School's Summer

An empty classroom, a floor like a sheet
of ice, reflects summer light from outside,
slight scent of wax lingering. A light wind in
the hall, and the school breathes easy.

The room reaches, wide and empty--
walls and board clean and bare.
Everything's been moved out:
furniture to the hallways, students

scattered like seeds, sprouting into
summer months, under high sun.
Here, real work has been done--
those who came before, turning

twenty-five, twenty-six or more,
somewhere, carrying something
from here—no one enters or exits
a room without taking something

and leaving something else.
Endings and beginnings, stories
crafted in four quarters, two semesters.
Now, no bells, but the slow pulse

of summer's time, measured in
light and darkness, heat and relief--
leading to a chance, in a while,
to pick up the pen, to start again.