Aggies

Aggie, Aggie, on this day

You roll around

As we play!

Long before video games

Before the internet

Before cellphones

There were games

Of

Marbles AKA Aggies

Played in the sand of school yards

Shot in and out

Of

Circles drawn in the dirt

By little fingers

From

Little hands

Ready to win the next game!

Losing could mean

Fist fights

If the loser didn’t pay up!

Turning over your Aggies

Was always

A hard thing to do

For, Aggies were also currency

Along with

Hand drawn

Ink pen tattoos

Ten cents a pop!

But that’s a whole other

Story all together

Then there were

The shakedowns

Teachers would ask you

To empty your pockets?

Confiscating anyone’s marbles

They were holding!

Dostoyevsky would have

Surely shook his head in disgust