Cliche

a funny, balding man bisecting variables at the blackboard,

his nasal voice dictating geometric means.

And I, the proverbial starving artist,

in silk and jeans and black boots,

last seat, chewed-on pencil, bored expression.

"Let's take a look-see at number twenty-eight."

Glinting glasses.

But I am unwilling, and defiantly scribble this on my homework.

Somehow, it clicks a key in me and I find myself disgusted to be here,

to be a textbook artistic rebel.

So I turn to the book with a wry kind of feeling

and focus on the Pythagorean Theorem.