When I was in college, I had this global literature professor from Ethiopia whose sole mission in life, if you went by his classroom behavior only, was to try and stir up as much trouble as possible. He would often enter class, calm and stately, traversing the space between door an lectern with even, measured steps. "Hello," he would intone with beautifully-accented English, and then unleash a torrent of debate in the room with a single phrase. The University of Mary Washington, where I went as an undergrad, is still more female than male, but the split during my time was about 60/40. In an English major, that split was even more dramatic. The most memorable of my professor's one-line controversy grenades went like this: "Hello. I believe that female circumcision [here he would pause for dramatic effect, grinning an impossibly wide and mischievous smile] is a good thing." He would never really feel that way, but the discussion we had after the initial explosion taught myself, and my classmates, so much about a practice we were completely unfamiliar with, about the human motivations, insecurities, and rituals that push people to that extreme. The gift of curiosity that arose from his class was nothing short of life-giving to a student who loved finding out everything about everything. He was also the professor that taught me the most about critical thinking; the conversations we had between the lines of my papers forever challenged me to be the best version of myself that I can. This draft poem is to my professor for the gifts he gave me.
"A Death Remembered"
Untimely deaths always bring
Me back to that awkward day.
You
Dead
In your house
Alone, but not truly alone.
Your students' papers, stacked
Nearby, called to you.
They asked for an insight,
A touch of your genius,
But you could no longer
Make them whole.
Wednesday, April 6, 2016
Tuesday, April 5, 2016
It is Impossible to Say Just What I Mean
Free verse today (read as completely unstructured today). This, like all of the predecessors, is a draft.
Entitlement
The electric buzz of students in the afternoon
Pulses with the innocence of a taser.
"That bitch don't know" cuts thorough the vitality of the
Moment, a sharp reflection of the careless brutality
To which we all are heir.
I step into the hall, outwardly all placid calm while
Inwardly I am ready to fight in case others must fly.
Tension between groups waits for the flick of the switch,
Betrayal of all against the common good will.
White tolerates Black.
Gay tolerates Straight.
He, she, they tolerates the gender normative.
No one tolerates
Stories of people unlike themselves, tales of
Macroaggressive slave-owners and
Microaggressive "phonies." How dare we make children read
Stories featuring near minstrel-caricatures or anything featuring
Featuring any slur that may have been a single hideous,
Though integral, thread sewn into the fabric of our past.
All the while, that misunderstood near-minstrel continues his
War of words to win the heart and mind of another little boy:
A boy who needs to be "sivilized," crouching at the knee of a man
Whose blackness made him less than human while his words
Immortalize him as a gentle and passionate father.
Because "He know how to value" his children,
Distant though they may be.
The buzz continues through the door; insults fly in a misguided
Mass, crashing into and souring any in their path.
The English teacher sits, novel and heart open to the page where
The hero makes the sacrifice,
The sweet sorrow ends, and
All of this phosphorescent humanity is laid bare.
If only the surly paper tigers of my hallway would turn from the
Artifical light of likes, pokes, and digital friendships to the
Cathartic flare of what we could be.
Meanwhile, the weighty and colossal rows of solemn
Stone house run inexorably to the horizon.
Entitlement
The electric buzz of students in the afternoon
Pulses with the innocence of a taser.
"That bitch don't know" cuts thorough the vitality of the
Moment, a sharp reflection of the careless brutality
To which we all are heir.
I step into the hall, outwardly all placid calm while
Inwardly I am ready to fight in case others must fly.
Tension between groups waits for the flick of the switch,
Betrayal of all against the common good will.
White tolerates Black.
Gay tolerates Straight.
He, she, they tolerates the gender normative.
No one tolerates
Stories of people unlike themselves, tales of
Macroaggressive slave-owners and
Microaggressive "phonies." How dare we make children read
Stories featuring near minstrel-caricatures or anything featuring
Featuring any slur that may have been a single hideous,
Though integral, thread sewn into the fabric of our past.
All the while, that misunderstood near-minstrel continues his
War of words to win the heart and mind of another little boy:
A boy who needs to be "sivilized," crouching at the knee of a man
Whose blackness made him less than human while his words
Immortalize him as a gentle and passionate father.
Because "He know how to value" his children,
Distant though they may be.
The buzz continues through the door; insults fly in a misguided
Mass, crashing into and souring any in their path.
The English teacher sits, novel and heart open to the page where
The hero makes the sacrifice,
The sweet sorrow ends, and
All of this phosphorescent humanity is laid bare.
If only the surly paper tigers of my hallway would turn from the
Artifical light of likes, pokes, and digital friendships to the
Cathartic flare of what we could be.
Meanwhile, the weighty and colossal rows of solemn
Stone house run inexorably to the horizon.
Monday, April 4, 2016
The Makings of a Sonnet
The poem today is a draft. I just couldn't get it refined, teach, and grade; however, I wanted to record my draft here as art of my process. I would like to say I will definitely come back to it, but, as Robert Frost pointed out, as way leads on to way I am fairly uncertain if I will be inspired to come back. So, for day 4, here is my draft sonnet.
One of the common themes in stories revolves around choices of love and lust, romantic or otherwise. This sonnet, draped as it is (for it certainly is not cleanly fitted) over a Petrarchan sonnet's frame, seeks to capture the voice of this conflicted character trying to choose between love and lust.
Draft Sonnet
When children, a sudden fear can come from
Slight, secret sounds drifting down the empty
Hallways of our minds, through the racing blood
Pounding at our temples, coming to rest like
Ice within our hearts. You, like this fear, have
Caught me off guard, driving my certain mind
Towards dissonant thoughts and heart-rending ache.
How do I balance the want with the need?
When driven to consider how much pain
Each choice brings to the ones I care most for,
I can only choose to shoulder the strain
Of bittersweet longing within my core.
For which heart to break, my soul cannot claim,
Relationships severed may not restore.
One of the common themes in stories revolves around choices of love and lust, romantic or otherwise. This sonnet, draped as it is (for it certainly is not cleanly fitted) over a Petrarchan sonnet's frame, seeks to capture the voice of this conflicted character trying to choose between love and lust.
Draft Sonnet
When children, a sudden fear can come from
Slight, secret sounds drifting down the empty
Hallways of our minds, through the racing blood
Pounding at our temples, coming to rest like
Ice within our hearts. You, like this fear, have
Caught me off guard, driving my certain mind
Towards dissonant thoughts and heart-rending ache.
How do I balance the want with the need?
When driven to consider how much pain
Each choice brings to the ones I care most for,
I can only choose to shoulder the strain
Of bittersweet longing within my core.
For which heart to break, my soul cannot claim,
Relationships severed may not restore.
Sunday, April 3, 2016
Show Me the Money: A Guest Post on Funding Schools in "Post-Racial" America
by Dan Bruno and Katherine Rose
This is Dan welcoming you all to view the guest post below by Katherine Rose. Ms. Katherine Rose writes for Topmastersineducation.com and adores creating articles and graphics on different aspects of scholarships, financial aid, and career related things. The article, also by Ms. Rose, that the guest post is about can be found here.
The 1973 U.S. Supreme Court ruling stated that it was not in violation of the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause for schools to be funded by local taxation. This of course leads schools in more affluent locations to gain more funding, whereas those in locations where there are less businesses get less funding. As of 2013, most schools have a majority of minority students, making public schools appear segregated. Nationally, two thirds of students of color are in schools where more than 50% are from low income households. Also, more than half of low income students are from the South.
Since 1968 when the Civil Rights Act was signed, there seem to have been a 24.3% increased segregation in the Latino students from their White student counterparts. In 2015, the separation appears to be more class based, and in 2014 SC Supreme Court pointed out the disparities between high and low funded schools calling the low funded minority majority schools “educational ghettos”. According to the latest data, 46% of states are still using local taxes for school funding. Essentially, class based resegregation has led to the problem of unequal funding.
With less money, there comes more problems and a creation of a school-to-prison pipeline. According to data collected from Civil Rights Data Collection in 2014, black students are three times more likely to face suspension versus their white student counterparts. Even in schools which are not minority dominant, black or latino students are more likely to face harsher punishments than their fellow white students, with additional accusations of insubordination or having a poor attitude. Also, lesser qualified teachers are often able to find work in high-poverty districts and are more likely to turn students over to law enforcement for punishment rather than be able to deal with it themselves. Due to violent crimes taking place in schools, having police on campus is now common, many have School Resource Officers on payroll. These all lead to schools being ran similarly to prisons in order to keep students safe. However it it also said to increase the school-to-prison pipeline. It’s even been noticed that the disciplinary sheets, race by race, for schools resemble the statistics for prison demographics.
It’s obvious that a reform in funding is needed to make schools more equal for students of any race. Currently about 25% of states have ongoing litigation in order to reform how schools are funded in order to address some of these issues. While statistically overall our nation has come a long way with how much we spend on students and improved graduation rates, we still have a long way to go to assure fair and equal education for all American students.
This is Dan welcoming you all to view the guest post below by Katherine Rose. Ms. Katherine Rose writes for Topmastersineducation.com and adores creating articles and graphics on different aspects of scholarships, financial aid, and career related things. The article, also by Ms. Rose, that the guest post is about can be found here.
The 1973 U.S. Supreme Court ruling stated that it was not in violation of the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause for schools to be funded by local taxation. This of course leads schools in more affluent locations to gain more funding, whereas those in locations where there are less businesses get less funding. As of 2013, most schools have a majority of minority students, making public schools appear segregated. Nationally, two thirds of students of color are in schools where more than 50% are from low income households. Also, more than half of low income students are from the South.
Since 1968 when the Civil Rights Act was signed, there seem to have been a 24.3% increased segregation in the Latino students from their White student counterparts. In 2015, the separation appears to be more class based, and in 2014 SC Supreme Court pointed out the disparities between high and low funded schools calling the low funded minority majority schools “educational ghettos”. According to the latest data, 46% of states are still using local taxes for school funding. Essentially, class based resegregation has led to the problem of unequal funding.
With less money, there comes more problems and a creation of a school-to-prison pipeline. According to data collected from Civil Rights Data Collection in 2014, black students are three times more likely to face suspension versus their white student counterparts. Even in schools which are not minority dominant, black or latino students are more likely to face harsher punishments than their fellow white students, with additional accusations of insubordination or having a poor attitude. Also, lesser qualified teachers are often able to find work in high-poverty districts and are more likely to turn students over to law enforcement for punishment rather than be able to deal with it themselves. Due to violent crimes taking place in schools, having police on campus is now common, many have School Resource Officers on payroll. These all lead to schools being ran similarly to prisons in order to keep students safe. However it it also said to increase the school-to-prison pipeline. It’s even been noticed that the disciplinary sheets, race by race, for schools resemble the statistics for prison demographics.
It’s obvious that a reform in funding is needed to make schools more equal for students of any race. Currently about 25% of states have ongoing litigation in order to reform how schools are funded in order to address some of these issues. While statistically overall our nation has come a long way with how much we spend on students and improved graduation rates, we still have a long way to go to assure fair and equal education for all American students.
National Poetry Month Challenge, Day 3
by Dan Bruno
"XXII"
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens.
I am a big fan of the mentor text as a teaching tool. This poem is one I have taught so often, but still have no clear sense of what I am supposed to get from it. How opaque could it really be? I mean what does it contain: red wheel barrow (check), rain water (check), white chickens (check). I know that the imagist poets were all about precise pared down language, but the language here is so precise as to almost excise meaning. For a great summary of the movement that is accessible to teacher and student alike, check out the Academy of American Poets Brief Guide to Imagism.
So, in tribute to William Carlos Williams, I am going to try this out today using his poem as a model.
"The Red Ink Pen" (with apologies to William Carlos Williams)
so much depends
upon
a red ink
pen
glazed with palm
sweat
beside the marked
essays
"XXII"
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens.
I am a big fan of the mentor text as a teaching tool. This poem is one I have taught so often, but still have no clear sense of what I am supposed to get from it. How opaque could it really be? I mean what does it contain: red wheel barrow (check), rain water (check), white chickens (check). I know that the imagist poets were all about precise pared down language, but the language here is so precise as to almost excise meaning. For a great summary of the movement that is accessible to teacher and student alike, check out the Academy of American Poets Brief Guide to Imagism.
So, in tribute to William Carlos Williams, I am going to try this out today using his poem as a model.
"The Red Ink Pen" (with apologies to William Carlos Williams)
so much depends
upon
a red ink
pen
glazed with palm
sweat
beside the marked
essays
Saturday, April 2, 2016
National Poetry Month Challenge, Day 2
"The Dive"
by Dan Bruno
The moment when the water parts
Disorients the body and the mind.
The rush of displacement, the
sudden
Substitution of crystalline summer
sun
With deep, glowing blue. It is the
way
My world changed, violent and disruptive,
My world changed, violent and disruptive,
The day I learned the name of the
Monster that attached itself to my
life.
The sterility of the laboratory,
Claustrophobic and chlorinated.
The stiffness of each strand of
hair,
Smeared with the silicone gel that
Attached each electrode. The cold,
Creeping fear of possibility
seizing
My diaphragm, forcing shallow,
Apprehensive gasps of air.
The diagnosis leaps from the
physician's
Lips and lands with an enormous
splash
In my ears, disturbing the surface
of my
Mind with an enormous wave of
doubt.
The mitigating terms themselves,
transparent
And contemptuous, splash about my
mind:
Chronic, not fatal; manageable, not
curable;
Permanent, intractable night in my
mind.
The medication list is a bouquet of
Chemical wonders, latinate formulae
Rattled off with galling ease:
Modafinil, Methylphenidate,
Escitalopram,
Oxybate. Life reduced and
subdivided
To incomprehensible pills and
potions
Of varying volumes and viscosities.
Clarity defined by the cubic
centimeter.
Years later, as I drift to the
bottom,
I wonder how much of me is left.
Am I man or medicine? Where am I
In the nootropic soup of my
perception?
If mind no longer matters,
If matter conquers mind,
If the thoughts I have are given by
Chemical induction, which of these
is mine?
My life has become the silent sea
That exists at the bottom of the
dive:
Quiet, blue-tinged, enveloping, the
Incoherent distance blurred out of
view.
Rest. At the bottom. No need to
rise.
Stay beneath the rhythm of life and
Let it slide away. Vitality is the
curse
Of one chronically shut out of a
healthy mind.
But then, my feet scrape the rough
stucco.
I kick out against the weight of
water and worry.
A rush rises in my ears. Who knew
that
Ten feet could be so deep?
Each flutter of legs draws me up to
that
Crystalline kingdom of warmth just
beyond
The distortion of the surface. A
place of
Exhilarating laughter and adventure
Where human voices wake us to breath;
Where, maybe one day, my mind,
After its long stay under water,
Will emerge to resurrection.
Friday, April 1, 2016
Celebrating The Rhythm: A National Poetry Month Challenge
by Dan Bruno
It is that time again. Time for the literaphilic world to get their moment in the "----- Month" sun. You guessed it, it is NATIONAL POETRY MONTH. Not that I am too excited, but I decided to throw down a challenge to myself this year. For everyday of this month, I am going to write some verse. Most likely it will be terrible, but that is not the point. I am doing this, as always, for my students.
Maybe you know what I mean when I say my students are often mystified by poetry as though it were some alien language scrawled in ancient hieroglyphs on the walls of a pyramid at the bottom of the Marianas Trench. What kills me is that poetry should be the most accessible language because of its focus on physical and emotional experience. Students should be able to wrap themselves in the lines of a poem and feel the comfort that comes from understanding human warmth and connection. A poem should be a hug, not a beating.
So, every day this month, I will write some verse. I will publish it here, but also share it with my students, letting them see me struggle with the language and form I clearly love too much. (The scientist in me also loves this project because it feels like a lab experiment. I sorely miss dissecting specimens, making new substances, and blowing up fairly expensive glassware.)
So, to kick it off, here is what I wrote for today:
"Hunger"
When considering the lives I hold in my hand,
Daily meting out parcels of essential knowledge,
Rationed to the size of an individually calibrated educational appetite,
I begin to wonder if the intellectually hostile environment
That greets our eager and impressionable students every day
Hasn't taught them that familiarity with the
Pain of hunger is far better than the longing
For something out of reach, something long ago
Forgotten; because someone, considering another
Room of lives, allowed the shade of ignorance
To choke the roots of their curious joy.
It is that time again. Time for the literaphilic world to get their moment in the "----- Month" sun. You guessed it, it is NATIONAL POETRY MONTH. Not that I am too excited, but I decided to throw down a challenge to myself this year. For everyday of this month, I am going to write some verse. Most likely it will be terrible, but that is not the point. I am doing this, as always, for my students.
Maybe you know what I mean when I say my students are often mystified by poetry as though it were some alien language scrawled in ancient hieroglyphs on the walls of a pyramid at the bottom of the Marianas Trench. What kills me is that poetry should be the most accessible language because of its focus on physical and emotional experience. Students should be able to wrap themselves in the lines of a poem and feel the comfort that comes from understanding human warmth and connection. A poem should be a hug, not a beating.
So, every day this month, I will write some verse. I will publish it here, but also share it with my students, letting them see me struggle with the language and form I clearly love too much. (The scientist in me also loves this project because it feels like a lab experiment. I sorely miss dissecting specimens, making new substances, and blowing up fairly expensive glassware.)
So, to kick it off, here is what I wrote for today:
"Hunger"
When considering the lives I hold in my hand,
Daily meting out parcels of essential knowledge,
Rationed to the size of an individually calibrated educational appetite,
I begin to wonder if the intellectually hostile environment
That greets our eager and impressionable students every day
Hasn't taught them that familiarity with the
Pain of hunger is far better than the longing
For something out of reach, something long ago
Forgotten; because someone, considering another
Room of lives, allowed the shade of ignorance
To choke the roots of their curious joy.
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