because I have been listening to
your bullying in my head 44 years
and that is 44 years too long.

Listen up Mrs. K
because in 4th grade you said
I was too fat and stupid to be a poet
and I'd be wasting paper anyway.

Now I have something to say.

Tonight in a bookstore filled
with people as my poetry group
launched our book, and I read my
my poems out loud - I was heard
I was good enough to be there.

Mrs. K, listen up
because I am a poet

and you are evicted.