What You Do - Letter of Instruction

(I wrote this during the second semester of my senior year of high school. I was waiting to get out of that life, to finish and be in college, and this is a prose-poem of sorts where I was trying to capture that desperate apathy and the feeling that existence at the time was just a holding pattern, a pointless intermission while waiting for purpose and joy. It's supposed to read like a list of commands, hence all the action verbs at the beginnings of the sentences.)

What do you do with a day? What do you do with a day after you’ve given up on it, postponed the revolution for another twenty-four hours, resigned yourself to the waiting? What do you do until? 

Wake up to screaming red numbers, far too early, your last memory of slimy, heavy thoughts pushing into sleep. Slam the screaming off and hit the lights, glance over the whiteboard list of things you need to do and fight the flitting panic with a sigh and an excuse. Feel time sliding forward with you along for the ride and wonder why you bother steering when everything is already headed somewhere. Stand under the hot water and step out, feeling no cleaner, no newer, than before. Leave before the mirror clears from the steam, no concern for looks. Feed the cat, grab a drink, make sure you have your glasses and phone. Scribble down an essay you forgot to do, chew on the pen. Your teeth hurt. 

Ride to school, watch the memorized route through the window, a memorized voice in your ear. Meet with a teacher, settle into the undefined roles, familiar but vague, somewhat codependent, aloof. Rubber stamp on your sheet. Done. Walk to class, sit outside on the linoleum, edit a junior’s paper, think about sitcoms, wonder about the future of your highlighters. 

Class starts. Answer questions about a poem. Decide to read the poem again, realize you like the poem more, and understand it less, than the College Board wants to allow. Think about Echo and Narcissus and mothers and romanticized notions of pain. Write a note to the best friend, check your phone for no reason. 

Move, new class. Cradle a fetal pig in non-latex gloved hands. Picture your brain light up with neurotransmitters, reactions, nurturing instinct. Mentally cite research studies, the “aww” factor, the “cuddle chemical”. Want to protect but instead slice and cut and poke and examine. Stand there awed and fascinated and horrified and revolted at it, pink and helpless and soft and curled. Worry about transfer when a misplaced scalpel catches on your hand. Clean up with a queasy stomach.

Move. Ask in broken Spanish for permission to leave without a pass. Leave. Hand out questionnaires to freshmen, get lost in the apathy and the ignorance. You don’t understand. Visit an old teacher, miss her, miss her class, wonder why she doesn’t teach everything. 

Move. Notice a bloody finger. Confusion, then the memory of the scalpel. Announce the situation nonchalantly, all worry gone. Sanitize for the benefit of those watching. Wonder what may have transferred, do not care. Take notes on Soviet leaders, scowl at your handwriting. 

Go to lunch. Don’t feel well. Stand in the sun, warm up, talk to your friends, feel the memory of the round face push against hunger. Walk inside, stand in line, try to eat an egg roll. Stand in line, offer up your ID. Get handed a box. Move outside, into the sun, eyes stinging. Open the box, check against the receipt, find everything in place: announcements, labels, envelopes, nonsense etiquette explanations, “put one inside the other”. Try to feel giddy, knowing this makes graduation a reality, but only check off one responsibility and add another. 

Move inside from the sun, “do your eyes feel weird?” Substitute, roll call, a name you keep forgetting you have. Stretch on the floor, watch the documentary on the projector screen. Glance at the couple cuddling behind you, try to settle on an appropriate level of jealousy. Watch. Get caught up in revolution, in youth, in romance, and even though you know it’s coming, you are blindsided when it falls apart. Try to fit the pieces in your mind; revolution defies definition. Feel like crying but decide against it for the sake of those nearby. Instead ball up your fists, feign numbness, resolve to join the fight once you can find it. 

Move. Give up quickly. Ignore the teacher at the board, bury yourself in what you can do. Edit junior papers and block out everything else. Leave.