where ancient brass recalls five hundred years
Of folk who lived and died in Cilla’s Rill.
I’ll leave as campanologists arrive
To ring the changes loud across the land.
Through the serried ranks of slate and marble,
I weave a path towards a wooden bench,
And here I’ll rest, below the old Scots pine,
To watch the setting sun across the fields.
Categories:
schoolroom, history, journey, travel,
Form:
Iambic Pentameter
Twitching limply atop an Ulster lamppost
Like a hung man, legs kicking in spasm at the last seconds of life
Its bigoted purpose now spent and now abandoned to the elements
No longer recognisable as the flag of union, a rag, a disgrace
Its fate summarises the fall of a culture that once honoured it
A proud nation of proud men, of starched collars and stiff upper lip
Colonially pink maps on schoolroom walls bore testament to empire
An empire won and lost when the map turned from pink to red
Up and at ’em lads! For King and country! Hold the banner high!
Ypres and the Somme, regiments of the brave under one colour
The twitching curtains of multi-culture now fearful of the emblem
The emblem of abhorrence uncased by those not qualified to fly it
Patriotism, a narrow path parting pride from prejudice
Defined by a flag, one duplicitous fluttering cloth, a split personality
Now the badge of hooligan, xenophobe and pop diva
Courage now gone, bleached by sun, washed by rain…atop an Ulster lamp post
Categories:
schoolroom, history, nostalgia, political, social,
Form:
Free verse
Loneliness the circles
In which the daydream never ends
I wish you'd go away those times
So I could find you once again
Perhaps a hole-in -middle whirlpool
The nothing that ever stays
A fist of clenching handful
A farmer begging God for rain
A plague of desperation
No welcome needs around
The sideway glance of people
As if you were a paedophile
An intrusion of their selfish plans
A car with a one way steering wheel
Thats always headed home
A dust devil with nowhere else to go
A ship that wayward stranded
Marooned on a broken beach
A schoolroom devoid of students
And theres nothing else to teach
Sitting so low in the restaurant
Furtive glances all eyes on me
I walk through them, they look through me
I'm a drive-thru KFC
Her virtue were her beauty spot
But she drove the rain to tears
Eating chicken in the parking lot
She didnt fit with all my fears
Categories:
schoolroom, absence, heartbroken, loneliness,
Form:
Free verse
Some folks put Jesus in a box
and take Him out on Sunday,
when church is over bring Him home
and He’s boxed again by Monday.
There are other folks who do not let Him
hang around at all
except perhaps at Christmas time
beneath the tree or in the hall.
Like the other decorations
He is just there for the fun.
He’ll be put away for the whole year
when Christmastime is done.
Then there are the extremists
who never want to see His face.
They insist He must be banished
from every public place.
They can bar Him from the schoolroom,
The avenue and mart,
But they can never take Him
from a faithful Christian’s heart.
Categories:
schoolroom, faith,
Form:
Quatrain
I remember when…
I tied myself to the chair in first grade.
Taking seriously Teacher’s red light -
“Young lady, if you don’t stay in your seat…”
I took my scarf and bound myself up tight.
I remember when…
the lunch bell sounded and Missus Storm said,
“Quietly, children, line up at the door.”
But I couldn’t get my hard knots undone
so me and the chair plop-plopped cross the floor.
I remember when…
I climbed out the school window in third grade.
Asleep at my desk, I’d run out of juice
then Mz. Willliams took the class to recess
I heard the door slam, it wouldn't come loose.
I remember when…
that schoolroom seemed more like Alcatraz
in solitary confinement, I pried
one window open. Taking a quick look,
I climbed up and out with tomboy-ish stride.
Categories:
schoolroom, remember,
Form:
Rhyme
A schoolroom
of my childhood
my mother's heart
My shy adolescence
her tender warmth
purified
My present success
her new pride
glorified
For Francine’s, ‘Senryu for mom’ contest
Categories:
schoolroom, mother
Form:
Senryu
I relive the nightmare of seeing my papa hanged
At six, I didn’t know I could cry so hard and so much
They dragged him to a tree while the crickets sang
It deprived me of any chance to feel his final touch
Growing up when the Jim Crow South was at its worst
I don’t care how hot it got, working in the scorching heat
They would offer me no water, let a black girl die of thirst
In my dreams, I saw papa swing from a Spanish Moss tree
It seemed I picked rough cotton or tobacco my entire life
I never went inside a schoolroom, much less learned to read
Mama gave me away at thirteen to be an older man’s wife
Birthing sixteen children. It’s for sure I knew how to breed
I lived too long and have seen too much. No tears left to cry
If you asked about my papa, I couldn’t bring myself to speak
On the news, I saw my great-grandson left on the streets to die
Now, those tears I saved for papa pitch slowly down my cheeks
Categories:
schoolroom, america, black african american,
Form:
Rhyme
She was a mere eighteen when she began her teaching career,
Never dreaming that a teacher's life could be so austere.
The challenges she met weren't mentioned at "Normal School".
She coped, teaching readin', ritin', 'rithmatic and the Golden Rule.
A one-room school in Indiana was where she began her profession.
Cultivating young minds was to become her lifetime obsession.
Day began with prayer and the kids singing, "Good Morning To You!"
Patriotism was stressed so the "Pledge of Allegiance" was said too.
Among her duties was stoking the fire in the pot-belly stove,
And clearing a path in the snow to the "facilities" in the grove.
On wintry days the room was filled with the aroma of savory soup,
Simmering on the stove, that she had prepared for her little group.
There were six classes in the schoolroom where she taught.
As she dealt with one class, the others were easily distraught!
In her desk a frog, mouse or garter snake she might find.
If the culprit was found, her ruler would warm his behind!
At the end of the day when the children were at last released,
She sometimes felt she had been training a horde of wild beasts!
But she loved the challenge and the kids and she persevered.
There was no one in that prairie farmland so loved and revered!
Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired (© All Rights Reserved)
Categories:
schoolroom, educationprayer,
Form:
Rhyme
she saved a bird
after
he landed
with feet in the air
near
the ceramic bunny —
someone’s brother
(in the garden)
ginger snaps
on her cool desk.
cages upon cages
of snakes
and an orange-cheeked
cockatiel.
i loved to talk
to that bird
“Twhoo, twhoo, twhoo”
the bird was there
in the afternoon
when
almost all
classrooms were dark.
one day they removed
all the fun
from her room
not one gingercrumb was left.
not one
even hinted
cancer
7/10/2020
*Dedicated to a friendly teacher and a little boy
Categories:
schoolroom, animal, bird, death, teacher,
Form:
Free verse
Kummerspeck
(Lisandro's Song)
Little Lisandro (he's white, don't get
offended)
sits at a desk in a schoolroom he'd rather not be in
forced by people he doesn't know
to do what he'd rather not do.
The people keep telling him:
"Lisandro, life isn't always about what you want. We know more than you."
Lisandro can't make sense of any of it.
The kids around him don't seem so troubled.
Sometimes they laugh at him
and call him idiot.
The world is angry with Lisandro, and he is angry back.
What did he do?
No one will explain. All they do is criticize.
Lisandro is lonely.
Little Lisandro likes to draw pictures.
They are good too.
Angry.
The teachers take away the pictures
and the other kids say he is sick.
He got sent to the school psychologist.
They gave Lisandro drugs so he'd be more like other kids.
But the drugs made him crazy
and his drawings were everywhere.
He'd discovered graffiti.
So they gave him different drugs.
He stopped drawing and took up eating.
He ate everything he could get his hands on
and nobody cared as long as he wasn't painting walls.
They would take away his mind.
Erase his spirit.
Lisandro quit asking questions.
He gained fifty pounds eating school food.
There were plenty of sleepy fat kids at school.
Lisandro finally fit in.
His teachers became more tolerant
and starting giving him passing grades.
And besides, the State required them to.
He has a disability.
Little Lisandro smiles.
It took a bit of doing but he finally got them off his back.
Now he sits at his desk and draws
and everybody ignores him more or less.
The sleepy fat little kid
quietly planning his plan
to get even with those motherf*****s.
Categories:
schoolroom, social, society, solitude,
Form:
Free verse
Don’t underestimate telling someone they were missed. There was a black hole in a pew, in a schoolroom, at work; on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday… Widen that smile, that big toothy grin. Don’t underestimate letting that sunshine radiate. We feel the warmth, the tether, that we matter, altogether.
puzzle piece of you
your unique shape with borders -
see palms reaching out
9/28/2022
Categories:
schoolroom, care, cheer up,
Form:
Haibun