Spiral Notebook?

I wonder if our kids will ever know the excitement of buying a new spiral notebook for school? How about pencils or pens or colors (see Isaac's Picasso)? Instead they'll have the excitement of shopping for a new notebook or tablet computer. At least the backpack will be lighter.

A Spiral Notebook

The bright wire rolls like a porpoise
in and out of the calm blue sea
of the cover, or perhaps like a sleeper
twisting in and out of his dreams,
for it could hold a record of dreams
if you wanted to buy it for that
though it seems to be meant for
more serious work, with its
college-ruled lines and its cover
that states in emphatic white letters,
5 SUBJECT NOTEBOOK. It seems
a part of growing old is no longer
to have five subjects, each
demanding an equal share of attention,
set apart by brown cardboard dividers,
but instead to stand in a drugstore
and hang on to one subject
a little too long, like this notebook
you weigh in your hands, passing
your fingers over its surfaces
as if it were some kind of wonder.

Poem: "A Spiral Notebook" by Ted Kooser, from Delights & Shadows © Copper Canyon Press. Reprinted with permission.