MARTiN ESPADA
Public School 190, Brooklyn 1963
The inkwells had no ink.
The flag had 48 stars, four years
after Alaska and Hawaii.
There were vandalized blackboards
and chairs with three legs,
taped windows, retarded boys
penned in the basement.
Some of us stared in Spanish.
We windmilled punches
or hid in the closets to steal from coats
as the teacher drowsed, head bobbing.
We had the Dick and Jane books,
but someone filled in their faces
with a brown crayon.
When Kennedy was shot,
they hurried us onto buses,
not saying why,
saying only that
something bad had happened.
But we knew
something bad had happened,
knew that before
November 22, 1963.
RACHEL WETZSTEON
Surgical Moves
Lights dimmed, the scraper scraped, and I could feel
the change begin; it was the kind of pain
you brace yourself and bear, imagining
all
the unfolding options that the cuts
