John Tesh and My Childhood Angst

I read this morning that a woman is suing John Tesh for stealing her 9/11 poem for his new album. (That’s pretty funny by itself.) But the incident brought back a painful repressed memory that I will share with you now.

When I was in Grade 7, I wrote a poem. It was a great poem about a hunter who kills a duck. I can’t remember much, but the last three lines were:
“His breath now comes in paces
They all would gladly take his place
A selfish hunter just to please.”
I mean, this was quality literature. The alliteration! The assonance! The personification! Another girl in my class wrote an excellent and funny poem about throwing a paper airplane.

The teacher decided to give a prize for best poem and she won. I was second.

When I got home that night, I picked up an Ontario Teacher’s Federation magazine my dad had brought home. There was the paper airplane poem….attributed to SOMEONE ELSE.

Hah! She hadn’t written it after all! I was so mad and thrilled. I couldn’t wait to tell my teacher. But my parents insisted that nobody likes a snitch and that I shouldn’t tell. I suggested that the magazine be left anonymously on his desk, but again, my parents said I shouldn’t.

I didn’t tell. But I still feel to this day that I should have. What do you think?