Repression

There’s nowhere to cry in college

except silently in the dorm’s unisex bathroom,

crumpling onto the toilet like a wad of used paper...

wishing you could fall in and drown.

Sensing the tears bubble up,

You tilt your head back and squeeze your lids shut,

willing the hot brine to reabsorb

In vain.

You allow yourself one minute.

Sixty seconds to suffocate, stifle, swallow, silence sobs.

Then wipe away the salt mines from your ruddy cheeks

as you stare in the mirror at your pitiful swamp eyes,

wimpy lashes dangling haphazardly from the corners.

You hardly recognize yourself.

A haze of self-loathing fogs up the mirror.

The girl across the hall’s alarm goes off.

It’s 1 AM.

What the hell is she waking up for at 1 AM?

It’s a tinny, recorded sound of a dog barking.

Her beloved puppy from home, you imagine.

She doesn’t turn it off.

Guess she isn’t here.

Guess she’s at her boyfriend’s place tonight.

Incessantly

it barks barks barks barks barks barks barks barks barks barks barks

from the other side of a locked door,

brainwashing you as it rings in your ears.

Your exhausted mind throbs to the relentless repetition.

It’s even worse than the mocking pornographic symphony

of whimpers and moans

when her boyfriend stays the night.

Your tears shrivel up.

Fire broils in your belly –

that fire that fuels you through this misery of days.

Before you flush the wretched thought away with your emotions,

before you look in the mirror

and paste on another Ivy League smile,

you imagine suffocating the bitch.

Shutting the damn dog up.