Freshmanitis/Poetry Lesson #2

So, it took me a while to post my Freshman-itis assignment because I wanted to make it a sestina, thereby making it poetry lesson #2. Before I post the poem, let me explain the guidelines of a sestina and perhaps you'll see what makes it so difficult. I do not claim to be posting a GOOD sestina, but more like a RAW sestina.

A sestina consists of six stanzas of six lines and concludes with a three line stanza. In the six stanzas, the end words are repeated in a pre-determined order. In the tercet (the three line stanza) all six words are used, two in each line... If the six end words were labeled ABCDEF, the six stanzas would go like this:
1. ABCDEF
2. FAEBDC
3. CFDABE
4. ECBFAD
5. DEACFB
6. BDFECA
and the tercet would go like this:
line one: BE, line two: DC, line three: FA

Born in a Petri Dish

It hasn't been the best day
but it certainly hasn't been the worst--
I have yet to find my messy blonde head
shoved into the toilet. Far better than most
days. I could have a good birthday still--
Even if Spud and Mitzi did forget.

In fact I half expected everyone to forget
that the undesirable child is fourteen today.
While I sit at lunch waiting, perfectly still,
I imagine the ways this day could be worse
and not even come close to being the most
devastating birthday. Because in my head

that honor belongs to the day my little head
pushed its way into the world, quickly forgetting
the warmth I'd known inside and finding the most
chilling cold outside. That very first day
my gray-blue eyes couldn't see the worst
name ever given formulating in my still

exhausted mother's mind. And to this day I'm still
cursed with an unfortunate name and a head
filled to the limit with only the worst
memories imaginable. I will never forget
what it felt like when I arrived on the first day
of public school when it seemed like almost

everyone was laughing and rolling eyes at the most
hideous of all imaginable names-Nebula Amoeba Kowstill.
It should be obvious by now that on the day
this world first saw my precious baby head,
my parents were scientists who refused to forget
for a single day, to leave their work at work. Even worse

the brought their work home in the worst
way, creating a daughter in a dish. Perhaps their most
controversial experiment to day. She won't ever forget
how she came into existence, but she still
has to go on living, reminded constantly in her head
that she was born as only an experiment, knowing each day

could be just a little bit worse. But she goes on because she's still
here, trying to make the most possible headway
in a life best forgotten for another day.