Teacher Exit Interview: A Cento

After a measured, reasoned assessment
of my budget, I have come to the conclusion
that unless the state is willing to take
some money from building more jails
and give it to schools, I will need to
cut box tops, panhandle and strip
under the spinning lights with something like
religious devotion on nights and weekends
in order to make ends meet. This is a wallet issue
and a heart issue. I am sure if you start
digging, you will see money lining the pockets
of every school choice expert and middle-man
all the way to the state house. The only thing
in my pockets is the asbestos, because far be it
from me to tell The Man what chemicals
to put in my body. I think in my time here
I’ve developed an allergy to gun nuts,
and if I do nothing, one day I will watch
my parents cry on the evening news
from my high horse in heaven.
I am going home. I am taking with me
this bad taste in my mouth, but I am leaving
behind the grief you would like me to feel.
The only thing I am abandoning is the vision
you have given me of myself as a savior.

Lines and phrases taken from comments by Facebook users on the WTHR Education in Indiana page, in alphabetical order: AK, AM, AP, BN, GR, JH, KH, LW, MF, MM, NL, RH, TS.

Frances Klein (she/her) is a poet and teacher writing at the intersection of disability and gender. She is the author of the chapbooks The Best Secret (Bottlecap Press, 2022) and New and Permanent (Blanket Sea 2022). Klein currently serves as assistant editor of Southern Humanities Review. Readers can find more of her work at https://kleinpoetryblog.wordpress.com/.