Covered in the soot
of last years math lesson
his drooping, purple button up looks as though
it has soaked in as much chalk
as he has knowledge.

A fragile bent-over body
even more worn than his blue jeans
and his thin, but wrinkled hands.

He is witty
Calculating,
and as cool as the deep grey slate
that he writes his stories across.

His white hair matches his dusty fingers--
dry,
and thinning
with nothing much left
to give.

I imagine him going home to a wife
Even though I have never seen
a ring.
His thin, and brittle body
Taking in the warmth of a woman.
A soft  woman
The only one who knows how to love him.
She fills up the edges of his concave bones
the tender heart that he never had.
A Juliet who escaped his callous,
chalked-over hands.

A human
that can, somehow,

make him Smile.