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To My Math Teacher
I am a writer,
an observer
and recorder of people.
When you ask me, “Do you have any questions?”
I see the condescending look in your eye
Yes, I have questions.
How is it supposed to be easy for me to solve inequalities
when I know that inequality always makes a great story?
How do you expect me to I survive if the only factors
I can comprehend are those behind a character’s actions?
Why do you want me to find the limit
when all I know is that great characters push the limits?
Where do I fall on your scale
when the only scale I can explain to you is that of
if the moral ambiguity outweighs its consequences?
What use am I to you if the only sinusoidal graph I can understand
is the rise and fall of tension in a plot?
Why are you forcing me in a geometry into which I do not fit?
When you ask me, “Do you understand?”
I see the condescending look in your eye
Teacher, understand this.
I excel—just at things that don’t count in your class
where the thing that matters is
how well and how many ways I can count.
My ability to square root says nothing about me
Because all I care about is the root of conflict.
You expect me to believe that
fiction isn’t important because it is imaginary
yet I am supposed to work on i.
Your Venn diagram problem perplexes me
yet I can diagram a sentence with no problem.
Teacher, listen.
Words spill onto my notebook pages like water
while your numbers dam at my pencil tip.
I thrive off the whys and not the hows
I want to live in the colors of life,
Not find the arc length of the rainbow.
You may be calculating how many feet are in my downfall
But at least I will fly.
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Favorite Quote:
"Despite everything, I believe that people are really good at heart."<br /> -Anne Frank