'Chasing the Sun", oil on linen, by Roxanne Steed

In the last few days, I’ve been rereading Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, and thoroughly enjoying it. It has brought to mind, again, the startling fact that I could spend the rest of my life reading only Shakespeare, and never feel dissatisfied or wanting. Somehow, in a manner totally beyond my understanding, Shakespeare was able, 400 years ago, to capture in 30+ plays all the beauty and power of life. Nothing written since then comes even close to matching the elegance and energy I find in his plays. What is especially intriguing to me is the fact that I find total economy present side-by-side with power and loveliness. He wastes no words. Nothing seems to be overdone. Each word is useful and necessary, and each line of poetry carries exactly the weight that it should carry. This is especially interesting to me, living, as I do, in an age when superfluity and extravagance seem to abound in writing (and everything else). Shakespeare was a frugal writer. He understood the beauty of brevity, something we moderns seem to have lost sight of.

I also realized, again, that many Shakespeare plays are rather easily accessible to eighth and ninth grade scholars. For instance, Julius Caesar is a play filled with the kinds of strains and tensions that teenagers constantly feel. Not only that, Shakespeare’s language in this play, though 400 years old, would be remarkably easy for my scholars to understand. As I was reading the lines aloud this morning, I could see in my mind the faces of my scholars next September as they listen to the feelings in the words and sense the power of Shakespeare’s themes. This play, in many ways, could grip them as well as the best beach novel.

REJOICE! IT’S ENGLISH CLASS!

(written December 2006; revised June 2009)

This morning I’m wondering if my students might actually sometimes rejoice during my class. Admittedly it seems a little far-fetched to think of anyone actually rejoicing during English class, but maybe it’s possible. After all, the word simply means “being happy ”, and I surely do hope my students feel happy at least occasionally during my classes. I hope they have a smile on their faces at least some of the time they're with me. Perhaps this is not as implausible as it may at first seem. Maybe my students can rejoice in my class simply because they feel satsified -- satisfied that things in Mr. Salsich’s English class are the way they should be, and that respectable feats are accomplished. My class is not a playground nor an amusement park nor a place where kids can throw up their arms and dance, but perhaps it’s a place where they can feel fulfilled because something good and right is happening. That might be worth rejoicing about. Today I’ll keep a close watch on how often my students smile. I’ll do a “smile survey”, and maybe I’ll be convinced that the kids are, in fact, doing a reasonable amount of cheering as we go through our lessons. They won’t be jumping around with glee, but they might be feeling quietly contented that Room 2 is not a bad place to be. That could be cause for at least some reserved rejoicing.

TEASING
(written on May 16, 2007)

Yesterday I slipped back into an annoying old habit, and I don’t intend to let it happen again today. Without even realizing it, I spent a good part of the day “teasing” my students – prodding, badgering, and pestering them as though I were one of their pals. It’s a behavior I used to exhibit regularly with my students – one which I thought I had left behind for good. I no longer like that kind of behavior in myself, and I hope to cut it out of my teaching style completely. I don’t like the teasing approach to teaching primarily because, when I do it, it suggests a wrong-headed attitude toward my students. When I am teasing them, I am doing it because I have temporarily lost awareness of who and what they are. Instead of seeing their true natures, I’m seeing them as merely physical “objects” that can be prodded, badgered, and pestered. Only a “mechanism” can be prodded, only a “thing” can be badgered, and only an “object” can be pestered. If I was seeing my students as they truly are – as talented, diverse, gifted, and infinitely inventive creations of an infinite universe – I would understand that they are not objects to be teased, but wonders to be appreciated. It’s interesting, in this regard, that the original meaning for tease was “to cut (tissue, for example) into pieces for examination.” This suggests, again, that teasing, at least when I do it, is done to some “thing” that can be taken apart, poked at, fiddled with, studied, and then perhaps cast aside. My students are not things. They are forty-two wonders of the world, and as such, they should be admired, respected, and cherished, not prodded, badgered, and pestered.

To my loyal readers:
Sorry I haven't posted anything in the last few days. I've been totally down and out with the flu. However, things are looking up now, and I should be back online soon.

Thanks for checking in.

Hamilton Salsich

Courage in the Classroom

I like to think of my scholars as heroes. I see it in my classroom everyday – the boldness of young people trying their best to climb the steep trails of serious reading and writing. They’re only 13 and 14, but in their intrepid approach to my difficult assignments they act like valiant adults. They sometimes appear to me as warriors instead of just confused and struggling teenagers. Someone might doubt this claim, since it’s only an English class, and they’re only eighth and ninth graders. How can I seriously suggest that these kids are heroic? In answer, I can only say that one of the definitions for ‘brave’ is “possessing courageous endurance", and I see a lot of this kind of fortitude in their willingness to stay with a daunting assignment until it’s completed. They may not be scaling mountain peaks in my classroom, but they are bravely dealing, day by day, with demanding circumstances. Even just sitting up straight, which I require in all my classes, necessitates a certain kind of heroism. My scholars won’t win any medals for bravery, and no one is going to cheer for the valiant acts they perform (except me), but I see them as young soldiers of serious English scholarship, and I’m proud of their valor.

Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen

Catherine Morland arrives at the Abbey, and is somewhat disappointed by its relative plainness.

This sentence deserves examination:

"A sudden scud of rain, driving full in her face, made it impossible for her to observe anything further, and fixed all her thoughts on the welfare of her new straw bonnet; and she was actually under the abbey walls, was springing, with Henry's assistance, from the carriage, was beneath the shelter of the old porch, and had even passed on to the hall, where her friend and the general were waiting to welcome her, without feeling one awful foreboding of future misery to herself, or one moment's suspicion of any past scenes of horror being acted within the solemn edifice."

1) The sentence is extremely long, but it is totally clear and grammatically correct. Long sentences like this (as long as there are not too many) always enhance a piece of writing.

2) The repetition of 'was ... was ... was' is extremely effective, adding rhythm and balance to the sentence.

Patterns in the World and in Writing

I have often marveled at the large role patterns play in the universe, including writing. Looking around us, we see patterns everywhere – the patterns of the seasons, the patterns of night and day, the patterns embedded in all life forms. Indeed, nature seems to operate under the supervision of patterns. If we looked with a microscope into the smallest cell, we would be amazed by the intricate patterns hidden there. They’re hidden in good writing, too. Each sentence is built on a pattern we call syntax, the clear and careful arrangement of words so they can be understood. A good paragraph, too, contains a pattern that makes it easy for the reader to detect the overall meaning. Even an 800 page novel must be constructed using patterns that will appeal to the artistic tastes of the reader: the balancing and counterbalancing of the characters; the sequential rise and fall of the plot; the parallel themes that engage and enhance each other. One of my happiest jobs as a teacher is to help the scholars improve their ability to see this vital role of patterns in writing. It’s often like something beautiful gradually being uncovered before their eyes. They’ve been readers for many years, but it’s my lucky task to reveal to them more about the lovely patterns that lie beneath the words.

WRITING WHILE SPEAKING

This morning, I received a wonderful gift from my son on Father’s Day: a speech recognition kit for my computer. I do a lot of writing, so it’s intriguing that I can now write by simply speaking. I can talk, and the talk instantly becomes sentences, paragraphs, and essays on the screen. It’s that easy, and it’s that fast. In fact, I saw a video yesterday about speech recognition, and the moderator, a college professor, estimated that students can write essays using speech recognition in about one third of the time it would take them to type the essay on a keyboard. Already, as I write this first document using speech recognition, I can see that this is probably true. The sentences spin across my computer screen way faster than any words that I could type. It’s another miracle in this age of technological marvels – a miracle that could make writing almost as effortless and relaxing as talking.

THE WINNERS . . . AND THE REST

Lately, I’ve been noticing, and thinking about, people who don’t seem to be winners. I pass them each day – the people with anxious looks, stooping shoulders, dragging feet, those for whom life seems to be a crushing weight. I see them in the news – the growing throng of those with no job, the vast numbers of destitute families, the millions of forsaken refugees. They seem to be ubiquitous -- these people who carry such heartbreaking burdens on their shoulders, who seem to have totally lost the game of life. Sadly, I see them in my own English classes, too, though certainly not to such extremes. I see the kids who have no friends, who spend recess and lunch by themselves, lost in their own fragile worlds. I see the students who never seem to “make it” in school, the ones who get C’s semester after semester, who never seem to be “winners” at anything. Sadly, it’s so easy to overlook these kids. The winners -- the ‘A’ students, the class leaders, the social butterflies -- take up so much of the spotlight that the ordinary, everyday kids get left in the shadows. Like the outcasts of the world – the poor, the homeless, the eccentric – these forgotten students must struggle by themselves to bring some distinction to their lives.

"A Lost Lover" by Sarah Orne Jewett

This is a touching, unadorned story about loneliness and compassion. A young woman comes to live with her elderly aunt, and becomes intrigued by the story of the old woman's lost lover from years ago. The young woman, too, has a lover who is far away in the navy, and she feels compassion for her cousin's loss and loneliness.

"Northanger Abbey" by Jane Austen

Catherine is on her way to the Abbey with the Tilneys, and now she is riding in the 'curricle' (a light two-wheeled carriage pulled by two horses)) with young Henry, who is an expert driver. Here is a sentence describing his skill, but I have substituted a few words to transform it to a sentence about how I try to teach:

"But the merit of the [classroom] did not all belong to the [students]; [the teacher taught] so well -- so quietly -- without making any disturbance, without parading to [the students], or [raising his voice] at them..."

"Communication Gap", oil on masonite, by Sharman Owings

GAPS IN THE CLASSROOM

It often occurs to me that I need more “gaps” in my classes. That may sound somewhat negative, but according to one dictionary, a gap is simply “an unfilled space or interval”, and surely my young scholars would appreciate more of those during our sometimes drawn out English classes. Surely they would be grateful for an occasional brief opportunity to do absolutely nothing – to neither listen nor speak nor think, but just sit in stillness and peace. In the midst of the veritable cannonade of words and ideas that is a part of every class, they would welcome a chance to sit back and take a breath. It’s odd that I don’t realize this more thoroughly, and put it into practice. How hard is it to understand that gaps – interludes when nothing happens – are vital to the proper functioning of young minds – and any minds, for that matter? Don’t we have a long gap every night in which to settle and refresh our lives through sleep? And, at the other end of the spectrum, isn’t there a brief gap in between each word we say, so that our words can be understandable to others? Without the gap of sleep, we would soon die, and without the gaps between words, our speech would sound like lunacy. Gaps are a vital part of reality, from the gaps between each breath to the gaps between the outermost stars. Why, then, do I so often insist on running a gap-less English class: dashing, shoving, and elbowing ahead in a nonstop manner, breathlessly pushing the scholars to the finish line? What about a chance to relax and think deeply about what’s been said? What about a deep breath now and then?

"Northanger Abbey" by Jane Austen

In the quote below, which originally referred to Mr. and Mrs. Allen's feelings about having the young people leave Bath, I have changed some words to suggest my feelings about losing the graduating class of 2009. (My apologies to all Jane Austen fans.)

"[Mr. Salsich was] sorry to lose [his] young friend[s], whose good humour and cheerfulness had made [him] a valuable companion, and in the promotion of whose enjoyment [his] own had been gently increased."

AUTOMATIC REACTING VS. CONSCIOUS RESPONDING

It’s always hard to pin-down one main goal for a coming school year, but right now, in mid-June, I’m thinking about this as a goal for next year: more conscious responding and less automatic reacting. If I had to name one problem that most reliably plagues both my students and me day after day, it might be the tendency to react quickly, without much serious thought. In our thoughts and in our speech, I’m afraid we often jump into the action too quickly, too heedlessly. Not only might the old slogan “first thought, best thought” apply to us, but “first words, best words” too – except that they’re not the best thoughts nor the best words. They’re just the first that come to our minds and lips, and so we grab them. This year, perhaps my scholars and I can make a pact to think and speak with care. Perhaps we can agree to use our minds the way old-time gold miners used their pans, carefully and calculatingly swirling our ideas around as we search for the specks of gold. Maybe we can speak our words the way we might pick flowers – choosing always the best ones, and passing over the weak and wilting ones. Maybe we can be conscious instead of automatic, wide-awake instead of half-asleep in the dreamland of partially-grown thoughts and fool's gold words.

"Northanger Abbey" by Jane Austen

Catherine is very upset because Isabella, who is engaged to Catherine's brother, has been flirting with Captain Tilney, the brother of Catherine's love interest.

"The Law of Life" and "Nam-bok the Unveracious" by Jack London

I read these short stories this morning, enjoying the excellent inagery and the straightforward and clear style of writing. Here in late spring in pleasant Rhode Island, it was fun to imagine the snowy and frozen scenery in the Klondike of the late 19th century.

The Arrow and the Bow

Years ago, a wise book I was reading suggested that we need both an arrow and a bow in our lives: we need to be sharp and piercing like the arrow, but we also need the gentleness and smoothness symbolized by the bow. We need to be strong, but also tender – incisive but also patient. The arrows of our thoughts and words can pierce to the heart of things only if launched by the supple bow of gentleness and openness. This, of course, is true in teaching. I have to be somewhat like a warrior when I’m with my scholars, a brave leader who’s not afraid to launch arrows of praise, guidance, or reproof – not afraid to pierce when things need piercing. However, the arrows will float feebly to the ground unless launched by the potent force of kindness and consideration. Firmness without the power of gentleness behind it is no power at all.

"Brownstone Kitty, Catching a Breeze", oil on board, by Chretien

GENTLENESS AND GENUINENESS

Over the long years of my classroom career, perhaps the biggest change in my teaching style has been a gradual increase in gentleness. I used to be an aggressive and confrontational teacher; now I tend to be affable and conciliatory. I’ve moved down from the jagged peaks of brusqueness to the valley of easygoingness. I guess I’ve slowly learned that friendliness makes better scholars than belligerence. What’s interesting to me is that I believe I’m now a more genuine teacher, one who has a more authentic and honest classroom manner. In the past, when I was making classroom proclamations and assertions in my typically ostentatious manner, I was playing a role I thought I needed to play. I was an actor and the scholars were the audience. I was as far from being my true self as August is from December. Now, thank goodness, I’m just me – just an honestly unpresumptuous teacher who often hasn’t a clue what he should do next, but who knows this teaching profession is the greatest work in the world. Instead of playing some counterfeit role, I’m playing the happy and chancy game called teaching. Some days I win, some days I lose, but either way, I do it with gentleness. It seems to me, after all these years, that gentleness is the only proper approach to my work with teenagers. Only people who know (or think they know) all the answers to all the questions use force and belligerence to make things happen. I know almost no answers, so I use gentleness. Like a little breeze, I blow around the classroom, in and out among the scholars, hoping I can stir up some new thoughts and waft a little learning along.

"Broom Closet", watercolor, by Andy Smith

ONE TEACHER’S ALPHABET:

R is for Reserved

Being a reserved teacher is one of my professional goals, but that wasn’t always the case. In my early years in the classroom, I was anything but reserved in my words and actions. Back then, I thought teaching was all about getting scholars excited, and that meant teaching them with fervor that bordered on frenzy. I didn’t know the meaning of self-possession or moderation. Ranging around the classroom like a mishmash of preacher and clown, I was effusive and vociferous in an obsessive way. Now, it's different. Now I treasure the discipline that has enabled me to be a soft and understanding force in the classroom instead of a hard and reckless one. I’m a quiet teacher the way certain rivers are quiet: they flow irresistibly onward but boaters hardly notice the power. I try to be restrained like morning is restrained: daylight arrives almost imperceptibly, which is exactly the way I try to teach. The word ‘reserved’ can also refer to something that is set apart for a future or special use, and sometimes that’s how I see myself in my classroom. I want to be held in reserve, in the background, ready for any situation where the scholars need some particular guidance or support. They should be the center of attention, not me. I’m the searchlight they can use to find truths in a sudden darkness, the pickaxe they can occasionally wield to break through an obdurate story or poem. The scholars are the craftsmen, and I’m the tools in the toolbox, the broom in the closet (see painting above). As they create their interpretations and understandings each day in English class, I remain nearby, quiet and reserved, like the silent overhead lights that make things easier to see and appreciate.

"Bowl of Soup and Silver Spoon", oil on linen, by Marie Fox

“Cooking the School Year in the Summer”

Thinking back on the just-finished school year, I’m reminded of something I read somewhere that said we should think of our lives as an enormous pot in which we can slowly ‘cook’ all of our experiences – the best and the worst – until they become a nutritious soup. In that sense, I think I better do some cooking this summer. Since the pot of my life is large enough (or should be) to comfortably hold all the successes and failures of the school year, all I need to do is get a slow fire going, sit back, and let the whole year softly simmer. The process can’t be rushed. I can’t quickly select helpful truths about teaching from the past year, the way you might pick a bouquet of flowers. No -- the good and the bad, the winning lesson plans and the flops, the classroom triumphs and the barefaced defeats, must all be cooked together until the truth of all of it blends together in the pot. Everything counts in this soup of truth; nothing can be left out; it all must work together to make a helpful, revitalizing meal. I guess I better start the fire soon, because I need to partake of this feast before the students come back in September.

ON TEACHING AND LEARNING:

“An OCD Teacher?”

If I went to a therapist, I might be declared a victim of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, for the truth is that I am obsessed with teaching. Today is graduation day for our school, the end of a long and exhausting year of teaching, a day when sane teachers are sprawling on couches in an attempt to begin the recovery and restoration process, and what am I doing? Thinking about my curriculum for next year! I’m lounging on my couch all right, but I have my laptop with me and I’m reading an essay by Robert Louis Stevenson, wondering if it might be a good choice for 9^th graders next year. I taught my last class of the year two days ago, and I’m already thinking about September. A therapist might suggest that I resist this obsession with teaching. She might suggest taking some time off to reenergize myself – to get completely away from my work so I can come back to it, maybe in July, with fresh energy. She might encourage me to plunge into other interesting pursuits, like bicycling, reading, hiking, even drawing or painting. In other words, she might say (though in a more polite way) “Get a life.” However, I have to confess that my response would probably be something like this: “I already have a life, and it’s a vastly fascinating one. I am involved in the fine art and science of teaching, and I find it so absorbing that I have time for little else. It’s like a fascinating hobby for me. It’s not a job; it’s a passion. Some men are passionate about cars, or baseball, or hunting; I’m passionate about teaching. I can’t get enough of it. It’s the end of the school year, and I’m sad because I’ll miss it. What would a guy who was fervent about cars do if he couldn’t work with his beloved machines for three whole months? What would a baseball nut do if he couldn’t see a game for more than 90 days? I’m sad that my school is closed for the summer, but if I can’t teach again until September, at least I can plan, devise, tinker, study, revise, write in this journal, and plan some more. That’s how I’ll have a fulfilling and inspiring summer. The beach is beautiful and riding my bike will be a pleasure, but summer is my time to rebuild myself as a teacher. If that’s OCD, then I’ll take it. There are worse illnesses I could have -- and I happen to enjoy this one.”

Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen

Finally, with the book half finished, the title comes into the story! Catherine will be joining her friend Eleanor Tilney (and Eleanor's brother, who is Catherine's secret love) for an extended stay at their home, which is called Northanger Abbey.

This installment (read online courtesy of dailylit.com) contained some spectacular Austen sentences. I try to teach my students to use parallelism, symmetry, and balance in their writing, and nowhere are these qualities more beautifully displayed than in sentences like these:

"With all the chances against her of house, hall, place, park, court, and cottage, Northanger turned up an abbey, and she was to be its inhabitant. Its long, damp passages, its narrow cells and ruined chapel, were to be within her daily reach, and she could not entirely subdue the hope of some traditional legends, some awful memorials of an injured and ill-fated nun."

TEACHING JOURNAL

Field Day, June 11, 2009

 

     Today we held our annual end-of-the-year Field Day – a day of recreation – and it started me thinking about the meaning of that word. Recreation, based on the origin of the word, is a time of re-creation – an opportunity to start over, a chance to remake ourselves. When we relax in the enjoyment of harmless games, we are giving our lives a chance to feel the energies of youth again. Playing a silly game like the beanbag toss (which I supervised today) can be like a small rebirth. I was thinking of this as I watched the children taking pleasure in the happy activities of Field Day. It was like seeing hundreds of little people being rebuilt before my eyes. After 9 months of seriously hard labor in their classrooms, the students were taking their tense and tired lives apart and enthusiastically putting them back together. With every toss and jump and sprint, a little more freshness and newness came back to their lives on this day of spirited recreation.  

 

GUIDANCE

 

She said he should strum

a mandolin in a small room

so the room will sing.

She said he should turn the pages of a book

like he was lifting veils

in front of lovely faces.

She said he should kneel

at the feet of every feeling

and climb the trails of kindness.   

"The Primary School, New Hope, Kasana, Uganda", oil, by Robin Weiss

Teaching Journal

Day 161, Tuesday, June 9, 2009

 

     Today, the last day of official classes, brought a dash of sadness with it, but, as usual, it was a selfish kind of sadness, the kind with a lot of ‘I’ and ‘me’ in it. I felt sad because I wouldn’t be the English teacher for many of these good scholars next year. They wouldn’t return in September to sit with me in my classroom. I wouldn’t have the pleasure of watching them continue to grow as scholars of reading and writing. I wasn’t sad for the kids, just for me. I find it somewhat sickening that, after all these years, I still get stuck in a small, egocentric place like this – a place where little me feels downtrodden and forlorn because I didn’t get my way. Why can’t I see, at age 67, that life is not about me, but about all of life? Why can’t I realize that, while I’m reeling around in my self-centered sorrow, some other human beings – my young scholars – are looking forward to great happiness at their new schools? Why does it so often have to be all about me? It’s disgusting, and I feel like kicking myself -- but that’s selfish too, because while I’m pay attention to berating myself, I’m forgetting that the universe is infinitely bigger than just me and my little worrisome world. The vast universe is beautiful and perfect today, just as it was yesterday and will be for all the tomorrows – including in September, when my departing scholars will meet their magnificent new schools, and a new group of willing scholars will take their seats in my classroom. 

WHERE IT ALWAYS HAS BEEN

 

For her, friendship has persisted.

In the praise she feels from the sunrise,

in the serenades she hears

as she cruises on her bicycle

across the brother and sister streets,

in the clusters of grapes she savors

as often as possible – in all this

there is the sound of friendship

passing through her life like quiet cars.

She listens to the lyrics

of flowing water over dishes in the sink,

and it says that friendship

will find us when we’re lost.

Her life wears flowered skirts

because friendship insists

on staying where it is,

where it always has been.

FEELING WEALTHY

 

He collects baseball cards

like they’re shining silver dollars.

He carries them carefully

in his front pockets.

He feels wealthy with his cards –

his Musial, his mint-condition Mays,

his Slaughter, a card

kids would kill to have.

He likes to sit

beneath the successful sweet-gum tree

and talk to his cards:

Say hey, Willie.

Pound one over the pavilion, Stan.

Enos, show me how to hustle home

from first on a single.

 

These days

he strides down Summit Street

in style.

 

"Sunset Ride", oil on masonite, by Candy Barr

Teaching Journal

Day 160, Monday, June 8, 2009

 

     I made it a point today to not be a ‘blurter’ in class – to not always speak my thoughts as soon as they arose. Strangely, it’s one of my disconcerting habits that’s been hardest to break. For the first three decades of my teaching career, I was the best of the blurters. I taught in a freestyle way, shooting from the hip. Words flew off my lips as fast as thoughts arose in my mind. In a way, I was an out-of-control teacher, a cowboy riding the range of English teaching, and I let my horse -- my mouth -- go pretty much wherever it wanted. It’s been a hard habit to break, but today I reined in my impulsive voice fairly well. It’s important to me, because teaching is about discipline, self-control, quietness, and – most of all – selflessness. A teacher who blurts is a teacher who thinks too much of himself – thinks his  thoughts and words are way more important than they actually are. As the years have passed, I’ve learned that my thoughts and words are just very small parts of the infinite process called teaching and learning. Consequently, I’ve tried to put my ‘self’ farther and farther in the background in order to allow the other important educational forces to do their quiet work. I’ve tightened the reins on my words. I now speak more slowly, more quietly, and much less often than I used to. An old maxim says that a good teacher speaks only when a student asks a question, and that’s the kind of teaching I’m aiming for. The more I move toward silence, the more my scholars will be able to speak. Today, because I avoided blurting, I probably said half the number of words I said yesterday. Maybe tomorrow I can cut it in half again. Maybe a silent teacher in Room 2 isn’t too far away.  

SOMETHING SPECIAL

 

The grass is dressed 

in its finest green,

the trees have their blossoms on,

and the sky is showing

some matchless clouds.

Even houses are dressed

to stand in the sunlight.

His arms, folded like friends,

are wearing sunlight

like a luxurious shirt. 

 

CONNECTIONS

 

A wild wind is a friend for him,

and the steam of a soggy day

can start his heart sending signals.

He prays to the modest sunshine,

to the sighing of shoes

on the supermarket floor,

to the tales the world tells him.

The events of an unfolding hour

are hands he loves to hold.

 

CONTENTMENT

 

He’s got what he needs –

veins full of force inside,

and a world of wonders outside.

He gets gifts everyday:

a quiet call from a bird,

the perfect flute of someone’s voice,

so many free breaths of air.

He’s rich with rewards.

Just now a bee in a bright shirt

blew by him,

and a breeze came across his arms. 

Teaching Journal

Day 159, Friday, June 5

Today I will write about my love for grammar rules. 999 people out of 1,000 (including my long-suffering students) would probably gag at the mention of grammar rules, but I honestly love them. I guess it’s because I love words. They're just small collections of letters on a page, just spoken groups of sounds, but words carry enormous power. In fact, words, to me, are close to the center of power in the universe -- because they are born from thoughts, and no other force is as mighty as a thought. Words are more explosive, more creative, than the strongest winds and waves. Words, not weapons, cause wars, and words make true love way better than bodies do. Grammar rules being the guidelines for how to employ these potent forces called words, it’s logical that I would enjoy investigating and understanding them. People who love engines love to know how they work, and I feel the same about words. Sit me down with a glass of wine, some pretzels, and a grammar book, and I’ll be content. Tell me how you use commas with participles and gerunds in your writing, and I’ll sit back and listen with pleasure.

"And God said ... "

MP3 File

 

THE DAY HE WAS BORN IN THE PARK

 

There was a squirrel

sitting in his best posture.

There were praises being sung

by a plane passing overhead.

A small girl’s laughs

lit up the lives of those

who heard her, and happiness

strolled around in its invisible way.

It was his first moment

as a miracle. It was

the rosy face of the world

staring at him suddenly.

It was the things of this life

cheering for themselves.