When you first passed through them

All butterflies and sparkling eyes,

Bouncing bundles of boundless potential 

In sharp creases and glistening shoes,

You will barely have noticed, the silent sentries

Marking the boundary between your worlds

Of heavenly refuge and interminable imprisonment.

 

Back and forth for years, growing as you go 

Like a tide, each droplet herded ever onward

By buzzers and bells to meet your future selves,

You will inscribe a path across this margin

So focused on the now, all change is imperceptible.

 

Until, perhaps, a brief moment of reflection,

Which often strikes only as you walk out,

And they close behind you, for the final time.