Blank Page

or

Quiet Classroom

or

Empty Classroom

(Waiting in Mr. Jaffe's history class for the lecture to begin.)

the page blankly stares

at me.

and the pen in nervous fingers

drawing doodles in the air

daring to defile it.

with what? I don't

know.

to the left of me,

in a too-small desk, a

brunette reads a page from the

text.

something about Rome—

could be Greece—

or something.

she's been reading the same page for

nearly ten minutes now.

to my right, another girl,

face in arms,

hair splayed across the flesh-colored desk

like an explosion inversed,

feigns sleep.

and she was like that when I got here.

everyone else either stares at a

spot on the wall or

walks out the door

to return

with a bottle of water.

basically, all the things

you do to stay

the silence for another moment

in an endless march

of seconds

empty,

until the door clicks,

the talkers take their seats

and the hum of life

annihilates the silence for an another

hour and a half.

better to be annoyed—to be

poked and proded by the mind(s) of

stranger(s)—

than alone, right?

Isn't that right,

mister blank sheet of paper?

ah, you're no fun…