A Display of Suits
They sit in square chairs
On carpet, shoulder to shoulder
Each a new button up shirt
Armed with black pens
That follow blue lines
Exactly parallel
Like yellow parking spaces
A black tar lot
unending, precise
Statistics: think administration,
The checkered tie
Mirrored in a big commercial window
Think a mansion on green grass
Lavish and lavish
And never in any way
Compared to the street
Nothing about it
Of modesty. Instead
They’re all exact expressions
Of one platform
Each a perfect fulfillment
Of corporate manifesto
University essence. As if
after a lifetime in brown desks
In these red brick walls, the instructor
Made uncountable dreams
Each as precious
On its cream paper
As the signature before
Suppose we could enlighten
Like them, and lose administration
Entirely to the politics
Of black pen and paper
To become ties themselves
Satin, left to no longer
Choke education.