a first-year teacher the morning before

a first-year teacher the morning before

You remembers the way your baseball coach,

who was like a father to him, would after practice

tell the team there’s pride

in being the first one there and the last to leave,
but he never made it sound this tiring.

It’s dark as you approach

the high school’s double glass doors, the renovated entrance

emitting a pulsing orangish light that guides

you through the faculty lot, your classroom key

in hand, into the silent gaping halls your trying

desperately to fill by audibly humming

“This little light of mine.”

You remind yourself to be aware of joy

in the little things:

the warmth of eighty-seven copies that slide

from the sleepy printer in rhythmic drumming,

the mumbled “morning” of the early student who reclines

against the cobalt blue lockers, the noise
the mediocre workroom coffee machine  

makes, beginning to drip with life.  

You know that in about an hour

the curtains on this darkened stage

will draw back in a rush, and from the hush will spring to life

hundreds of adolescent actors trying their best

to play a role that’s worth believing.

And you will stand, the weighty power

of stage director in your hands, the play

dependent on your every word. But now is not that time.

Now is the time to breathe the stillness, to rest.

Now is the time to hear your inner Calling.