Slow Torture | Teen Ink

Slow Torture

March 8, 2009
By _cgirl921 PLATINUM, Littleton, Colorado
_cgirl921 PLATINUM, Littleton, Colorado
33 articles 4 photos 3 comments

Tick.
Tick.
Tick.

Nearly perfect silence
But for pencils scratching
And the clock beating out
An eternity

And it is an eternity
Each second seeming interminable
Every moment a wasted opportunity
Because
They won't let me
Write!

I sit and
Twiddle my thumbs
And try not to let
Each sluggish second
Pass over my skin like steel wool

Colorful, ethereal words float through my mind
Images I won't ever capture again
Like prize butterflies
And I am netless

I stifle a moan
At the unborn poem
Dying in my penless hands
I grasp at the words
But they slip through my fingers like
Ghosts

Stories, too
Oh, the stories I could tell
If they'd let me

My empty fingers start to cramp
And I feel myself retreating into my shell
Soul laden with barrenness

The proctor's loud voice
Call me out of despondency
'Please put your pencils down'

I watch with itching impatience
As tests make their way
To the front of the room

Finally
I lunge for my backpack
And clutch my notebook
Scratching out words
As fast as I can

The first words I write?
'I hate standardized tests'


Similar Articles

JOIN THE DISCUSSION

This article has 2 comments.


on Feb. 13 2010 at 10:08 pm
_cgirl921 PLATINUM, Littleton, Colorado
33 articles 4 photos 3 comments
Thanks! :)

Shadow SILVER said...
on Mar. 22 2009 at 9:01 pm
Shadow SILVER, Sacromento, California
5 articles 0 photos 12 comments
ha, ha Don't we all hate standarized test. P.s. good peom