A few of my fellow BYU students recently created a website entitled, "The Daily Poetry Club."
It's pretty entertaining to be sure with a new topic posted daily for all to submit a relevant poem in reply... Here's the last poem I submitted in response to the "10/3/09: Freebie!" post:
Times tables and chairs and glasses
(or, The Legend of Daniel Sanford)
The memory of a math class
still persists
when time was shattered
when dreams were broken
and finally
pride was swept under
the table and chairs
(remember?)
(third grade?)
(how did we fit?)
(they were so low!)
If anything
any moment
meant anything at all
it was the timed tests
that rode the nerves
that made you squirm
in your tiny plastic seat
flexing and stressing
like a tinker toy
and for what?
for glory or fear?
No one cares now
that the sands have accumulated
and yet we always did
maybe not as much
as Daniel Sanford
that loony ninja nerd
so stressed
with his image
of unfounded genius
(because scrawniness
brings paradigm busting)
He just missed it
one problem
one little digit
no longer than your finger
barely
that was all
but something inside
exploded outward
in a mad fury
of ninja gaiden craziness
never seen off the playground
And so came the end
of a cheap pair of glasses
too thick
for a little master anyway
wrenched off his head
a two-handed job
and snapped
with a yell
and then came the teacher
and the stares
at the seppuku of Daniel Sanford
We were too young
too small to know
what had really happened
what had paused us
what he did
the broken glasses
the shame
and embarrassment
of a warrior
exposed
and brought to tears
. . .
So time passes
and our glasses
fill
or spill
or fade away
but we see
the light clearer
hindsight ever nearer
with each
and every
legendary day
