My Extra Face

The teacher told us to write a poem. So I wrote a poem. As a result of writing that poem I found myself with a compulsory appointment with the school psychologist.

I didn’t even know we had a school psychologist.

It was the 1980s. I was in fifth or sixth grade: what people nowadays call a “tween”. Back then I was called a nerd. At best a bookworm, but more like a weirdo. One of those kids who headed for the library at recess unless forced to “go outside and play” at things that broke my glasses and taught me how the frozen ground tastes like biting down on a fork when you fall down and hit your face on it.

In the eighties we really didn’t have the same mental health awareness folks do now. What we did have: after school specials and books for Young Adults that addressed troubling trends like anorexia, “satanic” fantasy games (Dungeons and Dragons), and the dangers of leaving lonely teenagers at home in the suburbs with access to a vehicle, car keys, and knowledge of how to go to sleep forever via carbon monoxide poisoning.

I never fantasized about satanism, starving myself, or sitting alone in a parked car after plugging up the exhaust pipe (we didn’t have a garage), but I might have fantasized about being a writer. But not a POET.

While I never had an urge to write poetry, I enjoyed the assignment and was proud of “My Extra Face”: a poem about having a (metaphorical) mask I pulled out to get through life and social interactions by hiding my true self and feelings.

I wish I still had the poem, but it must be in a file at the elementary school somewhere. A document of self-disclosure I had no idea would lead to concern over my emotional well-being and a series of appointments with a mental health professional. A “shrink” employed by the school district but completely invisible to the entire student body. Unknown by all and nameless to everyone except weirdos like me: disturbed children and little poetry-writing sociopaths, I guess. I never heard of anyone else in our entire school who had to go see the school psychologist.

Writing “My Extra Face” was intrinsically rewarding the day that I cranked it out: one of the few assignments in my entire school history I was able to concentrate on and finish in class. I discovered something I was good at, and loved feeling the words fall into place reflecting something about myself I wouldn’t have otherwise known how to communicate. I unfolded something beautiful, private and true. Something that alarmed my teacher, and indicated something was singularly unhealthy and different about me from everybody else.

I did not make a conscious decision to never write another poem, but any temptation the form might’ve held for me was extinguished by the consequences of revealing “My Extra Face”. I learned too well that poetry is scary, and writing it is like telling everyone that you’re crazy.