it’s another event
at the school of selfish parenting
teachers with microphones
can’t control
the stream of camera-ready vultures
clogging up the aisles
standing in front of the spotlight
chatting away in ignorance
as our tiny children
march across the stage
in caps and gowns
sing their off-key serenading songs
that we will neither see nor hear
thanks to our entitled generation.
education
Parade
trees drip with relentless spring,
weather that doesn’t belong here.
gray skies and chilled air,
we let them go on the last day
we stand under umbrellas, hoods,
huddled in sportsmanslike clutches,
our hands in Miss America waves
as endless yellow buses parade off.
we move into meetings, arguments:
what is best with what we don’t know yet
as rainwater greasily coats the glass,
blocking our view of the mountains.
the parade of buses will bring them back
on a sunny, hot summer day in August,
but we will not be huddled, hands in air,
waving our wanton hands in supplication.
we will wait in gray classrooms, chilled air
as trees glisten with relentless summer,
our view of the peaks shiny and new
their view of the world shiny and new.
Sunshine
With a toddler and baby in tow,
we walked our oldest to her first day,
the door open to your preschool room
lit up with sunshine shelves of toys.
You introduced yourselves to us
as Dee Dee and Helene, to the kids
as Ms. Teddy Bear and Ms. Jelly Bean,
quick-to-be-famous names in our ears.
For years our girls brought home
button families, clothesline crafts,
Dr. Dino, and homemade, hand-guided
projects to decorate our hearts.
Time has ticked away the tininess
of the baby you give back to us now,
her Silly Award another reminder
of all that has come to an end.
You will have an endless stream
of four-year-olds to keep the youth
and sunshine smiles on your faces,
but us? It will be just this: a memory.
A memory of their first school experience
that, as parents, perhaps we’ll recall
better than them, your warmth and love
the sunshine that will guide them through the next door.
Boneyard
the bones surround you,
starved from the dried-up sea.
you make your way through the maze,
darkness bearing down on the desert,
cold as a wintry mountain night
somewhere between the tail
and the cavernous rib cage
your pride follows behind,
a shadow of who you know you can be
lost in the wilderness of the boneyard.
you pick through pieces of skull,
sifting for the brainwaves that once
put thought into these bits of bone,
the iciness of your surroundings
building a tenacity you didn’t know remained.
your muscles tighten, the heartiest moving
you into a rhythmic undefined melancholy
through the motions of unreachable stars,
and you give in, release yourself to the night
just as Aurora touches your cheeks with her fingertips.
you resist, the dawn’s first touch as cold
as the depths of the boneyard in its darkest hour,
but the gentle kiss of radiant light awakens you,
casts away the shadow you’ve let fall behind,
and guides you to the mouth, the opening, to freedom.
Cause and Effect
If you suspend a student
for inappropriate behavior…
he’s going to have to make up his work.
When he makes up his work,
you will mark it late.
When you mark it late,
he’ll probably go whine
to his mama and daddy.
He may even ask for some new
baseball shoes as well.
When he asks for the new shoes,
he’ll show them off to all his friends
when he comes back to school.
When he comes back to school,
his parents will complain
to all administrators that his papers
are marked late.
The administrators will tell you
that suspensions are excused absences,
so…
He’ll want to turn in his papers…
with all As.
You’ll have to fix up your gradebook,
edit all of his mistakes,
and lose sight of why you became a teacher.
When all his grades are fixed,
you’ll notice that he plagiarized
some of his work.
You’ll have to suspend him again.
And chances are, if you suspend him…
he’s going to have to make up his work
and you’re going to have to give in
to the idiocies of our society.
Without Your Words
without your words
your hippie style of teaching
your gathering in groups
your relentless rule-breaking
your freedom-comes-first
your choice-is-the-best-choice
i wouldn’t be a teacher
and yet
i am trapped under piles of
standardized tests
computerized reading programs
administrative book doctrines
absentee students, parents
and find your words difficult to read
i wish i could capture them from memory
snap up the beauty of the classroom
that my children will never know
in thirteen years of institutionalized “care,”
that i could take your vision of education,
walk it right down to Washington
and make the world the place you promised
me it was capable of being.
Slip
blood working its way
into every capillary,
fingertips unable to stop
trepidatious air-tapping,
her outlandish words,
my lividity alive
as you walk in
to this simmered-down
moment of fraudulent calm
i stand without words
as you disappear
reappear
and place the thick slip
of her punishment before me
she will walk away,
saunter down the hallway,
continue on with
her outspoken life,
forgetting everything
before she swallows her lunch
but i will hear
only your whispered version
of the truth
the subtle (yet so obvious) gesture
and your strength
slipped in on carbon copied paper
that i can borrow for one day.
A Better Attitude
i’m hard-pressed to find
my miles, my mind today,
my ambition to walk down the hall
my muscles are as hard
and weathered
as stones through a storm
it’s only 9:36.
i still have four classes and
a stack of papers choking me
my mind is as scrambled
as the scattered papers
left behind by a class of forty
soon i will change into layers
of cycling clothes, clip in my shoes,
and pedal my way to a better attitude.
Room
as i move from room to room
always on my feet
i search for subtle differences
my mind tries to meet.
it isn’t quite the set-up
though your structure runs deep
but the small shift in tone
that close to heart i keep.
you see them for their strength
quick as their fragility
and ask that they participate
to the best of their ability.
negativity precedes her movements
though like you she’s here each day
i can’t capture the momentum lost
or the level of my dismay.
if i could stay in one place all day
i would surely choose your room
for all is lost when i enter the hall
and accept my daily dose of doom.
My Dear
i wish i could move my fingers
across the banjo with
the flair
the spin
the genius
the beautiful British accent
the perfection
the speed
but i can’t.
i can only spin these tires
new shoes clipped in
and ride until my breath escapes me
and try to remember
what i’m good at
which isn’t much,
being the mother of
that student,
the talk-about-in-teachers’-lounge
grumble-about-apathetic-parents
wish-you-didn’t-have-in-your-class
student
at least i can pretend to sing
like Mumford & Sons
and admit
I REALLY FUCKED IT UP THIS TIME,
DIDN’T I, MY DEAR??
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