i have watched a school breathe

She is far from perfect.

black fence mascara, iron wrought with pretentiousness clouds over green acres, excess of prosperity but still she takes theirs

Her hair: heirs to fortunes allowed to frizz and curl naturally, freedom through Her halls, an imperfect interconnected concerto,

Her skin is burnt, uneven brown heated daily by the fire of ideology, a 70’s wood plated gated community

pointillism carpets forming maroon oceans, scars in Her back made by the hands and feet of students scrambling up the last few rungs of ladders they were born halfway up, lungs bipolar in their humility and self-righteousness.

i am among them.

i have seen Her afternoon-bright skylight eyes twinkling in the face of stress and heartbreak, stakes taken and willingly devoured by those rich enough to gamble.  

i have stroked gently Her legs, running past them cross country paths criss-crossed over and over breathtaking, taking breath and time to appreciate the chances still unborn in the sweaty, humid air.

i have felt the buzz of Her throat in proud red commons-catacombs, humming, blossoming with intellectual discussion and stupid jokes, thick makeup and bare acne-scars, alive with social agendas and sexual materialism.  i love Her polluted dialogue like the smell of gasoline, just as powerfully incendiary and wholly intoxicating.

i have taken occasional refuge in the chambers of Her kickstart book-filled heart, library packaged completely in glass paned transparency, academic chambers locked and loaded bloated with explosive unborn artistic expression, tickling Her chin with every heartbeat

beat on pen and pad by poets

beat on outside skin by cleats like whips

beat on thunder-hum drum lines in near-perfect time

electric shock skip defibrillate keep

heartbeats in hardcover editions of old friends

i have seen Her naked cranium

the sum total of morally grey matter made without doubt to matter, scattered schizophrenically inspired teenagers tired of anarchy and authority

black bag discipline and brown bag pot brownies

hemispheres divided: left right raise battle flags but seeing Her twist and turn and dance with joy and misery all at once…

She is made of time-wizened teachers and art-deco light fixtures,

of sun-bleached pressure-cooker bleachers and framed black/white story-telling pictures

She is made of dirty secrets and dirtier jokes

of music that can only be seen in the smoothly lilting dance of hundreds, living, breathing, hating, embracing, making war and love to and with the idea of adulthood

Bullets and kisses fly, but, by and by,

Her dance remains the same.

lungs tight with music spoken and sung, necks hanged and wrung, faces happy and glum

notes on a staff, the staff graph authority anti-rebel trouble treble clef

love in their eyes

and on their whiteboards

hope in their voices

and in the occasional order

and then there’s the reporter, poet, spoken word warrior worried i’m off pitch.

but i’ve still got the rhythmic breaths hidden under Her fully carpeted breasts

the Exhalation a whisper of propulsion

Wisdom a lesson learned, not taught.

She is my inkwell wishing well higher hell speak and spell show and tell

And each of her students a drop of poetry on the chaotic pollock-canvas of Her beloved campus.