Country School

You can see the children coming
Down the winding country lanes
To the little prairie schoolhouse
On the North Dakota plains.
Some of them are riding horses,
Others walk a mile or so
And some come to school by auto
If Dad has one that will go.

You will find no yellow busses
Buzzing 'round that countryside.
A ride to school for learning
That child's parents must provide.
The school bell rings at nine am
Morning recess liberates;
An hour for lunch, another break,
Four o'clock emancipates.

At noon you'll find the big boys
Playing baseball in the spring,
Or catching prairie gophers
With a length of twine or string.
The sophisticated older girls
Sit still and talk of boys,
While the younger children scramble
For the school yard's few big toys.

There is one lopsided go around,
Some dilapidated slides;
But the coveted amusement
Is a set of giant strides.
The big boys have discovered
They can wrap one giant stride
Around the others and one boy
Will have a thrilling ride.

There is danger in that schoolyard
Lucky that no child is dead.
As they play a loose slide often
Will hit someone in the head.
I am speaking of the way it was
When I was in that school,
Where but one teacher taught us
And we learned the golden rule.

Country schoolhouses are almost gone,
Torn down or hauled away.
Those childen are grandparents
In this more progressive day.
It now takes a pile of teachers
To fill up one youngster's head,
And to catch a bus at seven
Children stumble out of bed.

They will miss the hearty breakfast
That their own grandparents ate.
If they are not there to catch it,
Yellow busses do not wait.
Oh, I'm sure that things are better now,
But back then we learned to spell
In a little country schoolhouse
And survived the tale to tell.

By: Joyce 01/19/04