~BARBARA CROOKER~

DRIVING UNDER THE CLERESTORY OF LEAVES

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We drive to your special education preschool 
under an arch of maples, half green, half turned to gold, 
the dark branches bold as the ribs 
of a great cathedral, flying buttresses 
that bend the light. 
You haven't changed in the last two years, 
developmentally delayed, mildly retarded, 
school a struggle to stay in your seat, 
say the beginnings of words, 
point to colors and shapes. 
While you wrestle with scissors, 
daub with paste, I sit in the hallway, 
trying to write, turn straw into gold. 

When our two hours are spent, 
we drive back up the hill toward home, 
see the stand of mixed hardwoods 
in full conflagration: red-gold, burnt orange, 
blazing against the cobalt sky. 
The architect who made these trees 
was sleeping when he made this boy. 
And my heart, like the leaves, burns & burns.
 
 

© by Barbara Crooker