Tape

I am a thin piece of plastic

You are dust and dead skin cells

I glanced at the blackboard but quickly averted my eyes

I did not want to be there

and neither did any other twelve year old

Even oblivious to the subliminal connect-the-dots forming in our minds like the wax on our papers

A middle school health classroom is a nightmare for all ages

The final weeks of classes bring excitement

Bubbling out through mouths and frantic graphite scratching

Visions of sunshine hatching, unbeknownst toxic thoughts latching

I liked to think that I knew what I was talking about

That I was independent, unswayed, a manifestation of unbiased

But four years later I find myself through the looking glass

Thinking why didn’t I ask?

We had learned the food groups and how much water to drink each day

But thinking back I can’t really say

What was fact and what was fiction

What was state mandates lost in diction

I, am a used office supply

You, are swept into dust pans in hallways across the nation

Full of graduated children whispering about how I’d lost what made me worth anything

And how you were the prop that aided my journey to the stained linoleum to be walked on by every living soul in passing

Because they have no connection to me

Because I am not THEIR responsibility

I am something to be tossed out

You were a relationship that couldn’t have meant anything

If you had why would I find myself torn under gym shoes shuffling back under fluorescent bulbs for everyone’s least favorite lessons

I am no longer a person, I am an object

I am less, I am landfill luxury

Because you are not the only dust I’ve seen

You are not the only shoulder on which I’ve decided to lean

A middle school health classroom is a nightmares for all ages

Wide eyes can get wider

Small minds should be handled lighter

The clay we used in art class was as malleable as our intellect

And they knew it too

At least on the day they stuck me to you