On Listening to Your Teacher Take Attendance

The “you” (the speaker) orders herself to “Breathe deep” (Line 1) despite the “fake-lemon antiseptic” (Line 2) that’s been used to clean the room. This opening image clarifies two things: First, the declaration to engage in deep-breathing shows the speaker’s need to calm herself as she anticipates the teacher mispronouncing her last name; this emphasizes that the speaker has experienced this before. The opening image also highlights the exceptional cleanliness of the room. Along with the “antiseptic” (Line 2), the description of “the mopped floors” (Line 3) and “wiped-down doorknobs” (Lines 3-4) create the image of an immaculate environment. This spotlessness is then extended to the surrounding students, who sport “freshly soaped necks / and armpits” (Lines 4-5). However, the “fake-lemon” scent, while describing the cleaner, suggests falsity.

As the reader learns from the title, the speaker is “listening” to the teacher take attendance. While the speaker gives the teacher the benefit of the doubt—he ”means well” (Line 5)—he does in fact do what the speaker fears. He “butchers” (Line 6) her name in front of her peers. This action solidifies the tension that permeates the rest of the poem. The emotional violence of the teacher’s inability to pronounce the name is a dramatic contrast to the previously described clean room and students. Nezhukumatathil has frequently spoken about the mispronunciation of her own name, as well as how she was often the only Asian Indian in her classroom (see interview with Ross Gay in Further Resources). While this poem might be autobiographical, it holds wider universal resonance. The mispronunciation of any name in public might inadvertently cause unwanted or negative attention from others. The poem also addresses the fear of being singled out as different, which immediately shifts group dynamics.

The violence inherent in the word “butchers” (Line 6) is extended: The teacher speaks the name as if there is a “bloody sausage casing stuck / between his teeth” (Lines 7-8). The image of the teacher as a butcher also involves “handprints” (Line 8), presumably bloody, which appear “on his white, sloppy apron” (Line 9). The teacher is careless—emphasized by the word “sloppy” (Line 9)—because he did not ask the speaker how to pronounce her name before attempting to say it, which brings unwanted embarrassment to the speaker. The classmates all “[turn] around to check out / your face” (Lines 10-11). The  speaker, already nervous, now must bravely assure herself that there is “no need to flush red and warm” (Line 11).

The speaker engages in self-soothing by imaginatively changing the scenario to deal with her uncomfortable physical sensations: The classroom is transformed into “one big scallop” (Line 13). The students’ gaze transforms into the “dozens of icy blues” (Line 13) that are the scallop’s multiple eyes. The strangeness of the examination is conjured into an object the speaker can recognize, allowing her a temporary escape. The speaker dives into a memory of “that winter your family / took you to the China Sea” (Lines 14-15), a happy experience. On the vacation, the speaker looked under the water to “gaze at baby clams and sea stars / the size of your outstretched hand” (Lines 16-17). In an interview with Kaveh Akbar, Nezhukumatathil said, “Growing up as one of the only Asian-Americans in most of my school[s] always set me a little apart, always observing. But my parents fostered a sense of being grateful and amazed and wanting to always be curious about the world and its inhabitants so I never truly felt alone” (Akbar, Kaveh. “An Interview with Aimee Nezhukumatathil.” Divedapper, 29 June 2015.). The act of observing for comfort is shown in the poem as the speaker proactively engages in the idea that there is a world greater than her classroom. Comparing the sea stars with the size of her own hand might also allow the speaker to remember that she is not powerless, for sea stars are the primary predators of scallops.

After this memory, fortified by family and animal dynamics, the speaker can then turn back to reality. Even though “all those necks start to crane” (Line 18), the speaker attempts to humanize her peers, explaining, “someone once lathered their bodies, once patted them / dry with a fluffy towel after a bath, set out their clothes” (Lines 19-20). She imagines the other students in a similarly vulnerable state.

However, the speaker remains on guard even as she struggles for equanimity. The poem ends with a series of commands: The speaker must “Think of [the students’] pencil cases” (Line 21) with “sharp pencils” (Line 22). The “pencil cases” (Line 21) are scallop-like because most pencil cases have a clasp or zipper that allows them to open like a pocket, much like a scallop. The “sharp pencils” are reminiscent of the tentacles that surround the edges of the scallop, holding inside the “pink pearl eraser” (Line 22).

In the last line, the speaker tells herself, “Think of their handheld pencil sharpener and its tiny blade” (Line 23). Pádraig Ó Tuama, host of Poetry Unbound, suggests the speaker is “recognizing the violence, the ‘tiny blade’ […] But she’s saying it’s tiny; don’t let this be a big thing” (Ó Tuama, Pádraig. “A Poem About What Grounds You.” The On Being Project, 2020). By contrast, reviewer Shannon Nakai believes “[e]ven the children are culpable of this butchery […] capable of the handheld violence of misunderstanding and distancing” (Nakai, Shannon. “Falling in Love with the World.” Tupelo Quarterly, 2018). In either case, there is a sense that the speaker, a sea star in an ocean of small cruelties, is resilient despite the unfeeling people around her.