School

Clay faces and windowsill geraniums,

declensions of latin nouns

     escaping the open door.

Lilacs swarming up the adobe walls

left this purple underline

     among the scrawlings of my mind.

Out deciphering the past, I find

     unmarked words and bridges

thrown out carelessly at every crossing,

with inscriptions

     in water birch and other foreign tongues—

they muddy the old pond

     beyond the smoking-shack.

And from paperback, from The Odyssey,

scribbles on the sun there

     flattened out, like beaten gold.

Box Elder bugs,

     tiny amulets of orange and black,

charm back the wistful memory

of lilics and latin grown wild—

     feeding on the clay, the Homer.

—Christie

(Spring 1977)