"School's out for ever" - Alice Cooper

Do you remember what you felt like on the last day of school after the last school -exam you'd ever write?

The Quiet Auditorium and Beyond
Tue, 21 Mar 2006 05:01:06 -0800

i was found standing
in a wide but closed space
on a sleepy noonday

a tall death's head glided
skeletally past me
to a long and spectral bench

tall, swaying trees came in
hemmed in by small seats
their branches, silent; moving

the hourglass turned thrice
i was found sitting
sleeping(!), sometimes writing

pacing is distracting
pacing shows distraction
eyes feasting on fair calves

ankles, thighs and muscles
shapes, twisting and turning
chairs and skirts, leaves rustling

three aeons went by
(for them but thirty seconds?)
of minds and sinews working

the clock struck five quietly
they rushed by, in gladness
22 soft-eyed gazelles

no longer penned in by/with questions
in "convent-ual" fences
free to roam the city

as if t'were green savannahs
to their hearts' feline dis-content(s)
in the heartless neon-lit streets

no more of school-exams
no more they, school children
no more they, girls; thinking

w/trapped in women's bodies
running out , gracefully
liberated, pretty gazelles

finally 'wisdom's' children
their sparkling faces declared
at one with their lissome limbs

and i was found walking
out of the gates of division
into the place, (of) my poem

setting it free, long-legged gazelle
into the azure - "nu/ew blue" - skies
of your desirous readings.