That Room Was Torn Down and Those Adults All Died Decades Ago

You don’t remember anything
About the trip, the visit, or
Even the interview, except

A dark, wood-paneled room, leaded
Glass, a desk where you take a test
Writing answers with a pencil,

Sun through the leaded-glass windows,
And the test doesn’t bother you,
Although it has no clear subject,

Then, a general sensation
Of amiable pleasantness
Among the adults, with no one

Telling you whether you have passed,
But all things seeming to go well,
One of the hinges in your life

And you were already thirteen,
But that’s all the memory left,
And you can’t quite trust your recall