Sweet Innocence (Kids Pick Up The Darndest Things)

Children appear to me as raw as the fresh fungi on a fence rail. - Thoreau

looking back

i remember

in the old, brick, grammar school with flat roof, hard floors and thick, wooden, graffitied  desks

standing in line for the newly introduced, "mighty mort", hot lunch program

"cold tray on the bottom and hot on top" they kept saying

"that's how they stack"

back at our seats, sharon was stirring and talking

with her long hair and shiny braced teeth

until she got up holding two hot dogs on a plastic fork and approached the teacher

"i got two", she explained

and wanted to give one back

thankfully she hadn't counted the beans

Author's Note

"As a mother loves to see her child imbibe nourishment and expand, so God loves to see his children thrive on the nutriment he has furnished them." - Thoreau