dead mice in the art class

"we are going to take the
dead mouse
and dip it into paint
and print with it"
says the instructor,
a willowy blond young
man with tight pants
and broad shoulders and
otherwise hyper-sexual
features.
"we are using the mouse
because I am interested
in your exploring your
natural feelings of revulsion
toward certain things
and perhaps mastering
them."
"The only
colors you may use when
you dip your mice are black
and blue," he says. "Then you
press your paint-dipped mouse
onto the paper once or twice
or as many times as you
like." I am outraged. My
artistic freedom is being
constrained. Two colors!
One of them not really a color!
One of them, in fact, the very negation of
color. He hands me my
mouse. His fingertips brush
mine and linger a few seconds.
"You can use different shades
of blue," he says to me, and to
the class as a whole.
We all seem appeased. My mouse
stinks. It has the smell of
rot. Students are pluckily
picking up their mice and dipping
them and pressing them onto
paper. The smell
is ghastly.
"Do you find all this disgusting?"
the instructor asks, hopefully.
I actually see a maggot crawl out
of my mouse
and leave an intriguing trail
as it crawls across my paper.
I title my picture
"Accidental Art"
and get a big fat A.
The instructor seems
ecstatic at what a good job
I did  the instructor seems
ecstatic at what a good
job everyone did, except for
the one or two who wouldn't
touch the dead mice.
He gave them rubber mice
though, started their
grade at C, and subtracted from
there accordingly.

--Carl Miller Daniels (This poem appeared in Slipstream, issue 16, 1996.)