Joey Gould | poetry | Geometer

Geometer
                                                                                         [cw: bullying, smoking/drugs, queerphobia]

Teenage me admired the rules + proofs
as told by Mr. P, who played Pure Moods
to soundtrack every test with his translucent
boombox (it was the style at the time).

He taught me to make as much meaning
as I could from what I knew. If one failed
to label X as whatever, inches squared
or milliliters, he’d shout at them:

what is X? Support hose? Oven puffs?
which lowered the pressure while teaching
the lesson. Mr. P, I was a mess of meth
+ cobwebs who slept through class til you

slapped my skull. I haven’t mentioned how
gay your lilt sang, how much you loved
to prove all shapes congruent to their peers,
or how the pink triangle on your door

made us feel safe. + I say us because
I was a freak. I hung with them
on Mellon street. The day the jocks
sent Wes + John to hospital I hid

behind the neighbor’s barn.
The day that followed I couldn’t prove
anything but acute bloodstains
still on the ground, on my left hand

that S-- had stepped on while I sat
behind a car to smoke a cig.
I doubted schoolyard bullies were really
erstwhile lovers or anxious parallels.

Your class had proved a hundred times
what I could know about euclidean space
was often not enough to keep
from messing up. But still I proofed

+ listened to your teasing us until
it started making sense. Adding up,
you’d say, + the whole class would groan.
S-- had started driving me home

in mirth. He touched the scar
he’d made + you were who I told.
You asked if we were “side-angle-side”
+ I hadn’t considered sides like his.

Oh, honey, it’s like a proof, you said:
you use what you have learned, go
step by step, then check your work
for errors. You learn about his shape.





**2023 Best of the Net nominee