Biology

when i was in high school, one of my favorite places to be was the biology lab. every morning i would feed the five small turtles in their dank greenish glass cage and stare at all the interesting instruments that littered every counter. test tubes and mold samples hiding among scalpels and bunsen burners. the most interesting parts were hidden in a (sometimes not) locked room in the corner of the class. bookcases packed to the hilton with more homes made of glass housing suspended dead parasites and thirty year old yellowed rats.
i smelt the dead pigs in a barrel in that room weeks before we had to dissect them. when we did i remember being really focused at the beginning as far as following the teacher and documenting everything in order but when we got to the intestines i got sidetracked making a bracelet. after 25 feet the tan translucent quality seemed magnified, like 30 coats of varnish around my arm. after soaking in the poisoned barrel it smelled just as sharp. what if people grew their art in labs, teratoma with teeth and hair, engineering an organic paint to make crude portraits of man? maybe if they could do that they could grow a finger and we could get married. i have the perfect ring in mind.

dedicated to emily
1973-1977