Sunday School Classes on a Wednesday Night 4/16/03
Middle of the week again; we hit
the road after supper, arrive
before I realize how much
I don’t want to be there.
Mom waving around those
gold gongs. I snuck out once
to watch her play, hammering them
like drums, caressing them as if to say
“I’m sorry.”
“Do you know where to go?”
she asks me. Down the hallway,
left at the fountain, second door
on the right, room with the plain
walls and the funny smell,
chairs set in a circle?
Mrs. Evonick swifts her dress,
sits down slowly and asks each of us
how we are and we tell her our small
adventures. She listens, blank-eyed.
Her cheeks have weights inside them,
pulling down down down –
she always seems upset.
Could she know about my
secret identity, how I get away
during bathroom break? I’m sure
she knows I’m keeping
something from her.
Even my parents don’t know
their son’s a hero, that I have
saved the world from destruction–
it’s better that way,
saves the constant bother of wasting
time solving other people’s problems –
but my archenemy, Mrs. Evonick –
every week she comes back. Same dress,
same saggy cheeks, wily and elusive –
she must have telepathic powers
hidden behind those thick lenses,
senses strong enough to see through walls,
spy out my escape route down the hall
and past the fountain, keen enough
to hear my mother, upstairs,
apologizing to those golden gongs.
It’s Wednesday again, the middle
of the week. The past six days
were pretty bad. My hero suit has been
folded away in my underwear drawer,
my escape route map’s been
confiscated, Mrs. Evonick
is waiting, and as punishment,
I’m going back.
-Matthew Harri
