The girls answer their cell phones
in the middle of class,
catty, raucous, privileged.
Who knew what so much wrapping
Could hide?
One doe-eyed girl
asks me about my boyfriends
(“Did you talk to them?”)
while the others laugh
at me
because I’m not married yet
She disappears
second semester, her father
sending her to a religious madrasa
as punishment.
In class
my students write about
their anger
and say, “I get angry when
I see a man hit a woman.”
This barren land
spits sand in my face
and blurs the truths
I want to escape.
Author Bio:
Molly Gleeson works as a writing tutor at a community college in Bloomington, Indiana. Previously, she spent seven years teaching English overseas, in China, Japan, and Saudi Arabia. She is working on a memoir of her time in Saudi Arabia, entitled My Heart is a Wilderness.
in the middle of class,
catty, raucous, privileged.
Who knew what so much wrapping
Could hide?
One doe-eyed girl
asks me about my boyfriends
(“Did you talk to them?”)
while the others laugh
at me
because I’m not married yet
She disappears
second semester, her father
sending her to a religious madrasa
as punishment.
In class
my students write about
their anger
and say, “I get angry when
I see a man hit a woman.”
This barren land
spits sand in my face
and blurs the truths
I want to escape.
Author Bio:
Molly Gleeson works as a writing tutor at a community college in Bloomington, Indiana. Previously, she spent seven years teaching English overseas, in China, Japan, and Saudi Arabia. She is working on a memoir of her time in Saudi Arabia, entitled My Heart is a Wilderness.
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