POEM FROM THE METAPHYSICAL SALVAGE&SCRAP LANGUAGE YARD (THE LAST CLASSROOM CHALKBOARD)
Kenneth DiMaggio
The last classroom chalkboard
with an unfinished but vandalized lesson
on American history became a weapon
of mass destruction after a round iron heart
made shrapnel of its slate horizon
Johnny may not be able
to read or write
but so long as he knows how
to salvage pieces of the Emancipation
Proclamation and the First
Amendment into marijuana pipes
and Kalashnikov rifles illegally made
in metal shop then he will still
have learned his lessons
But is there still time for him to drop out
and write his premature epitaph
in the lyrics to a song
that will be played in a stolen car radio
Is there still time to run away and join
the psycho-surrealistic circus where
crime meets the comics and criminals
become the new cartoon superheroes
And if you want to be a writer
aim and fire at the metaphysical
So what if you can never prove
what you may be hitting
with luck you might leave
behind a legend for having tried
to put a few caps into God
and for trying to trash out his house called Heaven