Gen Ed

The air in here is recycled,

tasting of wet sneakers and cheap glue.

I haven't been back in twenty years,

but my shoulders still bunch up

at the sound of a locker hitting the frame.

That hollow, metallic percussion.

The yellow safety tape on the stairs

is frayed and gray at the edges,

leading nowhere but the same

muffled basement of the mind.

I drop my paper in the box

and walk out before the bell

can tell me I’m late again.