By Elizabeth Burton
I tell my students about the research:
stand in the Wonder Woman pose
for three minutes before something stressful
and you’ll have a better time of it,
make them try it out on the first day of class,
giggles suppressed when they realize
I’m serious.
They’re young, this class of mine,
looking for the real world.
I sprinkle in things
they want to learn
between where commas go,
goal-setting, growth mindset,
how to improve their lives by
improving their posture.
One of the men points out
Superman did the pose first,
but we agree he’s being pedantic
and even he laughs.
Wonder Woman is our patron saint,
her lasso of truth sneaking through
their discussions and research papers.
Some roll their eyes, but some,
some embrace what I’m giving them,
envision themselves flying
in a plane only they can see
to a land where none of the things
they fear for their futures can find them.
Elizabeth Burton lives, writes, and teaches writing in rural Western Kentucky. She holds an MFA from the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University, and her work has appeared in The Louisville Review, The Roanoke Review, Valparaiso Fiction Review, Still: The Journal, JMWW, Split Lip Magazine, among others. She has been nominated several times for Pushcart Prizes and Best of the Net and has been awarded several writing grants from the Kentucky Foundation for Women. She shares her life with five cats, three dogs, two horses, a bird, and a husband who wonders why he's always last on these lists. You can find her at @elizabethburtonwriter on Instagram.
