Miss Hawthorne Poem by Ryan Glover

At half till noon
on Tuesday morn
in the chapel room
on threaded carpet torn,
sits little children ‘round
the new schoolteacher,
Miss Hawthorne.
They sing “Jesus loves me,
this I know, for the Bible
tells me so”. They read
John 3: 16, “For God
so loved the world, that
he gave…”
How easy to have
trust, how easy to be on
fire. When the deepest
pains are skinned knees,
growing bones, lost teeth not
being alone. Being lost,
lukewarm.

They spoke as children do;
understood as children would;
thought as children can.
Miss Hawthorne, on the rug
torn bare, cannot
prepare the little children
for the world that tears.
For the scars they will
wear upon the brow. How
easy to lose sight of God’s
love amidst the callous, drear
love the world returns, when one
hopes too hard and finds none of
it near.

2010