Welcome Week
by Michael Miller
Their installation starts after daybreak
on the outskirts of this blue-ribbon town,
the cars overloaded like so many caravans
pointing different ways in the sawdust lot
behind the freshman dorm — the one torn banner
on the fence still trumpeting the county fair.
By the hour, through the lazy sun,
they canvas the rooms with their kinetic art,
set tea drawing steam patterns in the kitchen
and slap posters on walls, cherished toys
on the skinny shelves. The first names,
the majors and the home states and schools,
are the notes they bring. Over conversations,
they fuse into chords, an improvised session
of laughter and half-invented stories
that flows day and night with the whistle
of the teapot, the past fleeing farther
with each morning waking ten feet from a stranger.
For nine months, it is theirs. They string
their banner below the roof, their group name
in multicolors defying the empty plains.
- First published in The First Thing Mastered (Tebot Bach, 2013)
Michael Miller is the co-founder of Moon Tide Press, the author of five books of poetry, and a former entertainment and community news journalist for the Los Angeles Times. He currently teaches English and coordinates the visiting-author program at St. Cyril of Jerusalem School in Encino, California. You may read more about him and visit his blog at www.michaelmillerpoet.com.
