and white, a photograph,
the kindergarten class picture
at Brisbane Elementary,
nineteen fifty-eight.
Twenty girls in pinafores and chiffon
saddle shoes and Mary Janes,
jumpers, Peter Pan collars, gingham,
pigtails tied with ribbons,
bangs. barrettes.
Six boys in striped or printed shirts,
tucked, belted, one with a bow tie,
one with suspenders, and one,
with faded jeans, scuffed Buster Browns
and a dark tee shirt, me.
Our shadows pool at our feet
our eyes squint against
the glare of noon, lined up
in three rows, on the steps
outside our classroom.
Our teacher looks faintly beatnik in her
black dress and black-framed glasses,
those pointy cat-eyed ones.
pale short-cropped hair,
long beaded necklace.
Does she go to smoky north beach coffee houses?
Sip red wine poured from reed-wrapped jugs
while some goateed guy in a beret
reads poems in counterpoint
with bongos?
I stand with dangling arms
and a trout-mouthed gape,
a puzzled forehead.
is there some trouble
I’ve forgotten? I don't remember
There is no grass to play on
just asphalt marked
for dodgeball and foursquare
where we run and shriek
and give each other cooties.
We trade wax lips and fangs at Halloween,
and suck on orange pan pipe flutes filled
with sugar water and red dye #2,
preen and pose like grownups
with candy cigarettes.
Was I impatient for the bell to clamor?
Itching to roam the hills and look for lizards,
pull off sprigs of wild anise to smell the licorice
or taste the burst of nectar from
the trumpets of monkey flower blossoms.
I don't know,
I see my open mouth
in that creased photograph
half a question frozen on my face
or was it just a breath?
