Educational Manifesto by Gretchen Phillips

EDUCATIONAL

MANIFESTO

School would be

more fun

if kids went there

barefoot

They’d learn by

wiggling their toes

in the lush green

alphabet

Running freely through punctuation

playgrounds

Tiptoeing around

the life cycles of sunflowers

and centipedes

Pressing their

footprints into

maps of the world

And spinning

among the planets

as they orbit

the summer sun

Gretchen K. Phillips

in Ann Applegarth’s poetry workshop

HPWP-ISI 2008