Late Bloomers Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Late bloomers are on the window treatments;
They are all about the sad long
Movements;
And they are nonsense:
And I don’t know which intonation you would
Like best,
And I am trapped in the boy’s bathroom to weary
To come to class;
And wouldn’t it be nice if it started to rain,
The grass was freshly mowed, and they canceled
Physical education,
And made room for us to French Kiss out in the
Empty courts without a racket,
Like concrete theatres
Waiting to be filled up at the edge of abyss:
Down to home-grown easements
Irrigated by canals and imported reptiles, with purple
Eyes and purple smiles,
And housewives so careful about their legs all steaming
Upward trapped in their kitchens:
The crenulated pools bleached of childhood echoes;
And later on the great processions of school buses,
Moving into the tardy afternoons,
And us latchkeyed onto a green rug where we fold
Paper airplanes, and
Arrange cowboys and Indians; and pretend my sisters
Aren’t really there watching us sleepy-eyed making love.