literature

The Test

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Literature Text

My heart spent her time out in the sun, trying to fly
while I sat at my school desk.  I spent time with her
at weekends, but it got less and less as I got older and my
homework increased.  My mind did the work,
and they said I was bright, but
my heart never cared a button for essays and exams
and box ticking.  She cried out in anguish the day I took
the aptitude test.  She begged me, Don’t listen,
whatever it says.
  But Sense told me to
give it a chance, at least, see what it had to say,
so I took it, the standardised test,
ticking box after box after box after box after box labelled
A, B, C, D.  My heart had her say in the answers I gave, but
all the time she was laughing in the faces of A, B, C, D,
and whispering, Listen to me.

Well I finished the test, and put it on the desk
with the other hundreds of ticked boxes labelled
A, B, C, D.  My heart
forgot it and made her own plans, not caring
what the test said I was or should be, and
I almost forgot it myself.  Until
the results came in.

My heart wept.

I thought about it, and Sense told me this time to
find out about the reliability of the test.  I read pages and
pages about how accurate it was, how many
successful futures had started with that test.  But
my heart wasn’t there.  I went back to her,
told her all about it, but she had already packed.
She was about to leave, when she turned and said softly,
Follow me.

I let her go.

But we kept in touch.  She called me all the time,
always pleading, Follow me.
She travelled the world, and she even fell
in love, and she stayed there but
I couldn’t follow.  I stayed where it was safe,
in the arms of that standardised test.
Another not-good-enough-for-the-collection poem - but, I think, only just. I like it ok. :shrug:
© 2007 - 2024 ThornyEnglishRose
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