Hell Week

Early morning rising

Wake up you sleepy girl

Dragging myself out of bed

I drain a bowl of cereal

It's music in the morning

And a little running

Windy days outside

Lacrosse, oh the screaming

Then I'm stuck in Biology

Soft, wrinkled skin and snouts

Piglets in breathless sleep

Edging forward into lunch time

After dissections though, my appetite wanes

Regina Spektor and the Emcee tiptoeing around those numbers

The equations and solutions in math class

The only time this week that anything makes sense

A definite answer, a method

I love it

And then study hall

Blue filter of daylight

That room's almost empty

And then it's time for rehearsal

Or, not quite

A gathering in the black box

Stretches

Then a patch of free time 

Waiting for dinner

Everyone's too noisy

Time to stand in a long line

For food purchased in bulk

And then I'm finished

I slip into my costume

And hurry upstairs

What a soft couch

Another patch of time

I am waiting ... waiting

Then rehearsal begins

Flashes of skin and sparkles

Unwilling feet pinched into too tight shoes

Cheers, tears, kisses

Freeze

Quiet in the wings

Clap for the orchestra

Hang up your costumes

And then there's more waiting

In the hallway

It's 10pm 

We climb into the car

City lights whiz by

Faces stare down at me from billboards

Snow Plows Dump Bodies

And sometimes I'm funny

And sometimes I'm mean

And sometimes I struggle to sort

The thoughts I feel from the words I say

In any case, I stumble through the side door of that house

Chip away at that library book that's way overdue

Then I flick off the light and sleep.