no child left behind (in our bedroom)

The house is warm and fragrant

the scent of rosemary and mint shampoo floats through the rooms

Sleep and solitude are so close

We make the nightly rounds

First The Baby and one more song and never let mama go

and the door left open, just a crack

Then the oldest boy in the room next door

binders and books splayed out on the bed,

wracking his brain to recall lessons learned earlier in the day

Too focused to acknowledge my shape in the doorway

with anything more than the rise of an eyebrow.

The second son, tucked away on the third floor, is so quiet

we sometimes forget to check in

Lost in his thoughts, in the importance of everything, the fairness of nothing,

rushing to get someplace but not knowing where to go

in the narrow corridors of his grey matter

And the girl, who says things in daylight hours like,

‘I want to spend more time with you,’

shuns the time I offer

Don’t interrupt, she is soaking up each second until ‘lights out’

Her notebooks and pencils occupying our bed as she has nowhere else to go

Do you need anything? Are you okay? I ask each one.

They are engrossed in their drawings, drudgery, daydreams

Too busy for small talk, they exercise an economy of words

 No. Yeah.

The older ones are too old to smooth the wet, ruffled, after-shower hair.

Too big to read a story to

But wasn’t it just last year when we all got sucked into that popular series?

Stretching the bedtime hour to read the next chapter

And the next.

Since nobody needs me, I settle my head on the pillow

But the girl, sensing stillness, feels an itch to stir the calm

She has to show me something, ‘It’s so awesome!’

Instructions for a homemade hamster hammock

‘Wouldn’t it be great for Pepper?’

She must make it Now! or it will never happen

So in her last allotted minutes, she rips the sleeves off a t-shirt and sews a pouch.

And of course the hamster must try the pouch Now!

So now there is a girl with a hamster in a homemade pouch on the bed.

As the hamster escapes and scampers across my lead legs,

the second son meanders into our room.

He stands quietly beside my bed

But he doesn’t need anything

He makes sure to tell us so when I look at him quizzically

‘Can I get anything for you guys before I go to bed?’ he asks.

‘We’re fine.’ We answer. But he has not moved. There is something else.

‘Okay then.’ He is still standing there

‘Are you okay?’ I ask

‘Fine,’ he looks away as if embarrassed to ask,

‘But can I just sit here with you for a little while?’

We fold him under the covers, this boy now taller than me.

As his younger sister shuffles the hamster,

who keeps wriggling out of the pouch,

from hand to hand,

we all giggle at the absurdity

which draws the oldest boy in

He just happened to finish his work and found a video

And it’s ‘so friggin funny’ and ‘you have to watch it’

So we do

And we all laugh

And from the other room,

‘Hey whatca all laughing for?’

The Baby in her pj's and floppy hair and wide eyes,

interpreting the No Child Left Behind act to mean something else,

climbs onto the bed

Suddenly they all remember that there were things they needed to say

Of things that happened and grades they received

Of teachers they love or hate

Of lunch and the bus

Of sports and death and lost calculators

These children who do not want to have anything to do with each other

now poke each other’s ribs and shake the bed with laughter

piling up in the center, limbs entwined

They do not realize how much they love each other yet

For now we just  float on our own island.