[a+]

While you were kneeling in morning's Adhan
droning like a foghorn from the nearby mosque tower,
I was scanning last week's lecture notes,
bells quaking sunrise from the campus library,
right hand brushing breakfast-breath with Arm & Hammer.
While you were dressing Hajj-simple for judgment,
I was pulling into yesterday’s skinny-jeans and t-shirt.
While you were strapping on an explosive vest of glory,
I was cramming a bag full of yellow-tagged textbooks.
While you were climbing out a back window
toward a crow-red sunrise to town,
I was hop-scotching down a tricky staircase
and dashing out a back door to 7:30 class.
While you were jolting magnetically into the heart
of red-light-green-light-cell-phone-coffee-drone-taxi-cab,
I was zigging blurry pedestrian sidewalk traffic
and j-zagging cars of caffeinated road rage.
While you were peering skyward through city smog to heaven,
lungs contracting a final faint "Allahu Akbar,"
I was tumbling into a desk in the front row,
gasping and blinking hyped eyes to focus.
While your thumb fumbled a button and you went POP!
in a burst of concrete and muted faces,
like black confetti or a flock of freaked pigeons,
I was pumping the eraser of a mechanical pencil,
Quiz 8 projected and glowing white on the overhead.