Mom, Dad, the couch,
Dad says the school called.
Where have you been?
I ask him Why does it matter?
I’m a Second Semester Senior,
who cares what I do?
He asks what’s happened to me.
Who am I?
I say I could ask the same of him.
Mom pats his knee, strokes his hair.
Tells me not to walk away.
I laugh, tell her she’s one to talk.
I pass April drawing a sign in her room:
SILENCE = DEATH
it says.
I slam my bedroom door with a flash,
a solar flare
burning on
the surface of the sun.