The young moms in the neighborhood 

Have stopped to talk on the corner beside the school.

They shake their heads and knit their brows

About what it’s all coming to now,

Quarantines and Covid tests,

And whether the children should wear masks at recess,

And whether to vaccinate children or not,

And just what is going on?

Does anyone know?

Suddenly my mind flashes back

To a boy named Jack who always sat

On the back row of our jr. high class.

His sultry eyes, mystic like the sea,

His sinewy arms, tensing, in the shirt

He’d cut the sleeves out of,

His expressionless mouth,

His chin jutting out, as he took his pocket knife and cut

The immortal truth in the faux wood on top of his desk,

“SCHOOL SUX.”

-jenn