“No Loitering” reads the sign by the school.
But what about a school that offers courses
In loitering as an art, each class designed
To break another link in the argument
That we ought to be somewhere else by nightfall,
Ought to start now if we’re to arrive on time
For the meeting of those in need of a truth
We’ve distilled over years in private study.
It’s likely they know already what we know.
Better stay here, loitering at dusk in the garden
A moment more, while the resident birds and squirrels
Settle themselves in the boughs of the linden,
And the roiled thoughts of the day grow quiet.
This is the hour when the lover loiters on the sidewalk
Across the street from his sweetheart’s house,
Waiting to see a light go on in her study
So he can imagine her reading his letter
In a mood that prompts her to a kind reply.
This is the hour when a daughter loiters
By her mother’s grave, in the final moments
Before the gate of the graveyard is locked for the night.
Here’s a last chance for her mother’s spirit
To make its presence felt unmistakably.
Gone to a better world, the minister said.
But her mother wasn’t looking for an alternative.
How happy she would have been to loiter in this one
An extra summer, plus an extra day.