IT'S ST. PATRICK'S DAY

"Bells of Ireland", watercolor by Linda McCoy

It’s St. Patrick’s day,

and for him it’s a day

for the sounds of spring.

He listened this morning

as water went through the pipes

with the rush

of revived rivers,

and he noticed

that the frig motor 

had found a youthful hum. 

Even his bow ties

swished in his hands

as he searched through them

for something green.

MAZES INTRICATE

“Mystical dance, which yonder starry sphere
Of planets, and of fixed, in all her wheels
Resembles nearest, mazes intricate,
Eccentrick, intervolved, yet regular
Then most, when most irregular they seem.”

     -- John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book V

Milton is here describing the dances of the angels, and my students are certainly no angels, but still, I find something in this passage that prompts me to think of their sometimes obscure and idiosyncratic writing. I push for the kind of closely controlled writing that will win them friends among their future teachers, but I do admit to having a fondness for the lightheartedness and pure foolishness I sometimes see in their essays. Their writing occasionally appears to be a maze made just so their unsuspecting teacher can have the fun of finding himself fully lost among the words.  I’ve often wandered for many minutes among student sentences, searching for the path to their meaning. From one perspective – that of the efficient, commonsensical teacher – this is not a pleasant experience, but from the perspective of a person who loves a little frivolity in life, these unskillful and rowdy sentences can bring a blessing in the midst of an otherwise undistinguished school day. Assuming the students are trying their best to fulfill the requirements of the assignment, I can make allowances for occasional casualness and high spirits in their writing. Sometimes, in fact, I find the best and deepest sense right in the midst of some maze-like sentences. Like the angels’ dances, the students’ sentences, “when most irregular they seem”, sometimes show a strange kind of young-looking radiance.

HE SAW A SMALL PERSON

(for Annie)

He saw a small person

at ease inside her,

and he saw the city

in silence around them,

cars settled into quietness,

complete stillness in stores and bars,

the hush of kindness

in the sky above,

the considerate stars and planets

so still, staring down

at this small someone

resting inside her.

HIS BIRD FEEDER FOUND A WAY

His bird feeder found a way

to win some happiness for him,

simply by swaying softly

as the birds

brought their needs to it.

He held in his heart

a space the size of Texas

for things that sway –

a feeder, trees in winds,

his little but valiant life,

and the birds

that bring the benevolence

of their lives

to just outside his window.

WHAT I NEED

"Morning Pasture", oil on board, by David Larson Evans

Like most teachers, I sometimes feel ill at ease during class because I seem to need something that I don’t have, but usually this thought comes to my rescue: all I ever need is a change of thought. It is, for sure, a strange fact that I frequently seem to have countless needs during class – for a superior lesson, for an advanced set of behavior benchmarks, even for a new class of smarter and more amenable students. I can easily fall into the mindset of making up new needs each time a crisis seems to occur. The secret to recovering from this frame of mind is the straightforward truth that fresh and enriching thoughts are all I ever have need of. A simple change in a teacher’s thinking can instantly sweep a classroom clean of a sense of confusion and failure, and suddenly all is as new as morning. The change can be as instantaneous as turning on a lamp in a gloomy room -- and it is the only change I will ever need.

ONE DAY HE DECIDED

 One day he decided

to search for the total truth,

so he set out on a morning

that made the world a miracle,

and soon there were sparks

of thoughts inside him

and crowds of words

that wished to be free,

so he sent them forth

to find the full truth,

but what they found

was simply this person and that person

and the poise of things like
lightbulbs and pebbles,

so the words just sat
and passed the time,

small words 
such as “here” and “now”.  

IT WAS JUST A BELT

It was just a belt hanging from a hook,

but as he stared at it,

something about it began to shine.

There was silence in the room,

and sunshine,

and this strange belt

that brought news and knowledge

about the brightness of things.

Then a thought in his mind

made a little light,

almost like life itself,

and then a sweater beside the belt

seemed reborn as it hung

on its hanger in silence.

TEACHING WITH ACQUIESCENCE

"Prairie School", oil on board, by Don Gray

“It is this almost pugnacious acceptance of reality that distinguishes him…”

-- Michael Sadlier, in Anthony Trollope: A Commentary

Until I read Mr. Sadlier’s essay this morning, I would never have considered using the words “acquiescent” and “pugnacious” in a discussion of successful teaching, but he used them so appropriately in his treatise on the Victorian novelist that I begin wondering whether the good teacher must not always be, you might say,  pugnaciously acquiescent. It’s thought-provoking that the word “acquiesce” derives from the Latin word for “quiet”, for it suggests that an acquiescent person is simply one who finds more reasons for inner peace and quiet than for unease and apprehension. The word literally means “to be at rest”, which summons up a picture of a teacher who treats whatever happens in the classroom as a worthy- of-note occurrence that should be quietly welcomed and walked around and appraised. This is a teacher who knows that nothing can be gained by giving battle, but that everything is won through simple acceptance. However, this is not a submissive and spineless acceptance, but rather a pugnacious one – the kind of acquiescence that says, in feisty tones, “Yes, I’m brave enough to say yes to life as it shows itself to me in the classroom, life as it truly is.” It is a courageous kind of acquiescence, more willing to wonder and marvel at the thoughts and deeds of students than to condemn and castigate them. Of course, there will occasions when the students deserve the teacher’s censure for one reason or another, but the censure should be given with the same humble acquiescence -- the same sense of quietly accepting what simply needs to be done. A teacher can be both tough and soft, both stern and merciful. It’s like being sweet-tempered but with boxing gloves on.

ON TUESDAY

"Last Light Belle Isle", oil, by Stephen Magsig

On Tuesday

he stopped struggling,

mostly because he saw

some split stovewood

that wasn’t struggling,

and clouds that went

where the wind went.

He set down

his precious life for good

and gave it a rest

under an undisturbed tree.

He felt his blood

being brought to wherever

it was needed,

and he didn’t oppose it.  

Scenes of Clerical Life, by George Eliot

I finally finished "Scenes of Clerical Life" yesterday evening -- ending with the beautiful story of "Janet's Repentance". I so much admire the artistry of Eliot in laying out a very complicated tale as if she were simply sitting by the hearth and telling it to us in her own words. The story of Janet is, like all of Eliot's works, utterly inspiring to me. It ends with some sentences about the nature of peace and acceptance that both the Buddha and Jesus would have enjoyed.

HE KNOWS HE CAN’T ESCAPE

"Pleasant Hill Morning", watercolor, 

by Andy Smith

He knows he can’t escape

sitting beside the window

at this moment and seeing

the beige bedspread

and hearing the sounds

of heat in the baseboards.

Souvenirs are presented to him

second by second,

and he has no choice

but to be present as they are given,

these gifts, 
this lamplight on a blue wall

and the wrinkled red cushion

on a rocker across the room

from where he necessarily sits.  

SUDDEN MIND

“…sudden mind arose in Adam…”

"Spring Storm", pastel, 
by Karen Margulis

        -- John Milton, Paradise Lost 

I love this phrase, mostly because I see so many “sudden minds” in my English classes. It happens swiftly and surprisingly, like a split-second flash of sunshine on a stormy day: a student suddenly sees into the soul of a poem or a paragraph or a story, or, even more astonishing, suddenly understands something of the spirit of life itself. I’ve see it happen to the humblest of students, the ones who say to themselves that their thoughts don’t shine like others. I’ve seen these unassuming kids, in the midst of their own stillness, abruptly break forth into words that seem filled with wonder. For me, this kind of “sudden mind” might be the single most marvelous aspect of teaching. It happens nearly every day, making a day in my classroom like a look into a land of miracles. It puts me on edge, makes me stay always observant, standing by to see the next unexpected rushing forward of youthful thoughts.

HE FEELS AS REFRESHED

"Morning Light Santa Ynez Valley", pastel, by Joe Mancuso

He feels as refreshed

as the free sunshine

that follows all of us

wherever we go.
He feels

like he is flowing

out to people and the proud

mountains of the west

and the wandering eastern rivers.

As easy as it is for sunshine

to raise the spirits
of a house in a forest,

as easy is it for him

to see restoration in all things,

even in thoughts that swirl up 

from who knows where.  

HE SAT IN THE DEALERSHIP

"Stars Over Casco Bay", oil, by Elizabeth Fraser

He sat in the dealership

doing nothing – 
not noticing other people, 
not preparing to-do lists, 
not listening to anxious thoughts. 
He simply sat in silence 
as the planets and stars sailed out

on their timeless journeys

and his blood held a steady course

through trustworthy veins

and flawless, unselfish arteries. 

HE FELT REASSURED THIS MORNING

"Morning's First Light", oil, by Karen Winters

He felt reassured this morning.

The sunlight was letting itself down

among the trees once again,

and the furnace in the cellar

was celebrating its skill

in furnishing heat

for his household of hearts

and minds made to be special.

The magazine on his desk

was impressive

in the first sunshine of the day.

ONE DAY HE DECIDED TO PRAISE THINGS

"Mountain River", oil, by Mark Webster

One day he decided to praise things.

The first thing he praised

was the thought of praising things,

then the feeling of flowing
into morning on a river,
then the way thanks

seemed to live throughout his body --

in his triumphant fingers

and in his feet

that will find themselves

standing on sacred ground

every second of this day

that somehow came dancing

up to his door.

CHANGING LIVES

I’m just a teacher of English, someone who hopes his students will understand prepositions and how to construct a levelheaded paragraph, but sometimes I do daydream about possibly being involved in the changing of lives. It occasionally occurs to me that all things are changing constantly, from the ever-veering clouds to the capricious cells inside me, so perhaps the same is true in my classroom. Perhaps, as the students sit and listen and speak in my class, their young lives are silently reconstructing themselves. It might be that small personal revolutions are continuously taking place right in front of me. After all, who can say how big a part a small poem might play in redesigning a ninth-grader’s life? Even two small words, like “Hey, Boo” at the end of To Kill a Mockingbird, might be able to take a teenager’s life and turn it topsy-turvy. I don’t pretend that I personally can take credit for altering my students’ lives, because I know better. I know that, like sunshine transforms mist into brightness, it’s the books they read and the words they speak and write in my class that might do some sizeable transforming, not just week by week but second by second. 

HE HAD NOTHING TO WRITE ABOUT

He had nothing to write about.

Winter was gone

with its gifts and finesse,

and the furniture in his house

had nothing that needed to be said.

A soiled dish in the sink

didn’t inspire him, and

heaven didn’t seem to reside

in his lined fingers

or the fine weave of his

dress shirt, the one

that wished to tenderly

warm his chest

on this day that was chosen

to be something exceptional

for him and the plenteous universe

he astonishingly resided in.

ONCE HE SAVED SIXTY-TWO PERCENT

Once he saved sixty-two percent

of his kindness and caring

and kept it in a carton,

but a decorous sunrise said that

kindness couldn’t be bought

or owned, and caring

only stayed when it was

let loose to be itself.

So he carried the carton

to the meeting of several streets

and set it down

for others to find,

and he felt a little light

flowing out from all things.

DRAFTING IN ENGLISH CLASS

When I was a serious bicycle rider, I often took pleasure in “drafting” off a rider in front of me, and my students occasionally use a similar kind of drafting in English class. In the bicycling world, drafting is simply a way to save strength on a long ride, slipping in behind a steadfast rider and letting the wind work against him and pass smoothly around you. You soon see, as you relax your leg muscles and start feeling refreshed, that drafting, surprisingly, is a way of going far while loosening up and taking it easy. Surely I want my students to go far as youthful scholars of reading and writing, but I prefer to have them travel with a certain looseness and liberty. Constantly struggling up the steep hills of great books can only bring bewilderment and hopelessness, so I often send the students off to do some “drafting” to make the ride through the pages somewhat easier and more pleasurable. For an especially problematic chapter in A Tale of Two Cities, I might ask them to read the Sparknotes summary before reading the chapter, just to gives them a calming foretaste of what’s ahead. Yes, it’s a shortcut, and yes, it eliminates some of the challenge of toiling through the chapter on their own, but, like drafting on bicycles, it’s a way of refreshing their worn-out minds for the long and laborious reading that lies ahead. It’s a break, a chance to take some mental breaths, and it usually results in singularly spirited reading for the next few chapters. After cruising behind the Sparknotes bike for a few pages, following the twists and turns in Dickens’ sentences can seem as easy as coasting downhill.

RIGHT WHERE THEY SHOULD BE

This morning, I noticed my pencils and papers were right where I left them last night – right where they should be -- and it made me wonder if all of life is always right where it should be. I spend far too much time trying to tell things and people – including myself – where they should be and what they should be doing, when I should almost certainly just sit back and be in awe at the simple properness of everything. Pencils, papers, small twigs on trees, clouds that carry themselves silently above us – all are precisely where they need to be at this moment. Are they where I, with my worse than sparse wisdom and willpower, wish they were? Perhaps not, but neither are the falls at Niagara falling because I wish them to. The universe, together with my papers and pencils, is always just where it should be, relentlessly bringing to birth its absolute fittingness and precision.   

HE TRIED TO TAKE HIS THOUGHTS

He tried to take his thoughts

in certain directions,

but they threw his plans

in their wastebasket

and wandered wherever they wished.

They were thoughts as wild

as the winds that went alongside

his life, letting him know

that nothing can  calm

this universe that sings

and unfolds in splendor,

just as it desires,

days of surprise

after days of radiance.

THE REAL PROTAGONIST

Lately, I’ve been discussing with my students the concept of “protagonist”, and it has reminded me that I often drift into considering myself the gallant and sometimes unappreciated protagonist of a serious drama called “Ninth Grade English”. It’s amazing how alluring this fantasy is – this notion that I am the center of an ongoing tragicomedy involving some of the most essential questions of life. In the back of my mind, a video frequently plays, in which “Mr. Salsich” is the intrepid fighter for his students’ education, defying the most disheartening obstacles as he leads the students onward and upward. What’s peculiar about this daydream is that it’s utterly groundless and illusory. It’s as if a minuscule swell along a shore saw itself as the center of the entire ocean, or as if a breeze blowing by considered itself the boss of all the winds worldwide. I am no more the protagonist – the center – of the educational drama in my classroom than any single star is at the precise center of the sky. The sky is vast beyond measurement, and so is the learning my students are involved in. I am one small star, you might say, in a process of learning that is boundless. I shine modestly among zillions of other lights that show the students the way. I simply teach things like comma rules and the significance of the word “protagonist”, while the power of the universe, the real protagonist, prepares everlasting learning experiences for my students.

Money, good looks and cool friends can be taken from us, but we can't be robbed of gratitude, faith, joy and goodness, which lead to lasting supply, beauty, grace, health, and

A SIMPLE LIFE

His is a simple life,

like a stone sitting
in the midst of a field,
a flowing river,

a single star lost in the sky.

He never knows

any scientific fact about anything,

and never thinks thoughts

that are new or breathtaking.

He just sits silently
among the blossoms

of the universe,
moves easily
like a shy stream,

or a star that loves

where it is.

We had a wonderful family celebration today to honor Luke and Jaimie on their 41st birthday. It was a long, loving day, filled with laughter, fine food, hugs and smiles, and -- almost best of all --

The birthday guys with cakes

lots of quiet conversations. Making it even more special was the fact that the temperature reached the 50s, filling the air with a feeling of springtime.

THERAPY

When his life becomes too busy,

he sometimes thinks of things

that are resting.

He thinks of pencils relaxing on desks,

patiently waiting to be used –

of carpets quietly lying on floors --

of doors standing peacefully

but with perfect posture,

poised to open or close.

He thinks of mountains taking a break

just where they’ve been taking a break

for thousands of years,

of rivers running

like serene runners running for fun.

He thinks of his own hands

that often relax at his side,

and of the few gentle dollars

that sometimes take it easy

in his pockets.

SITTING IN THE LIVING ROOM

Sitting  in the living room
while flames find their way
among logs in the fireplace,
he looks through his feelings
to find something he's lost.
He lets the light of his life
shine like a search light,
but with no success.
What he's lost is little
and lying among the distant stars,
but he doesn't know it,
so he never stops searching,
sending the sparks of his thoughts
through his life.

THE GIFT OF SPACE

We teachers give of ourselves in countless ways, but perhaps the best gift I can give my students is the simple gift of space. I see constrained, restricted lives in the eyes of my students – lives lived inside the anxiousness of all kinds of fears and alarms – and I take pleasure in setting them free in my class. There’s more space in their hearts and minds than they can possibly imagine, and making that space visible and accessible to them is one of my most esteemed responsibilities. Restrictions on thinking and feeling find no place in my classes: the landscape of our work is as wide as an everlasting series of mountains. When reading, they are free to find insights and truths wherever they wish to roam, and the same is true in writing, where their sentences can soar out to the far distances of sentiment and understanding. They do, of course, have to obey the accepted standards of orderliness and correctness, but those boundaries, if understood rightly, are also doorways to unrestrained thinking and feeling. LeBron James does indescribable feats of magic with a basketball while abiding by a bevy of rules and regulations, and so can my students in the limitless secret lives they bring to English class.

PULLING OUT THE RUG

I sometimes think one of my most essential jobs as an English teacher is to continuously pull the rug out from under my students. That may sound severe, but I actually think of it as a gift to the students – a constant reminder that all their cherished thoughts and theories are as insubstantial as summer winds. As soon as the students think they’ve found the fundamental truth in a poem or a story, it’s my responsibility to somehow show them that a measureless universe of opposing truths lies concealed underneath the one they’ve worked so hard to discover. The truth they’ve discovered is like a rug, and it’s my task to tell them that it rests on nothing but an infinity of differing thoughts and theories. I don’t want my students to ever become too comfortable with their knowledge, too sure of their understanding, too solidly positioned on some presumption or other. All the rugs they stand on in 9^th grade to convince themselves of their righteousness and wisdom will be pulled out from under them in due course, and part of my responsibility is to do some of the pulling when they’re 14. Perhaps it will help them find, sooner rather than later, that the universe of knowledge is vaster than the galaxies, and that all “rugs” do nothing but separate them from this bountiful and beautiful universe.