This poem was inspired (if you can call exam invigilators inspiring) by the ubiquitous nature of the scene pictured opposite, and those regrettable moments when imagination wanders during a Maths exam...

 

THE SECRET LIFE OF AN EXAM INVIGILATOR

 

You’ve seen them:

The ones in your exam who daydream,

The Guardians of academe,

Blankly handing paper to teens,

Who deem them slaves to routine.

 

But beneath that wearisome esteem,

They’re plotting their elaborate schemes:

The ways to glean textbooks in thievery,

Or anything that’s possessory.

 

On every steal, their plans contingent,

Their “Godfather’s” punishments, astringent.

Their pockets rattling with protractors.

Tear pages from Maths books, chapter after chapter.

 

Bit by bit they “case the joint”,

The only giveaway the point

When they squeal during an exam,

Having been stabbed by a compass pinpoint.

 

Every single school they target

Loses thousands of its whiteboard markers,

Which the robbers put on the black market

(Or as it’s known to them, “The blackboard market”).

 

Yet, with each season, they set their eyes

On an invigilator’s biggest prize –

The most valuable thing in any hoard –

An Interactive Whiteboard.

 

Sneaking out of an exam to “fetch more paper”,

They pick a classroom lock with a stapler.

They snatch the whiteboard and computer,

While chased by police on their mobility scooter.

 

Adam Woolley