poem

By Jared Belden

The English Teacher at his Desk at 4 p.m.

Grading pen stalled over the notebook,

what can he say that makes a difference?

In an empty classroom

on a Tuesday in April

before play rehearsal at 5,

instant potato tray steaming on the desk.

There’s an integrity he won’t go against.

Each person wants to say something real.

Don’t say important. Never say nice.

For the love of God don’t say interesting.

From where he’s sitting, he can’t see out the window.

Did students ever listen did they ever?

Students he’s worked with since middle school,

who made fun of the Beethoven biopic

then attempted to cheat on the test,

for reasons having scant to do with

the man playing English teacher

who lost it a little

and knows he shouldn’t take it to heart.

Upstairs the composer

hacks off the piano legs

to fill the floorboards with music again.

A listening quality leads.

He finds a phrase about rain

he really likes.

Underline. Exclamation point. Star.

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Jared Belden is a writer and educator whose teaching posts have taken him around the world. He’s taught writing at Eastern Washington University and Northwestern College in St. Paul; English at the Chintheche Community Day Secondary School in Malawi; and fourth grade at Colegio Peterson in Mexico City. His poetry has appeared in Artful Dodge, as a winner of the AWP Intro Journal Award, Rock & Sling, and the San Diego Poetry Annual. He holds an MFA in poetry from Eastern Washington University. Currently he teaches English Learners at Shepard Boulevard elementary in Columbia, Missouri, where he lives with his wife, Elena, and the family dog, Quetzalli.