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I wrote this a few weeks after our 50th high school reunion a few years ago. I know it isn’t great poetry, and I said the same thing more prosaically back then, but I thought I would post this anyway. I think a lot of people feel this way later in life.
One of the school’s staff members took us on a tour of the building that had been remodeled, updated and expanded a number of times since we graduated. I said to Jacquie, who had graduated with me, that I would find it easier to learn my way around a completely new building than this one, because I had the old school inside my head.
The Old School
I went back to the old school,
the one where we learned 2+2,
and that every state was a star
on the American flag.
(There weren’t so many then.)
I learned the facts my teachers thought were true.
I learned cursive writing,
how to use a card catalog,
and a cross-cut saw.
Half a century after I left in my cap and gown,
I went back to the old school.
The hallways I could walk with eyes closed.
had new branches
and walls blocked old passages.
PC’s sit in the old study hall
replacing desks carved
with words like “Fag” when
“Gay” still meant “happy”.
Rolls of toilet paper and paper towels
are stored where I stood,
on my first day of Kindergarten.
And the Periodic Table is 1/3 longer.
In order to find my way around this new school,
I will have to unlearn the old school.
As I have unlearned cursive on my keyboard.
As I have had to unlearn 2+2
In a world where everything doesn’t add up.
As I have had to unlearn the history that
supported the superiority of my race,
my country,
my culture.
I go to a New School now.
The school of Unlearning.
I learn almost nothing when I pass.
I learn everything when I fail.
Hello.