Long Blackboards Poems

Chalk is the magic of blackboards, sports fields and
little girl's sidewalk games of Hop-Scotch.
How many equations and statements, measured lines, and boxes
do you imagine have been drawn upon those waiting surfaces?
Dare one imagine -into infinity?

On...

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What's in a Name? 
                              ...

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If you go downtown early morning
You can see the shopkeepers setting
Old treasures on the sidewalk,
Writing their welcomes with chalk
On little standing blackboards,
Inviting you inside their stores.

Honeysuckle Antiques has its window
Filled with newfound things to show,
Local...

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~~~Second Grade Terrorists~~~

Chicago Public Schools

I graduated in January, happy as a lark!
I was able to enlighten young ones, no longer would
they have to live in the dark!

With my little blue Fiat, as sweet as candy,
I...

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How the wind is howling grit into the eye
and the storm vents its commiserating
to burden the worrisome sky
back forced into the bleach bit
to hang by grasping throat
and scurry to those rat holes
where safety feels safe...

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Enough is enough of this seriousness
Back to the sillies where I belong
Here's something to ponder, my friends
Why is the word 'abbreviation' so long

I don't usually have to think twice
Before giving it a second thought
You're schizophrenic?...

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Enough is enough of this seriousness
Back to the sillies where I belong
Here's something to ponder, my friends
Why is the word 'abbreviation' so long

I don't usually have to think twice
Before giving it a second thought
You're schizophrenic?...

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Appendages 


They grow up in wardrobes
in their place of coat-hangers
and are left to develop a certain comfort for
dark uniform closed door spaces

Occasionally the light of day 
on a whim may grant them praise
and flaunt their...

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In an attempt to document my worth to your esteemed organization, I hereby submit my unredacted resume.

I was educated using blocks, books, chalk, blackboards and the slide rule.  “Testing” was used to “evaluate” progress...

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The old school bell would ring out at the start of the day.
Chalk on blackboards, shirts and ties.
The school colours of green and gold.
Crowded classrooms, with very little room.

Lunchtimes were spent in classrooms,small and crampt.
No...

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Seamless Breath
                by Odin Roark

At sunrise,
Man-child of his heart,
Reaches past the years,
Washes little sleep down the drain,
Accepts the body once...

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Another dream  

My strength seeps from the cracks,
crevices ripped in a single slip
Reaching for hope again
I left my chest wide open

Streams of worth
flow like lying children
stealing quarters from the collection plate
at Sunday school -...

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The little brick school house
where Mama used to go,
sets quietly atop the hill
thru' summer heat and snow.

The bell on top is silent now,
the window shutters tight,
the door is weather-beaten,
and floors an awful sight.

The old stove...

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If guns don’t kill people 
Why are so many people dead
Another moms child 
shot in the head
Blackboards white chalk
splattered in Red
A teacher killed
For something she said
Victim after victim
Demons need to be fed
On violence they’ve been...

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Highschool years,
Not my best,
Though I easily passed any test,
I joined the chem lab,
To assist a bird brained woman,
She was rarely in the lab,
And we were rarely performing,
what we were supposed to be do'ing,
We'd mix different...

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So you feel, like a miscarriage
a miracle of statistic, boxed away and sealed

Where love-lost is a permanent condition
Faith a contra-septive thats declining with permission

And you kneel, and you kneel

And you feel, all that you portray
is...

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on fibers coarse
	with little clay
nibs are stained
	with indigo ink

lines of cursive
	carefully formed
seeking meaning
	to come forth

chrome plated steel
	and laminate wood
plastics cast
	a cage formed

aligned in rows
	of boys and girls
trying to find
	what to know

classroom did form
	a prison dark
locked...

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The lesson was don’t speak with a mouthful,
And not at all when grown folk speak.
My pitiful plate burns on my lap,
So too does my sister’s on hers.
The dinner table sits too small to invite children
So...

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Here I stand once again
Can't care if the words flow anymore
Nostalgic overload blows through my shell
Staring out of an old window

Where did I stand?
Head down, staring out of the old window
Teacher cleaned the blackboards as...

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Pointedly poignant points portend pointillism.
Pontiffs pontificate pointless pointers ponderously.
Pompous poems populate Pompei pottery potently.
Porous pornography portrays Portuguese porta potties.
Poppies pop Popeye’s popular popcorn.
Populist populism pots ponies properly.

Blithering blather blots bloody bleeping blips.
Bloomberg blogs bleach bleating...

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SO BROTHER YOU SAW BLACK BOARDS 

Them that have made you a stranger to your people
Them that have made you an alien among your own
I hear you saw blackboards…
And indeed they changed you

For you have...

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You know you have a small apartment
When Kellogg's Coco Pops echo
Maybe our world is another planet's hell
Sure wouldn't surprise me to know

Why do psychics have to ask you your name
Going to live forever... so far...

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Ink wells drying out,books march to their graves.
Stationary evolving like cavemen in caves.
Bibles on websites,there's no longer books of prayer.
Electronic revolution's just too much to bear.

Handwritten letters,that were sealed with a kiss.
Signing your name on...

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“Hey Fat!!! Sit down and shut up!”
starts with butter on the butter on the corn
half-baked concepts dragging from the board ‘cross the floor
up to my pen. . . damn, this Prof. got two, too many...

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Sister Mary Grace
was my third grade teacher.
Like all of the other nuns in our school,
everything but the front part of her face
was hidden by a starched, white wimple
and a black habit,
layers of robe-like cloth which...

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