Dentist, Mexico, 1959
The room was big, not small.
The noise was big, not small.
The light was small, not big.
The light
Caught me as I sat, a spotlight
I had seen in the movies, aimed
At those prison escapees running
As fast and as hard as they could.
I thought about it.
I looked around, starting a plan.
But then I saw el señor doctor.
He would have been the ringmaster
Had this been the circus, and had
He not looked the way he looked.
This man was sad first, a sad man,
A doctor second,
A dentist now. He did not want
To cause me the certain pain
He was about to cause me,
Be the tiger-lion he was about to become
In the eyes and mouth of a little boy,
In the long-lingering roar of imagination
He knew and I knew
We were at the edge of.
