the field trip to Gettysburg

on the cold yellow school bus

to Gettysburg for

the 8th grade

field trip,

a girl, Madeline, who everyone

called Mouse, 

came over to where

i was sitting,

staring out the window,

happy to be

out of school, thinking

about the civil war.

she told the kid

sitting next to me to scram,

then sat beside me,

and said,

i'm Madeline, i think we

should go steady

and go to the 8th grade

dance

next weekend. okay?

i looked at her round 

freckled face

and wiry red hair

and shrugged. sure.

whatever, i said.

having no plans for that evening.

she went back to her seat

in the back

of bus with her giggling

girlfriends.

i turned back to the window

to the rolling

hills of the battlefield,

to the long fences,

the stone walls

and gravestones and wondered

which side would i

have been on.

that enormous oak tree

would be a great place to hide behind

as i pointed

my loaded musket.