hopefully for Laura

in a time to come

 

"I struggle to try

To become something worthwhile

As not to have my mind

Sectioned in the 'out' file"

 

J.B.M.

Teaching The Unteachable

 

we want along, side by side,

at the corner, you reach,

grab my hand, and smile.

a woman of middle-age bulge

checks us out and nods a nod

of approval

 

you mutter something i can not understand

and try to walk a foot high

six inch wide wall.

i cover the imperfectness of your steps.

you beam so proud of your accomplishment

 

your size seems statuesque for your actions.

and i am now overcome

by a feeling of impending doom

which allows me to only finger brush your hair

 

when, at our destination,

you raised your dress chest high

adjusting your underwear;

it was only your age that forced

my etiquettorial comment

 

accepting your professional's invitation,

i observed your therapy,

my comments bordered on the helplessly ignorant

but i spoke anyway

 

the fear is shared

that it will drive you into a

self-sheltered, silent world.

As today slides into yesterday

so to do your chances

 

your seeking of sanctuary

in the abundant freedoms of a toddler,

classifies you a behavioral problem

because eight year old should act eight

 

your present realization

of the eventual acceptance

of anything ending in the p sound for cup

will come to cost you dearly

when the patience or today

evolves into the intolerance of tomorrow

and tracks you forever into obscurity

 

i trust for you,

trapped by the conformity of time,

that somewhere and soon

along this quicksand-ridden road of life

you really get angry and show them all

 

my dear friend,

please do not, under any circumstances,

let them sow a seed in you

that will grow only ho blossom as a weed

requiring constant tending to

 

to beat the odds

you will have to be strong

and step by step plod along.

if you do not

it is my fear that you will not be around

but daily wronged

 

i leave you at the center

and go for my therapy

it does not work

i fail at my recitation of the anglo-saxon

version of the lord's prayer

 

but, of course

it most definitely remains to be seen

if i succeeded

The green room was one of the rooms of a day car center.

This was to be the first of several pieces of a thing to be called,

THE LITTLE PEOPLE OF THE GREEN ROOM.

This is the only I did.

 It was not lost on me that among the definitions of green are:

9. Lacking training or experience.

10. a. Lacking sophistication or worldly experience; naive.

b. Easily duped or deceived; gullible. *

I read this at a poetry reading. I had to submit it first. The professor liked it when I read it, but said I was supposed to read only what I submitted. I had submitted it.

 I write things the way I talk, but often people, who don't know how I talk, miss the point. Those pauses of mine, the angry or passion. They can't read the soft or the loud.

 If I were a writer, I would be able to write so people could read and then hear what I was saying. In this case, the writing was so bad that the guy missed the poem itself. He didn't even recognize that what he heard was what he had read. Might be the same for you. Don't know

 And here's the kicker, I originally wrote it without punctuation. I put in the punctuation because I thought it would make it easier to understand. "No good deed goes unpunished."

 The people seemed to like it.

Hey, I wanted the first line to be

 we walk, along side by side

 but I can't type very well, and when I looked up at the paper it said

 we want, along side by side

 Much better line. At least, I think so.

My bad typing produced several of what I call "accidental insights."

 Once I wanted the line

 love is a four word, sex it not

that confused me for years

 When I looked at what I had typed, this is what I saw

 love is a four letter world, sex is not

that confused me for years

 I think that's a great line. Anyway, the problem is how to tell what I really meant to say versus bad typing. I make errors that are errors all the time.

 The professor felt it necessary to point out that there is no such world as etiquettorial that the correct word was decorous. The line should be

My decorous comment

I put it to the assemblage. And they agreed with me. Etiquettorial may not be a word, but everyone of them understood what "my etiquettorial comment" meant. Furthermore, they felt decorous just didn't fit. It just could not be substituted. You try it and see what you think.

Maybe 10 years later, I was managing a food service and had a reputation for taking kid's who could not be placed. Kid's with problems, mental, physical, emotional, etc.

How this happened still remains a mystery.

 It was for most of them their first job.

 Anyway, I worked with this one girl. She tested marginally retarded, didn't speak very well, and moved kind of awkwardly.

 Her one goal was to be normal, at least to be treated normally, to be treated like everyone else. So I did.

 And in time, I fired her, for doing and/or not doing, what I would have fired anyone for.

I told her counselor, I felt bad, but I felt she should be held accountable for her actions, her job performance just like anyone else. There is a price to be paid for being treated like everyone else.

 Some time later, maybe a year or more, I don't know, I had yet another "project" and the counselor and I were remembering kids gone by. I asked what ever became of the girl. She said she was working at some fast food place and was the most conscientious employee in there. And she was engaged to be married.

 I said, "That's great. That's all she wanted just to be like everyone else. I feel so happy for Laura."

 Now you are reading this and so are way ahead of me. But it just jumped into my mind, could Laura be Laura.

 I was so . . .so . . . .

 I don't know what I was.

 I don't know what counselor thought I was.

I just kept saying, could Laura be Laura?

Laura could be Laura!

 Yes!

 Yes!

 Laura could be Laura!

  I checked around and Laura was, indeed, Laura.

 And I just cried.

  And when I finally found it, I gave the poem to the counselor and told her she should decide if this was "a time to come."

  I have no idea if she ever got it.

________________________

*Excerpted from The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition Copyright © 1992 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Electronic version licensed from Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products N.V., further reproduction and distribution restricted in accordance with the Copyright Law of the United States. All rights reserved.