The Airplanes Brush The Meadows Poem by Robert Rorabeck

In crooked time in school,
Butterflies chewed up by the shoulder blades of lawnmowers,
Perfumes of the substitutes wayfaring out of the open
Windows
Like the armpits of geniis, as we go like this swimming over
The crocodiles and away from the lilies of the school:
Go across the canal, and far into the pines-
And deep into the meandering suburbias and into never minds-
There the shadows freckle and dapple our imaginations
Of girls,
And the sweat runs down our boyish necks, as the tadpoles
Curl in the brackish shadows:
Soon they will be returning too- like fireworks dying into
Fish- the manmade highways of their wishes finding
Them wives above the saddles of turtles,
And deeper once the brushstrokes are removed,
The cenotaphs of conquistadors on their blue maidenhoods
Of wishes- where they swim in their stewing echoes,
While the housewives hearts flutter, and the airplanes brush
The meadows.