How old were we
when I entered the capitol,
word I still misspell?
I’d been a spelling champ
& popular sidekick,
the class clown Tom Crook’s
best friend till I moved to town.
Here I was no one.
Here I was
just another
face among the class
trudged beneath the copper dome
atop of which an Indian archer
sculpture now crouches—
meant as a compliment I’m sure.
We had climbed the marble
divoted steps, jostling
to better see
when we saw it:
John Brown
muraled, arms thrown
wide, beard afire, dead
soldiers smoldering
at his feet. Holy me—
how to unsee those eyes
wild-wide like a mouth?
Behind him a tornado
tearing up the plain—
which would never be
that way again.