When I was five
I spun around with a deck of cards
They sprayed all around the schoolroom
Like flying soldiers filling the air with a swishing swoon
Diamonds and clubs and kings and things
When I was five
I shattered the gendered playroom
I was the only boy on the girl's side
A midst the play kitchen and table and dishes and dolls
I was the husband and father and brother and son
When I was five
And the girls decided to banish me
I organized the boys and we took
Styrofoam building blocks breaking the barrier between
And we began to play together
When I was five
The one thing the teacher told us not to do
Was go down the slide backwards
So that is what I had to do
I just had to
When I was five
I never told the teacher what I knew
I would wait until I got home
And tell my mother everything
All the things I learned
When I was five
I could read everything the teacher wrote
She thought she was just helping us with ABCs
Bu I could read her notes to her friends
What was "A wild date with Bill" I wondered
When I was five
I heard my own drum
I followed my own dreams
I listened to my own rules
I was a rebel without a clue
When I was five
I was very small
There were many facts and figures I did not know
But my imagination was large
As big as the world
And then every year it got smaller and smaller
As everything else got bigger and bigger
Sometimes I miss
When I was five
There's a freedom about poetry.
ReplyDeleteYou can say things, how you feel them.
Nothing to revise, if you don't want,
Clarity is of no consequence,
Except for creating the necessity of the re-read;
And don't we want that?
Don't we want that?
You want that.
Years of working with 5 year olds... I can picture this little boy. Nice poem.
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