A Place Like This

To everyone who helped make Phase II a reality,
from the donors to administrators to planners
From the construction crew to custodial staff,
anyone who helped…in any manner…

It may have started for you in a place like this
Where someone inspired you to reach higher
Or a teacher encouraged an ember in you
That, when nurtured, ignited your fire.
Your passion to plan, to create, to build
From nothing you’ve produced what surrounds us.
More than brick walls and carpeted floors,
A place to explore what confounds us.
It astounds us the way that you went about your work
Completing this task on time.
Making the best use of your every resource –
Each material, each man-hour, each dime.
From the architects who brought the vision to bear
To the laborer with shovel and nail,
You’ve captured the imagination of an entire school,
Brought it to life in vivid detail.
You weren’t alone; none of us are in our creative tasks
There was help from University School crew
Who moved two whole schools with coordinated aplomb
They’re that good. Hey, that’s just what they do.
And we’re here today, in these halls that you’ve built
To thank you all for delivering on your promise,
Giving us somewhere to be inspired to reach higher.
It may have started for you in a place like this,
And because of your hard work, in one form or another,
You’ve helped build a place like no other.
We thank you for your hard work, in one form or another,
For building this, a place like no other.

© 2010, Jeff Wilson

Places We Sat

For Florence, 93 years on Earth, 39 as my grandmother...

Unforgiving hardwood chairs on Cramer Street, softened by crocheted pillows, eating corn flakes with bananas and powdered doughnuts. Hours of Friday mornings spent together huddled around a kitchen table over mugs of freshly-brewed coffee and Friday afternoons hovering over Benji’s corned beef sharing laughs and life.

On Oakland Avenue, long, richly-stained benches and high-backed chairs crowded around a table shrouded in white linen, covered by plates of fried fish and beer-battered onion rings. Your plate neat, your portions small, in stark contrast to the smile upon your face, beaming more brightly with each small voice’s request for more.

Around the dining room table, gathered to give thanks, watch football,and overindulge on food and family. Well, I sat, so proud I had made the adult table. Your chair was infamously empty as you made quick trip after quick trip to the kitchen - "More rutabaga?" - to keep our plates full and our celebration seamless.

The cushioned seat of a movie theater, only one row up so as not to navigate stairs in the dark. A soda in one hand, my hand in your other. Garrison Keillor’s characters on the big screen. Then, the metal and plastic chairs at Pop’s, sharing a strawberry schaum torte and swapping stories.

Flowered, upholstered chairs - gathered for any number of events: Easters, Christmases, baptisms, birthdays, 4th of July, Packer games. Sitting to my right, soaking in the sustenance that a family together provides every bit as much as the feasts before you. Laughing at the antics of your sophomoric grandchildren, even when the joke was lost in translation.

Those same cushioned kitchen chairs from Cramer, now in a small apartment, occupied by great-grandchildren building you a gingerbread train with frosting and gumdrops. Your kind words and sincere interest praising and inspiring them. Their youth, your legacy, burning brightly and renewing you, if only for a few hours at a time.

At your side. Bruises and broken bones and tubes and a cavalcade of specialists and doctors and nurses. Despite some dark days, you pulled through and worked your way back home, back to your comfortable chair. Your effort, your legacy, burning brightly and renewing me, if only for the rest of my days.

And today. A long pew filled with family and friends, remembering a long life lived well. Me, unaccustomed to your absence, sitting here in sorrow. You, sitting with your husband. Sitting with your son. Sitting in my heart. Smiling at me, knowing that my grief is temporary, because you’re saving a seat for me in heaven.

© 2010, Jeff Wilson

Here's To Your Success

Another 6th grade year comes to a close...

We’ve spent the year
To make things clear,
To provide for you a
Strong foundation.

The skills you need
To help you succeed
Beyond this year’s
Summer vacation

You’ve done your best
And passed each test
It’s time for
Sixth grade graduation

Your rising star
Will take you far,
From the 3rd floor
To what lies beyond

You’re a terrific class
You’re sure to surpass
Expectations – I’m
Sure you’ll respond

And years from now
You’ll all take a bow
As the grade that
Knew how to bond

It’s great to be smart
And know all you know
But beyond that
A piece of advice -

Only two words,
They’re powerful, though,
A secret learned and
Now shared: Be nice.

How you treat each other
Says more than your score
When it comes to what
Matters in the end

Play hard, work harder,
Your potential will soar
Even higher when others
Count you as a friend.

Count these days as a blessing
And not as a chore
To your studies pay heed
To your relationships tend.

I’ve seen what you can do
In the class, on the court,
With instruments
Of mass education

Whether on stage in a play
Or at play in a sport
Your talents are cause
For jubilation

Use your talents for good
Be a pillar of support
And to your friends
Give your total dedication.

I’m proud to have been
A small part of your life
I look forward to see
How you’ll grow.

May your cup runneth over
May your successes be rife
Be nice.
Oh, the places you’ll go!

© Jeff Wilson, 2010

Somewhere Down the Road

It's a lucky thing to have found her, and equally hard not to screw it up.

Your words are meant to comfort,
To demonstrate how much you care;
The things you think I’m feeling…
Those emotions aren’t really there.
I can see the pain you’re feeling
For the things afflicting me
The empathy exudes from you
And, I’m not too blind to see.
But I am too numb from anger
To ‘preciate your loving touch,
Your devotion in these coming days
Won’t seem to ‘mount to much
Over time, I’m sure I’ll find
Your love was my Gibralter
The rock beneath my ev’ry step
That would not let me falter.
‘Til then, I will hear your words,
See the tears well in your eyes,
And wish that I could be as strong
As my stoicism belies.
And wish that I could offer you
Some emotional compromise.
And wish that I deserved your love…

© Jeff Wilson, 2010

Nothing So Disheartens

When the bloom fades...

Nothing so subdues the soul as being undervalued.
Nothing so weakens one’s will as capricious criticism.
Nothing so dampens drive as one’s extra effort eschewed.
And from these careless condemnations, is birthed a seething schism.

© Jeff Wilson, 2010

Impact

There's an idea for a novel in me somewhere...

Bits and pieces,
The collected musings and brilliance
Of artists and authors.
Searing their talent and insight
On my incompetent consciousness.
A fleeting brand
That dies in the light of a flat screen
        And sinks into the depths
        of routinely rejected experiences
        gaining neither traction nor foothold
        in the amassed memory of life times.
An impermanent tattoo
Broken by time and
Deformed by attention deficit.
Were it within my ability
To piece these miniature jewels
Of immense meaning
These significant epiphanies
Together,
Were it within my faculty
To discern their import
To synthesize their arrangement
Into smart, familiar patterns
That others would recognize
As simple, obvious truths,
Were it in my destiny
To think
And be thought of
To bestow words
of measurable merit
Or comfort
or escape;
Satisfaction lies therein.

© Jeff Wilson, 2010

Bright Cold

Baby, it's cold outside.

“It’s a beautiful day,” my grandpa would say,
As blue sky replaces familiar grey.
The sun shining down on our sleepy, small town
Wrapping it all in a bright, yellow gown
But it is easy to see, through each barren tree,
Fallen snow is not awed easily.
It’s hard to cavort in a gown that’s so short;
And heat?...offers nothing of the sort.
Each breath is a cloud, snow and ice do shroud
Earth too solid to yet be plowed.
And yet, no matter how deep the freeze,
Like my grandpa, I desperately seize
Days as fleetingly beautiful as these.

© Jeff Wilson, 2010