Mrs. Burnside

So I wanted it to be for the masses
but it was just for one or two of us.

I intended to give her the box with the bow
on top but I left it at the airport.

They say the most dangerous place to put
your hand, germ-wise, is the seat-back pouch.

I could stare at the manual all week
and not know how to assemble the swing-set.

So fidgety was how Mrs. Burnside,
my third-grade teacher, described us.

But look at me now. No fear of dying.
Take that, Mrs. B. None at all.

Poet Steve Langan is the author of Freezing, Notes on Exile and Other Poems, Meet Me at the Happy Bar, and What It Looks Like, How It Flies.