Reunion

And even now, after so many years,
so many coats of institutional whitewash,
the corridors still smell of rage.

The last thing I remember;
running like hell on the last day, trailing
torn up scraps of exercise books, equations and dates swirling

in a useless snowstorm.
And now I’m back and walk solemnly, keeping to the left.
The assembly hall is decked out for the do.

It all comes back like rushing nausea,
the old resentments and the urge to turn on all the Bunsen burners
and blow the place to bits.

We’ve turned from rough sketches into scenes by Hogarth,
thicker now and sporting gin blossoms,
bald spots and beer guts, swapping business cards in huddles.

The teachers barely living now,
were barely alive then. A powdery handshake,
I can remember faces, it’s the names

I struggle with. What was it now? Oh yes…
It’s bastard, isn’t it?
“How are you, Sir?”