In the classroom beneath the stairs
Along the hallway near the doors
Stands the substitute teacher
And all hell has broken loose.
Despite the texting of bad news
He still lectures all with bland glares
He spins the globe in his hands
-- He’s proudest of foreign lands --
But the weary world turns its back 
Wiping chalk dust from its shoes.

Listen up, pupils, open wide
Today I have restored science
To its rightful and lovely place

A spitball is launched from North Korea
China throws milk cartons at the blackboard
Over Persia soars a middle finger
And beneath the metallic ticking clock
Russia gives America an atomic wedgie.
“Marijuana, Tijuana!” shouts a
Blue-haired boy in oily Caracas jeans
“It was an inside job,” sneers the bitter jock
(With all due nine-eleven certainty)
And they all think they’re cleverly daring and edgy.

The substitute never strays from
His teleprompted lesson plan
Picked safe from a cool Blackberry
He lectures all without blinking
About old Churchill and the Brits
About climate change and stem cells
About the vices of earmarks
The vile voices of talk radio
And all the wrong ways of thinking
(Ignoring certain sleeper cells)

But the class cannot listen well 
Mired in economic hell
They’d rather see the principle
Paid on irreducible debt
Than ever show interest
In their always tired mid-terms
Hopeless for the day’s closing bell.


©2009/Bill Gnade