Yesterday’s blog was about the excuses students make to professors. My friend Lynn Hunter, an author, writer and poet, also taught in the community college. Her poem Excuses describes her struggle with classroom justice and mercy.
Excuses
Because my grandmother died: it’s a line
older than dirt. I myself have used it.
Now behind the lectern when term papers are due,
I collect excuses–from this one
in pink high-tops, another with proud
canary hair, a third with a lilting
name and a ring in her nose. I need
an extension, each one begins, because:
1. My boyfriend was murdered and I had to give my baby away.
2. My mother was on life-support and we had to unplug her.
3. I had to rush my roommate to detox after she smoked a pair of hemp sandals.
With clinical eyes, they measure my response:
Does my face fill with pity? Does my mouth form
a compassionate O? Does my grade book
appear, and is an extension recorded?
Ah, my vicarious daughters–they have
no real reasons. And, because their cheeks
are still lined with babyfat; because
their lies are rich and dumb and plain as milk;
because, soon enough, a boyfriend will
die, someone will lose her baby, drive
a loved one to detox, unplug her
mother from a respirator; my
face fills with pity, my mouth forms a
compassionate O, and I give them two weeks more.
Poem: Lynn Dean Hunter, © Copyright 1999, used with permission
