The Old Country School

The Old School
   (By Tari Mtetwa)

In the old country school
under the cool of the tree
I scribbled
on the dust's pages

and the wind
my unfailing teacher
blew away my wrongs 
and whispered corrections

and mother tilling the soil
to philosophy's depth
unearthed syllabii
to school my eager eye

the enduring sun
shifting the shade's course
moved me from class to class
to my graduation

(Tari Mtetwa is a Zimbabwe poet.)