Dr Fixit (081 - 090)

 081

their eardrums. Instinctual was the popping sound

with our lips. The idea was based around

the belief such act would deaden the effects

of the blast. With the chaos in the classes, the gates

were locked as it was greatly feared the frogs

and lizards might roam into the schoolyard from bogs

to whisk away young ants learning the rudiments

of survival in their wild environment.

While the gates and towers were tightly manned

by the sentries, we obediently followed every demand

082

made by our teachers.  With the din by the rain

and the ensuing dimness, Mrs Bearit did refrain

every child in her class from copying further

what she wrote on the board, every character.

We were asked to sing, clap and dance 

till when the downpour would chance

the class to resume its studies. We sang

our favourite songs and our teacher clanged

her small classroom bell along, her heels

clicked across the floor and we jumped and wheeled

083

near our seats. One popular song we sang was

how a teacher's wife fried winkles which caused

a fire to burn a school which made the head teacher

ring the bell and everyone was pitiful. A shower

was the rain now and the gale a breeze.

The children with themselves were pleased.

Our teachers composed songs and put them

in our mouths and we joyfully made anthems

out of them but the import of the songs

we grasped more at the dusks than dawns

084

of our lives. I personally came to understand

the periwinkle song was a protest across the land

at the army ants who had embraced the act

of frying food which teachers thought would impact

negatively on our health and the song was composed

and the curriculum on the children imposed

they should be taught and we were taught in fun.

We were still singing when the bell was rung

by the timekeeper it was time for long break.

We shouted and jumped in delight for the sake

085

we would be free from our teacher's control

in the next one hour. A friend took hold

of a friend's hand and we dashed to nooks

and spots suitable for our games, from playing spooks

to boat people in the rivulets formed by the rain.

We wrestled and blows we would aim

at one another's hide but without knowing

bones and muscles we were actually moulding

for our survival in the wild as we grew up.

Someone pushed someone, someone wailed and someone sobbed.

086

We were a medley of peacemakers, wimps and bullies.

Our teachers moved outside with their brollies.

I'd taken from my raffia bag a melon cake 

and sought Crookedmouthit to break

a piece of it for him. He had a tangerine.

All over the school premises, there was the sharing

of this and that. We ran in the drizzle

to Elementary Three where I blew a whistle

with my lips through the window to attract

Loveit's attention who was a member of a cast

087

of girls who clapped, jumped and kicked the air in a corner

of the class. She streaked to meet me and her brother.

We were all from Palm Belt, same neighbourhood.

They brought me goodies from there and what grandma cooked,

I brought them too. We left the block

which housed Elementary Three to Six, ducked

the raindrops and returned to ours which hosted

Elementary One to Two. We sat down and pelted

a rubber seed at a pyramid of four rubber seeds

positioned at our fronts. Who did succeed

088

in knocking a seed or seeds with the one he threw

would have them. If your seeds were gone, you withdrew 

from the game as another person would play.

All my seeds were gone. I got up and moved away

even though my friend had wanted to share the seeds

again to me. I was going outside my eyes to feed.

The doors were on one side of the wall, a window

in between. Opposite were two windows. Boys bent low

in the puddles behind the rear wall with a paper boat.

I joined them, dug the sand out to create a pool to float

089

the marine vessel with some lovely passengers:

a lady bug and a grasshopper. With the wanderers,

we played building castles, tunnels and moats

till sodden from our shoes to coats.

The timekeeper rang his bell. Break time was over.

I washed my hands, dusted my shorts and pullover.

I returned to my seat to listen to our teacher.

She returned and said we'd finish with every letter

of Nsebeedee today and so she picked her pointer

and hit an image which was the fourteenth character

090

on the chalkboard. 'Reh,' was the sound.

It was like a river that goes around

a bend at one hundred and eighty degree,

then angles and stretches out. A broken tree

with a curving branch was the small letter

standing next to the big case. The pointer

touched a new image. The big and small letters

looked the same. The sound our teacher uttered

was 'Su.' Each looked like a snake.

The next letter was like an artisan would make