“Students will dissect a human brain.”
Not canoeing class and campfire sing-alongs—
sawing through skulls, peeling off the dura mater,
pia mater, and arachnoid to explore the gray matter inside.
Not archery, homesickness, marshmallow-
dripping s’mores—carving out the cerebellum;
following the curves and valleys called sulci.
Not splitting white-skinned tribes into Arapaho,
Algonquin, Chippewa—dividing medulla from pons,
left hemisphere from right.
Not pulling perch
and catfish from a muddy lake with a cane pole—
dropping a line in the cerebral aqueduct; dragging up
the amygdala from limbic depths, dripping.
Not hatchets and whittling with Swiss army knives—
scalpels; bone-saws.
Not hobbling horses, bedding
down under the stars—lifting the tentorium cerebelli,
skirting the optic chiasma and fissure of Sylvius
to enter the substantia nigra, dark as night.
Not huddling in mummy bags, chewing dried
apricots and jerky; not dangling, tacked
to a cliff face over an abyss—bending to see
the mountains of awareness rise: the mind’s range
moving off in silver mist . . .