History Coursework

You talk over me, so I tell you to
Shut it.
(In the nicest possible way of course.)
You don’t like that.
But then again you wouldn’t.
We’re all smokers to you
(because, clearly, that’s the only reason for a
cough.)

Eight pages.
Nine with bibliography “Is this all the books you used? Hmm.”
And the surface is relief under my thumbs,
Peaks and crevices graze the grooves
in my fingertips like stylus to the vinyl
Crackle, static,
as I’m searching through “to what extent”s and “how far”s
to find page five.
(Should’ve put page numbers in. thought I had.)

There’s a heat glowing from within the paper,
but then again it’s most likely just the
embers dying in my hands.

I can feel the ink sat above the chalky peaks
Like Braille.

I could probably recite this from memory.

“Is that okay?” reads “can you manage this?”
Or it would, if there were any annotations on the processed sheets.
Maybe Elizabeth I just didn’t like men,
But that wouldn’t fill
Three thousand words feel like nothing when I hold it.
A bouquet of synonyms.
Weighty air.

This “no written feedback” stuff is a joke.