A thought to think about, in your mind,
If you died today, what kind of memories,
Would you leave behind?
You live your life every day, is the knowledge,
In your soul, growing in many ways,
Or is your life, the same habit every day?
Do you ever think pass tomorrow,
What this life will be in future days,
Will every one be free, or forced to live a certain way,
Our generation, is creating the future days,
We are to share our wisdom, with those of the future,
So, they will understand today, that no one,
In this life will forever stay.


                                                              

                  The Original: Tom Maxwell  © 06/13/2024 AD

You ever think about all the people,
You meet in an average life time,
Sometimes a face, or name, brings a memory to your mind.
Many you only see, a short time, although their actions,
Or words may appear, when your day turns to a bind.
Almost everything we do, we learned from someone else,
That was sharing so kind.
How many memorized stories, do you repeat,
On different days, without a clue who told you,
A stranger to you today, they taught you something,
Then you went on your way. We each do the same, sharing,
Which could be, hard physical work, or to help someone,
Too breath and see, their next day.

Always keep listening too, and teaching, with each other’s mind,
Not until your last, will you know the best day, of your life this time.

                                 The Original: Tom Maxwell  ©  6/26/2024 AD

Trying to learn
Something from the
Past
Is a funny way to spend the
Future.

We look back
At the beauty,
Seeking the safety
Of our imaginations,
Knowing memories of
Other Lives
Can shield us
From the pain
Of our own
Biography.

You long to sit
In classrooms,
Captaining other minds
Through the fogs
And mists
That shroud memory.

The light you bring
Can illuminate
Or blind.
Sometimes, a dimmer light
Is better
To see through
The fog.

Glance backward,
Don't stare.
The future,
Glorious and clear
Awaits.

Intent on the final bell ring
declaring spring for reals
as we feel every inch
a bag of hammered turds

You will have heard the crack
in every colleague’s voice this term,
felt the glut of panics
that the journey home may be in a hearse

Still, it could be worse,
and when the rear view
shows a dwindling, darkening school,
we’ll spend two weeks pondering how,
exactly

The absolute ******* grind of it,
each inch upholstered rough,
sandpaper cushions and *******,
this is school my loves:
best days of your life,
except the frequent crying
and wishing for an end,

but then
the dazzle blather
of someone excited by your subject,
your patient, pent up words
heard
and your bitten cynicism scuffs enough
to see your old electric truths beneath

Two paracetamol
washed down with Gaviscon
from the car stash, 7:57

Later, at break,
if I’m feeling cheeky
I’ll pop a couple of Nurofen
from the desk drawer
and ride that mild alleviation

At lunch, if the planets align
and I reach the toilet,
in the muffled cubicle
my eyelids will flutter
as I stretch and let the Anadin Plus
do its thing

Medicate to educate

Counterpoint:
I love you lot.

You colleagues and loves who despise this
alongside me
so when my foot slips or knee gives
you are at my shoulder, my elbow

with a Kit-Kat or quick jab
about being old and ****
so giggles lift the misery
of ignorant, blind and fruitless bosses

while our loss seems their gain for now
I am bound to remember this refrain:
We’re not gonna take it

So, my brothers and twisted sisters
get those pitchforks ready,
sharpen in the dark,
keep being artisans

for when the time comes,
the spreadsheets won’t even be worth
the cold nothing they’re typed on
but your healing hands will

You’ll look close for all its feints,
its lies of needing you
being lost without
while the fingers on your windpipe tighten
and those tears come in place of shouting

loud, steady, drip-drip mention
of blissed futures,
dispatched, ***** pasts,
the present full
of passive aggression
where passivity is too nuanced

you’ll still be there with open arms
and a heart dark with hope,
but that tickle-whisper in your skull
is not just the concussion
not just

Having dispatched the sound rabble
with mostly love,
our already flaccid balloon
deflates with a final raspberry

a fitting fanfare to a term
that left its markers marked,

the shared mirth,
across eyes and hearts,
at a **** noise
proving once again:
we are why we’re here