Stone Soup Croutons is a weekly poem I write using lines and impressions picked from Stone Soup Poetry's open mic readers and features. I figure out a title (and sometimes the rest of the poem) later. You can read the other ones I've done since 2015 here.
I also have an award nominated book out now collecting the best of my first year of poems. Click here to purchase it.
Another all-open mic, but next week the features start again! I appreciate of the group that gathers no matter how little I offer or how late I post information.
Speaking of offering little? Here's the poem. Sorry. But this was written quickly this morning. If I had to guess the poem's meaning--and your guess is probably better than mine--I'd say it was influenced by my last couple of weeks on the job, coupled with the teachers (of which my girlfriend is one) returning to the classroom. At least that's what I figured before adding a title at the end. Thanks for reading.
In Session
Next to eight-year-olds, teachers
handle roaches more easily. Those kills
don't make permanent record.
All names unpronounceable
scrawled for one night
Small creatures mark their time
of birth daily, unsure about lasting
to annual anniversary.
The ones with zero income pay most
in flesh, a scalded knee complexion
on bodies small enough to be stomped
by well-meaning prayers.
They write their own eulogies
in refrigerator art scrawl.
Curtains don't draw together,
they march over little bodies.
Squirrels scurry nearby, know
something happened, can't figure
out what. Teachers and truck drivers
would offer same distant consolation.
In their sleep, guard dogs bite at what
they can't see. The master's enemies are
everywhere. Nowhere is just a blind spot
they gnash wildly at with each breath.
Confessions of crimes lie in the sky,
just wait to be collected by the paranoid.
Special thanks to Bil Lewis, Erik Tate, Ed Gault, Carol Weston, Jan Rowe, Nancy Dodosn, Ethan Mackler, C.C. Arshagra and James Van Looy.
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