The Mathematicians Poem by Don Fredette

The numbers buckled from the stress,
the weight of thought and equation.

From dry silent lips, the chalk dust speaks
and coughs its solution
to eraser head interpreters with graphite dialects.

Out in the hallway the ink flows freely ~
sticky musk of the unbridled minds

Upward, around corners,
thick and dripping from archways,
pooling, moving, bending steel and stone.

But in here, in this classroom,
it is fluorescence over fire,
order over chaos

Preserving the ancient language,
building shelter for the dreamers.