Amanda

It’s not your fault,

I know this.

I know you can’t help our location,

Our  poverty,

Our family "issues",

The System.

I know you can’t do much but force us,

Force us to read when we hate to take the time,

Force us listen when we want to preach,

Force us to sit when we want to preach from a mountain.

I know you can’t do much but force us.

Then again, you can’t even do that.

I know you can’t really do much.

Can’t do much to save the System,

After all you’re just one person.

But there are many of you.

Tens.

Hundreds.

Thousands.

Millions.

Just like you.

--All shackled.

I do have one question:

Why?

Why do you participate when you have no control?

Not in the classroom.

Students.

Not on the board,

Parents.

Not even in the lounge.

Regulations.

Why?

Why do you spend day in,

Day out,

Obeying the system you know is corrupt.

The System you know isn’t right for your students.

Your Children.

The System you know doesn’t appreciate you,

Doesn’t allow you to actually teach,

Insists that you meet the “standards”?

Why?

Why do you kowtow to the System you know is wrong?

The system you taught me is wrong.

The system that doesn’t care for us,

Only numbers,

Ratings,

Listings,

Rankings.

Why don’t you change it?

All of you.

Why don’t you change it?

For all of us.

Then again, it’s not your fault.

You,

Yourself,

Have been forced,

Like us,

 To obey.