Roll Call

Request for poems come all the time, but rarely am I actually moved to write one (without pay..lol...jk). I was close to not writing with this latest request, but as I thought of the individuals for whom this piece was composed, it took me back to a group who've I've always wanted to write something for. These were those special educators of my past whom provided some of my earliest and most vivid memories. To them and the retirees of ps36K, this poem is for you... As always, enjoy...

"Roll Call"

These names came to me
And my first memories
Were of halls
Whose opposite ends
Contained rails of opposing shades
Red here
Blue there;
Of rooms
Whose doors seemed so heavy
They'd lock you in
Forever;
Of floors
Polished to the point
Were it not for the fact they were wood
They would've been transparent;
But mostly of them
With the names like
Trotsky
Williams
And Compton
Or Tarr
Those with their bright ideas
Who sought to introduce me
To the intellectual world...

And at that time,
I didn't want to learn.

Then there were the ones who saw
Believed
Beyond the changing scenes
That I would not be lost
To my loins
And those inescapable pressures
We placed on each other
To do whatever
Say
Whatever
As we started to sniff ourselves;
Those were the names
Like Wuckovitch
Coffee and Phillips;
Believing and exposing
Feeding the desire
I still did not recognize within me
That lay dormant
Biding it's time to flourish...

Those were the ones
Who would not let me fail
Even as society bound their hands
Tighter
Even as the district weathered
Those phone calls from my mother
Because the ones before
Could care less
As they escaped each afternoon
Back to their privileges
Figuring they'd pass the buck
On my lazy
On my haziness of perception
About the world
And just where it was within it
I could actually be...

At that time,
I was learning to learn.

I hadn't stopped learning
By the time they came
Those who fanned the flames
Shaped my coal of existence
With Pressure and time
Into the internal diamond
All take me to be;
Those who sought to tell the world
There was no denying me
That I would not lay down
A statistic;
They were the names like Goff
Graves, Benfatta, St. Amant,
Brown, Raynor, and Holmer...

These names came to me
And I realized why I was here
Why
You were here
Because there is nothing greater
Than the one;
The one who'll stand
Far off in the sands of time
Reciting their own roll call of greatness
Appreciation
The one
Who'll hold their child close
And give their child's educator
A nod of appreciation
For the struggle
As hands are bound
By entities substituting
Testing for educating;
The one
Who will take the place
Carry the torch
Igniting the flame of learning
Within souls who have no idea
Just what it is
The world may bring...

The one I became,
As I loved to learn.
©2010clarencecbess