Coloring Outside The Lines by Stephen Wilson

Our purple fingered teacher passed
Out sheets that smelled of alcohol. 
Our kindergarten class was told
To crayon in all train car bars
Or else our tigers might escape.
The choice of tiger stripes we made
Was any color that we liked,
But smeared unless you shaded close
But not across the black wax bars.
We muddied all attempts at art.

I tried again, ignoring rules
And even lines defining car,
And tiger, railroad wheels of steel.
I even asked for crayons in
Our teacher’s special crayon box:
Illuminating Emerald,
B’Dazzled Blue, and Alloy Orange.
Not only had my cat escaped,
But lost himself inside a scene
Of psychedelic jungle light.

Retirement is like my pre-
School was with tiny painting jobs,
Naps every afternoon before
A story time I write myself:
Where children breathe in evergreens
And tread a gently thistled earth.
Where lakes are glazed too perfectly
And tempt them into skipping stones
To break the sun to splintered glass
With    flashes,    all  di  min  ish ing.