The amount of money saved. Scrawling everywhere. Green red, red green. A loose evening, becomes looser, restlessly restless. In the dream, you’re running. No, in the dream, you’re sitting. The river on your lap. A tortoise is hunted by a rabbit. How many ways can you look without looking? How often can you count, then backwards? Hypochondriac or cursed curious? You’ve sewn a moon into a blanket. It’s never finished. You give it cheeks, a clown nose. You, class clown, sit in the principal’s office. He tells you to stop touching his paper clips, the leather chair. You ask Do you need your bicycle tuned up? Principal slams his desk, stands to look out his window. In the sky, a cloud shaped like a rabbit drops to the ground. The principal asks When you grow up, what do you want to be? Outside, the cloud’s breath steams the window. Put down my stapler, my rubber bands. Are they yours to touch? Can’t you just sit there? Can you do that, huh? Sit there and just listen?
Gianni Gaudino teaches 8th grade English and Language Arts in the School District of Philadelphia. When he was 6, Gianni was diagnosed with ADHD and a minor form of Tourette’s Syndrome. He has poems in ProLit Magazine, Yes, Poetry, Muzzle Magazine, and a few others. He lives in Philadelphia.
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