Spelling

we learned letters so that we could spell
and loved the spelling bees
thinking we were the flowers spelling

honey, there in the classroom sunlight
for a little while that seemed eternity
breathing the colours of words, the vowels

the constantly friendly consonants
who loved us amid the chalkdust

the gold starred feeling too
of spelling the list, all the way through
and no mistakes

and matching the cake word to its picture
in a kid dictionary what pink what custardly content
candle by candle lent in state textbooks, owned before

until you can see it, say it, write it perfectly.
that came later, in workbooks; how huge our pencils were
so that they could be firmly grasped

in writing laboriously on pale blue
highways of lines that made me think
every time of summer lessons with

Grandmother, early music theory
the only kind I could understand
how forming the treble clef especially

seemed such a victory
and singing the alphabet song
and spooning alphabet soup

seemed mystically, naturally linked.
later I thought so long learning of Helen Keller
from a school fair paperback of her life

spelling water, and feeling the water run blindly
over her hands
and I thought the water of language

the language of water
and understood alone in the wood of my thoughts then
by the honeysuckle 

what all spelling was for.

mary angela douglas 9 february 2019