Show and Tell

Acting class
And the teacher was a frank atheist
And all eyes on me.

How could they ask me to do this?
Inside a storm of wills,
And all eyes on me.
I moved not a whit.
Very, very still.

"Perhaps if you tried telling instead of showing us?"

So I did. I moved. I told.

I shared:
Seventeenth birthday.
Asking for a song.
A silent, secret prayer.

I shared:
My seventeen year old fingers,
Picking up my birthday card,
The paper fluttering out.

I shared:
My mother pulling out her guitar,
For a newly seventeen John.
Birthday paper in her hand
Headlined by words: "John's Song".

Now, today, in class,
All eyes on me,
On my private memories.
On a Heaven sent song,
On a miraculous answer to prayer.
On a devout side I closet at all costs.

It's unfair they chose this memory.
It's unfair my profession demands
Even my secrets.

I struggle to keep talking.
Even voice and still face.
I show, I tell. I sing.