1.
The room
is so busy with
the bright ceiling lights,
the green board,
filtering chalk dust off
Of itself, into the square room,
That maybe it is hard to see a person
teenager sitting there,
installed motionless in the blue seat, because
the windows are opened to let in
The sun,
and the human heart, nestled in its cave
is extraordinarily hard to hear, even
Above pencils and pens, writing the numbers
down on paper,
And even with the noise going to silence,
if you would
bend
awkwardly, listen closely, you
can still hear it,
wrapped in such fluttering,
that I know nothing else but our fear.
2.
Once, I saw a video of how they caught a fish.
Beautiful, sinuous: I didn’t know its name.
It was shiny and smooth, fluttered like a wave.
It flapped the air with its tail;
there was a cruel hook stuck in its lip,
and when it moved, thumping
the floor, there was no sound that it could make, that would do it any
good.
Trust me, I did not look, but I know:
how it closed one eye, to shut
out the fear, but it kept one open, to cling to—
Whatever.
3.
Look, the fish knew that to struggle was not the point—
silence; anonymity in its death throes, how it
arced, hard with concentration.
4.
It was so large and heavy, (medium-sized, really)
that any movement caused pandemonium,
so, naturally, they had to hold it down.
5.
Is there no other way to let it go,
to let it go?
6.
I was not that fish.
7.
Maybe nothing more to say, but—
everything.
8.
But truthfully, I am interested, so tell me:
What would you have had me do—
9.
Scream?
