You can’t write a poem about scantron tests
It would have to be written with a No. 2 pencil,
And you would surely smudge it with your palm.
Or you would make a mistake and try to erase,
But it would just make your poem wrong.

You can’t write a poem about scantron tests
With the slightest wrinkle or too many erase marks
That damn machine couldn’t read it.
If a Machine can’t read it,
How is a human supposed to?

You can’t write a poem which
May require a review
Or a test
Or more than a fifty-minute period to get through
Because a poem is an expression,
They should be short
And catchy
And imaginative
Not just a bunch of questions
Or “distractors”
Or answers
Or annoyances.

You really shouldn’t write a poem
About scantrons when
They should be in a jail-cell-like-room
Sitting with other useless pieces of paper
Instead of testing on them,
Unlike a poem.