EXORDIUM

she wore 
her hair 
in one long braid, 
wound around 
the top of her head 
until it became 
an alabaster pillbox – 
prim standard 
of her unwavering 
propriety. 


she was neither 
oblivious to 
its effect 
upon her pupils 
nor deterred by 
our unruly gibes – 
in the end, 
the pillbox prevailed 
(so it continued 
through april -- 
we flouted 
every primer, 
learning nothing). 


six a.m. 
one bright may morning, 
early to school, 
i padded mischievously 
down the asbestos corridor 
to peer in
at her classroom door; 
puckish surprise 
my puerile aim. 


inside, 
she sat – 
a septuagenarian sylph 
serenely brushing 
six feet of 
undulating alban 
gossamer. 


i remember 
weightlessness, 
reverie, 
light 
and music; 
nothing in 
nine years 
on earth 
had prepared me 
for such 
ineffable 
radiance. 


i stood 
transfixed; 
one glorious moment 
in Dian’s presence 
before backing away 
with shame 
hissing 
in every cilia. 


later, 
her immaculate cataract 
restored to 
pristine cylindrical obeisance, 
she expounded upon 
the virtues of cursive 
and made perfect 
chalk spirals 
to inspire 
fit chirography. 


having seen her, 
i scribbled stupidly 
and dreamed of 
wings ...



About Rich Follett:
Rich Follett has recently returned to writing poetry after a thirty-year hiatus. He lives in the sacred and timeless Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, where he joyfully teaches English and Theatre Arts for high school students. His poems have appeared in BlazeVox, Exercise Bowler, Calliope Nerve, Leaf Garden, Four Branches Press and Counterexample Poetics, for which he is a Featured Artist. He is the co-author of Responsorials (with Constance Stadler) and the solo collection Silence, Inhabited for NeoPoiesis Press, which will publish his second solo collection, Human &c. late in 2012.