Through the municipal green, overpainted wire mesh
obscuring the grammar school basement windows

comes the spank of a basketball not engaged in any game,
just pounded in place in an empty, echoing cafeteria, then

an outside metal door gets gut-punched open to release
gruff-voiced janitor, belt keys jangling, cursing at the world

while from a first-floor office a stretch of plastic packing tape
screaks off a roll as a phone rings and a copy machine whumps

as if providing a bass line to a class that, upstairs,
bursts into a trebly, mocking laugh, after which,

yet farther up, in a distantly reverberant bathroom, a toilet
flushes and keeps running even after a door slams shut and

all the old, hard memories flood
back enough for me to know

that if a documentary film was made
about daily life in grammar school—

with shot after shot of small, solemn faces
taring out at us—

its scoreless soundtrack
would be this.