New Poem

Five-Year Olds Creating a Heart Agreement
the First Day of Sunday School
at Unity of Gaithersburg



Rambling nonstop with guess whats
and stories of the pet goldfish that died
and came back to life, somehow,
the girl leaped like a fish to another bowl
of words about the goldfish swimming to heaven,
or how to draw the Big Head of God,
or should a sea nettle be colored magenta
or green, how we shouldn’t bite each other
in Sunday school, that was for a dog
one boy piped up, a dog who nipped at people
like the mailman and fire engines, biting
that just wouldn’t do on Sundays.
The boy drew his bad alien spacecraft
(to be destroyed by a bigger and nicer ship)
and still the talk was of fish
and cats who chased squirrels that
dressed in pink and sea nettles
that swam to shore and bit their legs,
and the boy listened patiently because
we agreed to be friendly in Sunday school.