To Dream

Sitting in a cafeteria
With walls of white
Staring off into empty empty space

Thinking about Alma 24

Take my past
The sanguine stain
That always seems to taste
Of metal rain
And bury the sound
Of swords crashing
Worlds clashing

Bury it all
Beneathe more than just
A trained eye

And so I say to him
Who would believe in peace
If it weren't for the broken pieces

"In the Book of Mormon
There's a story
About a people
Who buried their swords
To keep from fighting"

I watch him laugh
And craft
A mixture of
Intellectualism
Cynicism
Skepticism
And all the other isms
I used to wear like pretty polished prisms

And eventually he says,
"That sounds nice.
But wouldn't that just
Leave the violent people
With all the swords

And the non-violent people
At a disadvantage?"

And with sad eyes, I told him
"It's nice to dream sometimes."

And wouldn't you know it
There was a fight in school that day.
Two boys settling a little bit of nothing
With four fists and a busted eye

Blood spilling from a punctured eyeball,
I heard from the girl
Who came into my Calculus class
And tried to throw up

But couldn't.

"A knife," she said
"He had a knife and ran from
the principal."

He might have used it
Like that kid who stabbed
Some son of Adam
In the face with a boxcutter
(Was that last year,
or the year before?)

And I thought to myself
Wouldn't it be nice to bury it all
Beneath more
Than a trained eye

Taught not to see?

But with spilled blood in the hallway
It's hard to recall ways
And days

To dream.