Fifth Grade

It was an annual field trip, for which Mrs. Yount was famous,

That and that she didn’t take bullshit.

And that she had cancer, and that she was black,

And that she said often, “Shut your mouth, child,” if you said something stupid.

On the ship trip, everyone was part of a different crew:

The rigging, or the bosun, or the fishing, or the deckhand.

We spent weeks preparing for our night on the ship,

What an amazing trip it would be.

I learned how to tie some knots,

I learned “starboard,” “portside,” “stern” and “bow,”

And the “capstan” and “galley” and “below deck” and all that stuff.

But what I really thought about was the coming night,

Everyone sleeping below deck, in hammocks:

If I could just sneak over to Amy Kush in the dark,

Then everything would be okay.

But her dad was Colonel Kush, a chaperone on the trip,

And what would I do if I did make it to that hammock unobserved

And lay down with her amidst all those other hammocks,

Low slung with bodies, like scrotums, no, like bells ready to clang.

And in the old days, back in 1850, what did all those sailors do,

Out on the sea for months and years?

There must be books on it.

And also many books that were never written,

Think of all the stuff that could have been written in all those books

About what happened on all those ships.

And well, shit, we were just kids,

And just docked in the harbor, for just one night.