Rollin' on poems, part two

This is part one,
though there have been other occasions
when I have shared other people's
vision and verse.


Out of Bounds

Soft assurance, pavement lullabies
round our days—we blink through streaked
panes, dark forms rise like lifeboats,
red boots stammer on the pavement.

Which detail arrests you?

Each dawn casts
that part of us we don’t know well
to warm the seat beside us.
What matters shifts, and shifts again.

Kim Hamilton


Water Aerobics at the YMCA

We struggle against gravity,
mostly graying, mostly overweight.
We hop backwards as instructed,
in sudden kinship with crustaceans,
hot crawdad mamas jetting out of danger,
ghost shrimp scooting back to shelter --
we are the known ridiculous,
time lost and less remaining.

Margaret McLeod


Blurred Reflection

How can you describe yourself,
When every day
You are a different river.
Culture, ideas, impressions,
Float through,
Rippling your water.

Sarah Neal, 8th Grade


[All from Seattle Metro's Poetry on Buses series]