The Math Teacher Parables

When I was about seven years old,    
I called a bush Jackass.    
I don't remember why,    
or in what way it offended me,    
but it says something about you    
when even shrubbery    
has to walk around you like it's on eggshells.    
my world was my own hell,    
and I was the Devil;    
prisoner and warden in one.    
I used to jabber-walk like my middle name was Alice,    
because I was mad.    
When it was good it was O.K....    
... but when it was bad it was bad,    
all my friends were fingernails    
and I had a VIOLENT oral fixation,    
slow in the classroom,    
quick to frustration.    
I'd like to count the number of outbursts I had,    
but I don't have enough hands,    
and I was never very good with math.    
   
My math teacher knew that.    
   
She was so kind to this kid    
who slept in her class like he was a dragon  
with lead eyelids.    
   
And to this day I never understood that.    
   
He had a short fuse,    
but his eraser was shorter,    
from mistake after mistake    
toe constantly brushing the border between    
"Give up' and 'why try'.    
Between 'you can do this' and 'who am I?'    
But still she helped.    
   
I don't even remember her name.    
   
And that's okay,    
because unlike Beowulf and his great Danes,    
she needed no song.    
Just the fizzle of a half lit lightbulb    
flaring brighter for a second.    
For her it was the same.    
if she was remembered in poetry,    
or one passed math test,    
so long as I made it alive,    
and goddamnit I MADE IT.    
   
When I was eighteen years old,    
I met someone who took pictures of themselves    
 with only a corner of the mirror.    
When they deserved to use the whole damn thing.