Hubbub Poetry: I SING THE SELF DIDACTIC

(A celebration of an American Literature teacher)

From out of papered aisles of genius and drivel,
Among masses, sometimes one only speaking both,
I hear it.
Blue and black, the song didactic.
Head-open sky, awashed by light and Black as bored when not read.
I hear it.

Along distant breadths of books and time carried.
Carried, not needlessly, to half-seen panoramas
Of puritans with knots fastened to breakneck decay,
Peering and denying, prying, prying and praying,
Praying, praying, down.

Carried to mountains thick, along the trails ghosted
By trees who have stood above hunters and their dogs,
And watched as they grew sleepily older Above their fingered roots.
While the surrounding countryside celebrated birth.

Carried on the low wail of the song passing through
Cracks of a final dark stone placed carefully beyond.
Leaving behind silence but for the mimicking mock
Of a certain, seated bird, stealing hope with just a word.

But the song, ever unfettered, rises and rushes reckless.
Sirening past ashes, eggs, and autos,
Dusting its wake with echos of wounds that sometimes
Scar, or kill, or even at moments inspire.
Inspire to settle in the dreamy green warmth
Of remembered soft words and whispers.
The song surrounds the sound of sounds Not gone but chanced to be heard.
Words of notes in old flames, old sports, age-old games.

And when at last the bell joins the song
It reaches again the aisles of life and promise,
Who change the key, shuffling knowingly out,
Harmony of vision forward.

These last carriers of sound and sight so bright
My song can only at best half-see...
For they are now, as ever, singers
Of newer, better songs...


M. Kelly


This poem originally appeared in The Hubbub vol. 1, October 1992