via #Monday prompt – Living Poetry
A new school smelling of raw pine
boards, new nails gleaming
in the windows’ light,
and the teacher, dressed
in her best; both are ready
and waiting. Outside,
the dusty road seems too empty
and the fields too bare
for anyone to appear in time.
It’s not as if she’s nervous,
the way she was four years ago
facing her first class. She knows
all these children, their parents
and grandparents too. She knows
what they need to learn
and what their future holds.
Only her future is in question,
as she looks ahead, trying to see
a life beyond that room.
Inspired by Jessie Ball duPont’s two years of teaching at Shiloh School in Virginia.
....Bilocalalia.... 