A Lesson in Ben

Heaving knowledge
in crisp, convenient packets,
talking of peptides and receptors, poisons and myths,
as pictures jerk on the screen facing
a sea of gaping eyes and gazing mouths,
heads bent to hoist hasty, scribbled flags against oblivion.

To rise
and leave
would be so simple.

Yet

how still are your hands as the dust-flecks
tumble by your ears. I look to the
back of your neck, Ben, a clay figure reposed in thought,
if such statues could be thoughtful- of
what, I cannot say.

How then
shall I leave,
and where away to go. For this
I came, for this I stay.