PHYSICAL EDUCATION Poem by Claudia Emerson

Her bodily growth is stunted by the long want of exercise, and when, on attaining womanhood, she is brought out, her complexion is pale and wax-like.
The coach has grown larger with each decade
until, wrestler-fat, she travels to the hockey field

in a golf cart rattled with whistles, rackets,
sticks, and cleats. From behind the wheel, she metes out

laps like lashes, and terrified, they circle
the school the way water, not yet furious,

trains around an impatient drain: run -
run - you girls, you stupid, stupid girls.