Outer Space

Reported: Freckles. Mindless chatter. Pencil shavings.

Munching teacher. Smelly classroom.

Hot dog water. Child labor.

Playground victims. Muddy football.

Jogging woman. Lake monster.

Rainy days. Soft blanket.

Blank paper. Silence.

Silence.

Translated:

As a third grader, I was a space cadet

who crashed landed on Earth.

The extraterrestrials of my private school conditioning referred to me as

“that red-head kid with freckles—”

which was weird because it was brown, as a matter of fact.

Reported: There doesn’t seem to be any sign of intelligent life on the planet.

All the kids seem to like this sport called football

but tackled everyone but the players.

I liked my scratch papers blank and chalk white.

A pen wouldn’t suffice. I needed pencils to tune in with the satellites—

disrupted by that classroom teacher.

It was clear by the rigid lining of the desk—

And my behavior card on yellow—

I was one flip away from a time-out;

Reported: My kind do not belong here.

There were shavings of reminders, all around my desk,

of a place called home, which I was told to clean.

Home was a different memory

No gum was left under our lunch table,

or the mindless chatter with mouths filled with food.

Home was the whispering wind

Blowing raindrop kisses against the window pane.

It was the embrace of a warm blanket until I freely drifted away.

Home was outer space.

Reported: Torture. Growling stomachs. Prison classroom.

Microwave. Beeper. Work direction. Slurping teacher.

Reminder.

Translated:

There was a woman jogging, I would see

every morning

and wondered where she was going,

on my trip to school.

I closed my eyes, wanting to take her place.

Her black shorts— mine— embraced the morning dew.

The green leaves of the trees offered glimpses

of a glorious sunrise.

Yet, when I opened them—

There were no clouds or wind beneath my feet.

Not even the sun.

I saw my tiny desk, the back of this other kid’s patchy hair,

and there was an awful smell was in the air.

I remembered I didn’t eat breakfast when Ms. Teacher had hers.

I could see in my classmate's wandering faces

that I wasn’t the only one that didn’t have spaghetti.

Reported: Hidden monster-- eyes of envy.

Ringing phone. Blast off.

Translated:

I couldn’t get any closer to the water,

in my backyard, without falling in

until my grandmother told me the story of the loch ness.

It lurked under the seaweed, in the creek.

Whenever I was all alone, it could come and snatch me

with its tentacle arms and drag me into the murky abyss.

That was her crafty way of getting me inside for dinner.

And when dinner felt like years away,

I would draw the monster around the corners

Of my assignment papers

And wished it would take me from “this…”

A watery grave was even better than "this."

Reported: Phone ring.

The teacher called my name.

Stone face.

Translated:

She had already asked me to clean around my desk

and it’s still a mess.

The assignment that was handed out

was filled with monsters and my behavior card

was telling me to slow down.

All the kids turned to me

with trouble in their eyes and a flash of pity.

A sweaty grip around my pencil when I answered,

and she told me the surprising news,

I was going home.

Blast off.

I jerked my jet pack, threw it over my back,

and prepared for my early departure.

The sun beamed through that tiny window

at the back of the room filled with the envious murmur.

I remembered their once troubled eyes closing

as tightly as they could.