Lower Upper Midwest
A cool, steady breeze
Betrays the high summer sun
Northfield, not da Yoop
A green lawn, not a stone beach
A corn sea, not the Big Lake
Lower Upper Midwest
A cool, steady breeze
Betrays the high summer sun
Northfield, not da Yoop
A green lawn, not a stone beach
A corn sea, not the Big Lake
Construction Season II
Without the chatter
Of the strolling customers,
Campus resounds with
The cheerfully annoying
Chirps of trucks going backwards
Construction Season
The school year over,
Orange safety fencing now walls
The vacant sidewalks
And construction vehicles
Invade the empty green quads
Reunion Weekend
Reunion weekend
Campus tours are upside down
A few kids amid
A shuffling, sandaled swarm of
Retirees in college hats
Graduates
Parents’ arms leaning
Up and toward their graduates
A black-gowned river
Thumbs tap, phone screens flicker, and
Photos ascend to the cloud
Graduation
I try to avoid
Wistful parenting, because
Time flies straight and true
But ending fifth grade means that
We have no little kids now
Birdbath
The freshened birdbath
Draws visitors from the air
Finches sip shyly
Robins gulp, beaks tilted up
Starlings splash, water vandals
Field Day
I’ve spent four Field Days
Manning the ball-throw events
And the first exchange
In the 4 x 100
Relay: I’ve earned those sunburns