The clipboard is heavy in my lap

The clipboard is heavy in my lap.

I have to initial fourteen times

to prove I know the risks of existing.

My name used to have loops,

vowels you could recognize as actual letters.

Now it’s just a jagged, executive line—

an 'M' that looks like a fence falling over.

I’ve practiced this for a decade,

making the pen move fast enough to look like

I have somewhere more important to be.

I handed the pen back to the girl at the desk.

There was a smudge of blue ink

on the side of my pinky, a little stain

from the one honest thing I did all morning,

which was pressing down too hard on the page.