I sat there in his office, for our first formal meeting and
I thought: what a strange little man
and I thought: thoughts are private, he can't know
but I've no poker face, so as I watched him look at me silently
I was eyeing him like a stained onion under a microscope
Look at the cell wall, the keys dangling from the faded Dockers from 1982
the pale hands with the small sausage fingers
everyone talked about his hands and those small fingers
that would gesticulate and pontificate and annunciate his power over us
He walked from his desk to the table, and it seemed like it took ten steps
and he became smaller with every stride, in the faded wrinkled shirt, made of flannel
like a used bed sheet
there is the nucleus, the papers in his hand I thought and his faded green eyes darted
over at me, and he knew, he could feel it, he knew I thought he was a dork
At last he settled down at the table and I joined him and the sausage fingers
of power shuffled through my evaluations, which were good
before he had that grudge, nursed over the summer
before he let it sink in that he was never good enough in my eyes
that he was always dissapointing me
I would walk to him, like trying to buy good organic food at a seven eleven
and wondering why every time, it wasn't there
He knew he couldn't do anything right in my eyes
He wasn't up to my challenge
I didn't know that he knew