The Smell of School

Freshly mown playing fields.

Lines like tipp-ex, drawn round summer’s track.

Pupils clamber down from the morning bus, they laugh, spilling out like marbles from a jar, all bounce and noise.

I enter this building that is teeming with young life.

The scrape of chairs, the flicker-plink of strip lights, gleaming white boards.

Chalk dust and ink pens have gone — and happily so too, over boiled cabbage and carbolic soap.

No more tawse and less disdain.

Now; revolving doors, lanyards with passes, open plan classes, tablets, team spirit.

Acceptance and inclusion have much merit.

Some remains unchanged; the moving herds of blazers, sugar paper, poster paint.

Matriculation. Examination. Invigilation.

You’re late, you’ll just have to wait.

Please sit. Today’s assignment. Yesterday’s hand in.

Single file, one way — no running!

The jangle of school has ebbed quiet, settles to learn, scratches its collective head to think.

Candidates open paper one.

The exam hall air hums with collective focus and sweaty pits.

The bell crescendos loud, corridors flood again, clattering and chattering, careering, with shrieking, some teasing.

Like ants in their hill, they stream, instinctively knowing which way to the next class.

Doors close, youthful exuberance is again quelled, silenced, contained behind glass.

A brain factory, an endless output of uniformed, smart cookies with the odd broken biscuit.

It was a hundred terms ago when this was my only world.

Outside into the sun, free again, I am sprung!

I walked across that freshly cut grass — barefoot.

No one stopped me, no whistle blew, no detention, no uniform, no homework, no rules, no regrets.

Still, so much to learn.