GOLDFISH IN WINTER

GOLDFISH IN WINTER

In the other classroom

someone drops some marbles.

Next to the lazy slant of books

easing towards the horizon,

the calendar has its own agenda

in the rhythm of days.

Trapped behind glass, solarium plants:

impatiens and begonias smolder

against dreary winter clouds.

As my students write,

goldfish, like small birds,

rush up a dark ladder to the sky.

When we hauled branches

to the field for burning

their dark shapes scratched the sky

with random hope for a spring

that will never come.

2/21/92
Higham family school



Draft 
Goldfish, small birds in the dark 
rush up a ladder to the sky.
Solarium plants, impatiens trapped behind glass.
The lazy slant of books easing towards the horizon. 
In the next room someone gathers marbles.
When we hauled the branches to the field, 
their dark shapes scratched the sky 
with a random hope for a spring 
that will never come.

I like the first draft better than the attempted poem.