High School Biology: A Confession

Now I’m not saying you look like a frog there
in that casket, Mrs. White, but the day Garrett
saw a similarity in your eyes bulging and
the specimens’ prepped for dissection, well,

you didn’t look yourself that day either.
When we expected your voice to cut through
formaldehyde, you began a breath it took
an entire class period to catch. I know you heard

Garrett Johnson ringing ribbit, ribbit, ribbit,
because when you covered your croup,
your other arm waved wild jabs towards him
like a pinned toad’s free leg kicking.

All the while that double chin bulbed in and out
like a cartoon hot air balloon panting, unsure of
whether to fly off or pack it up for the day.
I laughed a little then, Mrs. White, but still

held that scalpel steady just like you’d said.
You showed the squeamish it didn’t hurt.
That frog was already dead, and that comforts me,
talking now. You look fine,

a bit pale maybe, and I never saw you smile
like this in class. I’ll admit it was hard to cut
a sure line when the class croaked its chorus
each time you turned your back to cough a spell.

Mrs. White, how do I prepare this question
for your dissection? What can I pin back
for a clear view? I wish you could have taught
how to identify and label what goes on inside

of me when lab partners don’t show for Receiving
of Friends. You taught us to respect the dead
amphibians, and I thought you were brave
for using bare fingers to fish through intestines,

stomach, and fat. If you were here now, well,
as you were, you would sit up in that coffin to
teach me again for yourself, how your body
was prepped for a final lesson on how a life functions,

where food was stored and breath held, where
veins dyed blue run toward the embalmed heart.