Special Ed: voices from a hidden classroom in the rockaways.

• Author: Bernstein, Dennis
• Position: Poem

Special Ed: voices from a hidden classroom in the rockaways Thirty years ago, I struggled to keep them awake days. Thirty years later, they are still keeping me awake nights. Now the noisy classroom is in my head: My kids raise their tiny hands, calling out to be heard. --Dennis Bernstein no tongue in cheek Pierre's on the run from Haiti. He had to leave in a hurry when the soldiers came to cut his mother's tongue out. He says they took her tongue because she talked too much. But Pierre could never get enough; even when she scolded him, it was kisses. some nights he dreams about her tongue, flies it around like a magic carpet, well beyond the reach of his mother's killers. innocent with guilty hands Karen says her own hands have a mind of their own. They come and go as they please. They take long walks and break off violently in her dreams. They pinch and slap and steal and scheme. They crave the feel of matches against gasoline. gloria's dream box I keep my dreams in a dream box under the bed. My sister Carmen says it's just an empty box. Carmen never sees what I see. Her eyes are dark like a night without stars. paulie and sadie play catch Paulie is playing with Sadie at the old age home. He takes out his red rubber ball and puts it firmly into her bone-fisted hands. Then, with an anxious whisper, Paulie urges Sadie to roll him the ball. Sadie smiles like a toothless child when Paulie takes this stance--poised to...