This is why I teach poetry to high school students

Because I can teach all the literary devices I want them to learn throughout the year by using poems for examples:

Metaphor in "Dreams" by Langston Hughes:

"For if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly."

Repetition in the same poem:

"Hold fast to dreams... Hold fast to dreams...."

Theme (with perhaps a life lesson thrown in):

What is the poet saying here? Don't let go of your dreams or you become, in a sense, crippled, unable to move forward. Is there something important that you want to do in your life? Whatever it is, you can do it. The path to your goal may not proceed in a straight line, but keep that end destination in your sights; you'll get there. How did the poet know this? He lived it.

A more challenging theme in a different poem by Langston Hughes:

"What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?"

Point of view and tone in "Bike Ride with Older Boys" by Laura Kasischke.

(I do this one early in the year with my freshmen because I want them to learn that reading a poem is sometimes like unlocking a small cupboard door to find a bit of truth just sitting on the shelf, waiting to be discovered, and to show them that in poetry, titles can be an essential key.)

The first line of the poem is this: "The one I didn't go on."

The next two lines are: "I was thirteen/and they were older."

In this poem I love "My afternoons/were made of time and vinyl" and "I have been given a little gift." We don't know what the gift is until we're nearly finished reading the poem. Some students are mystified by the lines "When I/stand up again, there are bits of glass and gravel/ground into my knees." They ask hesitantly, "What happened? Did she fall off the bike?" Others, when the impact of the narrative hits them, say, "ohhhh" in soft tones, and I know they are moved by it, perhaps even warned by it.

(As an aside here, that 'title as key' concept can also be seen in "Another Reason Why I Don't Keep a Gun in the House" by Billy Collins, which never references a gun at all in the poem, but does reference a dog that barks incessantly.)

Some poems should just be fun, so we do "Summer" by Walter Dean Myers, but they're still learning assonance, alliteration and internal rhyme as we go:

"Bugs buzzin from cousin to cousin/juices dripping/running and ripping" and

"Lazy days, daisies lay/beaming and dreaming...."

And there must be classics because, well, if you don't know Frost, you're not American.

"Whose woods these are, I think I know."

"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood."

"Something there is that doesn't love a wall."

Billy Collins is my hero, of course, and sometimes it's fun, especially with high school students, to discuss extended metaphor by reading "Schoolsville."

("Their grades are sewn into their clothes/like references to Hawthorne./The A's stroll along with other A's./The D's honk whenever they pass another D.")

And speaking of classics, we read "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time" so that we can discuss the concept of carpe diem, but I introduce it to them by showing them the scene from the movie Dead Poets Society in which Robin Williams as Mr. Keating has one of his new students read the poem.

I follow that by teaching them "O Captain! My Captain!" (because, in my humble opinion, Whitman was the most courageous American poet of his time), and then we watch the heartbreaking scene in Dead Poets in which Keating's students stand upon their desks in deference and respect, each one proclaiming "O captain my captain!"

I have shared tears with some students after such a lesson.

I allow Emily Dickinson to teach them that "hope is the thing with feathers" and also that "I'm nobody" can be a strong statement of defiance for an introvert. 

I teach them "Richard Cory" by Edwin Arlington Robinson toward the end of the school year because I want them to understand how subtle poets can be:

"He was a gentleman from sole to crown/clean favored and imperially slim," but mostly because I want them to fully understand what isolation can do to people, how desperate and alone it can render someone who feels incapable of making a human connection with anyone else. I tell them to consider the folks around them... and who might be suffering despite walking among them as if everything is fine. At fourteen and fifteen, they are still challenged to find empathy and compassion. ("If he killed himself, he's stupid. That's just stupid.") But we work on it. We work on it.

Generally we end the year with Frost's declaration that "Nothing gold can stay" because I want to remind them about that whole "seize the day" attitude and that, while they are perfect—just as they are—life is going to lob some considerably large stones at them, which may alter them. But that's ok. Because "hope springs eternal."

Homage to Miss Lee: Maudie Atkinson

Miss Maudie (Rosemary Murphy) and Jem Finch (Phillip Alford) in the film version of To Kill a Mockingbird

(The subject of this post is Maudie Atkinson, a character in To Kill a Mockingbird. In the film version of the novel, her character was endearingly rendered by actress Rosemary Murphy—no relation.)

I think about Miss Maudie often, especially when I am gardening. After Scout (and Boo Radley, on some days), she is the character with whom I most identify. Maudie loves to garden, and she loves to be outside. In fact, with the exception of the ill-fated and profoundly ironic "missionary tea" in Chapter 24, Miss Maudie is outdoors every single time her character makes an appearance (well, ok, except for those brief moments during which the rabid Tim Johnson threatens everyone on the block). I like that about her. I also like her sass. When the "foot washing Baptists" shout judgmental scripture at her for being prideful about her flowers, she shouts scripture right back at them—"A merry heart doeth good like a medicine!" Yep, she's my kind of gal. She also puts the hypocritical blowhard Mrs. Merriweather in her place at the missionary tea when she starts to talk crap about Atticus. Atta girl, Maudie.

Alas, love seems to have passed Maudie by, and I guess I identify with that, too, to some extent, now that I've been alone for a couple of decades. I'll tell you what, though, if a man like Atticus Finch lived across the street from me, I'd do a lot more than just befriend his children and perhaps, on occasion, bake him (or his horrible sister) a Lane cake. I'd have enough sense to step up my game—especially if my Atticus-neighbor looked anything like Gregory Peck. Those Lane cakes certainly would be packed with shinny if that were the case, and I'd find a way to deliver them when the kids weren't around.

Of course, due to her spinsterhood, Maudie misses out on raising children, though she goes a far way in helping raise Jem and Scout. She offers gentle advice without scolding or criticizing, which is always my goal with my students. Scout mentions at one point that Miss Maudie allows them to help themselves to the scuppernongs from her arbor or to get a squirt of warm milk from her cow, but you know, the truth is, Maudie doesn't have a cow. Not really. I mean, if she had a cow, wouldn't someone have mentioned the poor beast on the night of the fire? Or the morning after? Other than Scout's vague one-time reference, the cow is never mentioned again, so in my mind, she doesn't really exist.

The best thing about Maudie, of course, is that she is the spokesperson for Atticus, explaining his ways to the kids when they don't understand, encouraging them to appreciate that their father is someone quite extraordinary. It is through Maudie that we learn why "it's a sin to kill a mockingbird" (if we're referencing the novel; in the movie, this wisdom comes directly from Atticus as he speaks to Walter Cunningham at dinner). After the verdict in the Tom Robinson trial, Maudie tries to comfort Jem by telling him that some folks are simply called upon to do the unpleasant things in life that others don't want to do, and that Atticus is just such a person (though Jem's dismay is not in regard to his father's failures, but rather the town's).

I find it fascinating that people often equate Harper Lee with Boo Radley, since she declined to make public appearances (for the most part) or give interviews. But she wasn't a recluse. After Mockingbird came out to such success, she still enjoyed living in New York, and she went about the city shopping and going to baseball games unrecognized by the vast majority of the folks she encountered. (There is something to be said for the anonymity found in the writer's life. My guess is Stephen King can probably still wander around New York City in a baseball cap and shades and his fans are none the wiser).

No, Miss Lee wasn't Boo. She was Maudie. She loved to be outside, loved her town and the Southern way of life, despite its flaws. And she loved her father, the real Atticus (Amasa Coleman Lee), so it makes sense that Maudie is the character who says all the lovely things about Atticus. And she never married, nor did she have children. Lee, like Maudie, lived a quiet life, but a social one, I'm sure. She had her own view of the world, her own particular hope for its growth and enlightenment, and she put that hope forward with gentle words. She was a woman who, with her novel, created a space of comfort, wisdom and acceptance, much like Miss Maudie's porch was to Scout.

Pretty sure Harper Lee didn't have a cow, either. In fact, I'm certain of it.

In Memoriam: Harper Lee

In 1966, desperate to find a book to read, I snuck into my brother’s room when no one was home and browsed through the books in his closet. I don’t know what made me choose To Kill a Mockingbird, but I do remember that once I began, I couldn’t put it down. I was twelve years old.

Two years later, the movie starring Gregory Peck (and the inimitable Robert Duvall as Boo Radley) aired on television, and all the characters I had fallen in love with came to life in black and white. That same year, men who had become my heroes in the Civil Rights Movement mostly because of my reading of the novel—Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.—lost their lives to the socio-political war that was devastating the country at that time.

To say this novel shaped my life is an understatement. I lost my father at a young age and was raised by a non-nurturing mother. Like so many others who’ve read this book, I both envied and longed for the type of strong, loving relationship Scout shares with Atticus. And I yearned for the wisdom of Atticus in my life.

When Atticus looked down at me I saw the expression on his face that always made me expect something. “Do you know what a compromise is?” he asked.

And I learned volumes about parenting from his example:

I had spent most of the day climbing up and down, running errands for [Jem], providing him with literature, nourishment and water, and was carrying him blankets for the night when Atticus said if I paid no attention to him, Jem would come down. Atticus was right.

This was such an important book in my life that when my own daughter turned twelve, I bought her a copy—and I ended up re-reading the novel from start to finish, falling in love with Atticus even more, now that I was a parent myself.

By the time my daughter was a teenager, I had become a teacher. In my second year of teaching high school, I was assigned freshman English. That year we read To Kill a Mockingbird together, and for twenty-five out of the twenty-seven years of my teaching career, I have read it again—mostly aloud, affecting a Southern accent, and always, always fighting back tears in certain sections:

“Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father’s passin’.”

“Hey, Boo.”

“Mr. Tate was right.”

Atticus disengaged himself and looked at me. “What do you mean?”

“Well, it’d be sort of like shootin’ a mockingbird, wouldn’t it?”

Before he went inside the house, [Atticus] stopped in front of Boo Radley. “Thank you for my children, Arthur,” he said.

(Gregory Peck’s line in the screenplay version is, “Thank you, Arthur. Thank you for my children,” as he extends his hand to shake Boo’s. To my mind, it is one of the simplest yet most beautifully moving scenes in the film.)

He turned out the light and went into Jem’s room. He would be there all night, and he would be there when Jem waked up in the morning.

In my early years of teaching, I was sometimes criticized for readingewwww aloud to my students. (‘They’re in high school now. They need to learn to read and comprehend on their own.’) To my way of thinking, these folks had it all wrong. What better way to learn to comprehend the dynamics of literature than to hear the words come alive? Hearing someone who is familiar with the text stream through the long sections of dialogue in the courtroom scene has to be better than trying to parse through Tom Robinson’s style of speech (“No suh, I’s scared I’d be in court….”) while keeping track of who was speaking and what significance there was in the sometimes calm, sometimes accusatory exchange of questions and answers.

Because I read the novel along with my students, I’ve read it in excess of a hundred times. Each spring I read it with a new batch of kids, and each time I learn something new. It took me years to figure out why Harper Lee included the chapter on Mrs. Dubose—because as a writer, I know that every chapter has a purpose, but for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out how Mrs. Dubose supported the theme of the novel. Until I realized what she stood for. And then the epiphany came like a bolt of lightning.

“You know, she was a great lady.”

Yes, Atticus, just as the pre-Civil War South was, and it, too, suffered from a disease that ravaged it.

Over the years, as I’ve taught Mockingbird, I’ve thought fondly of Harper Lee. She would have been in her sixties when I first began teaching the novel. After I’d been teaching it for several years, I wrote her a long letter, never expecting any response, just wanting her to know how meaningful the book had been to me as a child and as an adult. She never answered, but this was her way, and everyone knew it. As the years went by, I would occasionally seek out her name on the internet to see how she was faring. Every year I’ve been able to tell my students as we finish the novel, “So Harper Lee is still alive…” (because 1960, the year the book came out, seems like hundreds of years ago to them). As it turns out, we are currently reading the book in my class. Tomorrow in each class period, I will tell them that Harper Lee has died, and we will talk about the legacy she has left behind.

Lee’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel helped solidify the Civil Rights Movement in America. Since its publication, it has never been out of print. Countless generations of readers, old and young, have found friends and role models in Jem, Scout, Dill, Atticus, Calpurnia, Miss Maudie, Tom Robinson and the rest of the characters. The novel will continue to influence readers for generations to come.

Rest in peace, Harper Lee. Thank you for your life, thank you for your work, thank you for your heart. Your words will be with us forever.

Sustenance

Today’s blog post is dedicated to my long-time friend, Barbara Tinsley. A score of years ago or so—when our grandchildren were children—Barbara was a regular reader of one of the papers in the City News Group trio, and she became a fan of my weekly column. Over the years, we’ve had great conversations about life, kids, grandkids, and other joys. Her official duty as the unofficial president of my fan club is to poke and prod me when I neglect my blog (which has now taken the place of my weekly column). Thank you, Barb, for your friendship, which is so dear to me, and Happy, happy birthday!

People have asked if, when I retire, I’ll still get up at 4:00a.m. No. Absolutely not. I’m planning on sleeping in until 5:00 or maybe even as late as 5:30. Because “we were meant to see the beginning of the day/Ibelieve it was planned to lift us this way.” And because the best quiet time to write is before my head is filled with the daily news and dire predictions. I still won’t use an alarm clock (as I do not now), and I will still spend the last moments before I drift off with nothing electronic going except a soft bedside light—to illuminate the pages as I read myself off to dreamland. Here’s what I’ve been reading lately, in no particular order of love:

Plainsong by Kent Haruf. If you read novels for the sheer joy of discovering characters, read this book. I tried to read it slowly as it is not terribly long, and I fell in love with the characters so immediately, I never wanted it to end—and when I finished, I couldn’t start another book as I missed my newfound friends. Love, love, loved it. I want every reading friend to read this book, and I might have to guilt some people into it. (Barb, I put this one first as I really think you would love it.)

Ordinary Grace, by William Kent Krueger. See the description above, and add a couple of murders and a plot twist or two. If you’re sharp and you read a lot of mystery, you’ll connect the dots before the intense climax, but that doesn’t really matter to this novel; it’s all about the characters. My bestie Donna sent this novel to me as a sweet gift, and I loved it so much I don’t think I can ever repay her.

Millersburg, by Harry Cauley. I am proud to say that actor, writer, director Harry Cauley is my friend, and we became friends because, well, I was a gushing fan girl over his novel, Bridie and Finn, and his memoir, Speaking of Cats. When I finished Plainsong, I dropped it off with Harry because I knew he would love it, and we subsequently had a phone conversation or two about it (Harry agreeing that it is “just lovely”). When I started Ordinary Grace, I remarked to him that it was similar to Plainsong, but with murder, and he replied, “That sounds like my novel, Millersburg.” How did I not know of this other novel of Harry’s? I hit Amazon immediately upon hanging up the phone. So once again, see the description above. Yes, there are two murders that occur, but the novel isn’t about them. Its subject is the people whose lives surround the circumstances of the murders, and it is Harry’s inimitable style and grace that makes this little book so satisfying. Again, I didn’t want it to end. (Harry also had a birthday this week. At 85, he is still writing up a storm, and I am the one who pokes and prods him to finish another novel because I just love his writing.)

The Buried Giant, by Kazuo Ishiguro. I would not have come to this book were it not for my book club. (Bless you, ladies.) If you’re a reader of great fiction, you may recall that Ishiguro is the author of The Remains of the Day (from which the screenplay was adapted). This book is nothing at all like that one. This book…. Oh, shoot, I don’t even know how to describe it. This book is imaginative fiction in its most brilliant and haunting form. Ishiguro, truly, is a genius, and is considered one of the greatest contemporary British novelists. (He was born in Japan but grew up in England.) This novel, to me, is an allegory—of sorts. And I really don’t want to comment further, other than to say there is an amazing storyline here… and ogres… and pixies… and dragons… and, of course, the buried giant. Here are my two favorite passages:

[King] Arthur charged us at all times to spare the innocents caught in the clatter of war. More, sir, he commanded us to rescue and give sanctuary when we could to all women, children and elderly, be they Briton or Saxon.

We must hope God yet finds a way to preserve the bonds between our peoples, yet custom and suspicion have always divided us. Who knows what will come when quick-tongued men make ancient grievances rhyme with fresh desire for land and conquest?

These books have sustained me in recent times. It is always heartening to know that, whatever calamity befalls me in the course of a day, at long last—in the remains of that day—I will rest upon my bed, a cat on either side, a dog nearby, and immerse myself in the brilliant stories of others. That, indeed, is lovely.

The Return of Bunny Tibbs

This is what she’s supposed to look like:

This is what she looked like when I finally—inadvertently—found her this week:

If you haven’t followed the saga of Sgt. Thomas Tibbs’ favorite companion in the world (after me, I’d like to hope), click here for the back story. To summarize, Bunny was the first plush toy I gave Thomas when he came to live with me, and he is bonded to her just like a three-year-old with a favorite blankie. Trouble is, he’s very possessive. The first time I picked her up from the yard and returned her to Thom’s bed, he buried her the next day. It took him some months, but he eventually taught me to keep my hands off of her or else she went into ‘deep hiding’ for a few days… or weeks… or months.

I don’t know what happened last spring to make Thomas feel threatened, but something kicked his hoarding inclination into overdrive, and I realized one day that he had buried not just Bunny, but every plush toy in the yard. (Currently, he has six inside buddies and four or five outside buddies—I’ve lost count because I can’t remember who’s buried in the yard.) And he buried them so deep, I couldn’t find any of them. Over time, he dug up every one of them—except Bunny. When she didn’t appear after many weeks, I went looking for her one day, digging up each one of his holes. (I did this in the late evening using a flashlight, after Thom had gone to bed in the house, so he wouldn’t know what I was doing. If you think it might’ve been a bit creepy, looking for small lifeless bodies by digging quietly in the dark with a hand spade, you would be correct.) Alas, I never found her.

With the heavy rains this past week, I thought we had lost Bunny forever, that she would be entombed in mud that would dry around her, incasing her forever and eventually degrading her lovely soft self. But no! The rains unearthed her, much to my glee. Or at least partially unearthed her; I actually went looking for yet another plush toy Thomas had buried (in the mud) the day before, but when I began digging, a long slender ear emerged. Poor Bunny had been buried for so long, a weed had actually grown through her foot. If you look closely at this photo, you might be able to see it:

Yes, I probably should have left her in the yard for Thom. But she was so dirty. So into the washer and dryer she went. Later that night, at bedtime, I presented her to Thom. In the past when I’ve done this, Thomas has awakened me in the middle of the night whimpering, trotting back and forth across the family room floor with Bunny clamped firmly in his jaws, frantic to get out to bury her once again. This time, however, I woke the next morning to find him happily sprawled out in his bed, the tip of his nose gently brushing her soft clean fur. 

I just love that he loves her so much, because in those first hours with me, when he was dazed and confused, recovering from neuter surgery (though not ready in the least to begin recovering from all the trauma that occurred to him before he was rescued), I didn't know what to do to comfort him, and I questioned whether giving him my favorite bunny meant anything to him at all. Turns out it did.

Hello, 2016

“I think of each day as a gold coin that you are required to trade for something. You’ll never get that coin back, so whatever you trade it for had better be worth it.” Raymond Barfield, MD, in the January 2016 issue of The Sun

Hello, 2016, I’m glad you’re finally here. Generally, I don’t celebrate this changing of the guard, this exchange of one calendar with lovely photos for a new calendar with equally lovely photos. But this year I’ve been waiting for you, watching through the front curtains, as it were, anticipating the ritual of your arrival so that there could be a jumping off place, a demarcation point for the shift in forward progress I’m about to make.

The previous year—I don’t want to name names, and I know it’s crass to speak openly of exes—had me stalled, blocked, detoured off the wide path of my journey and lost down a single-track trail of tears.

I’m back.

Oh, I wouldn’t say I’m marching forward with enthusiasm. Yet. But I’ve just come blinking into the sunshine from the dark woods, and my feet are firmly back on the path that will lead me forward a bit further each day. I know I’m going to move slowly at first, but I’ll gain momentum with each step of renewed effort.

I want our time together, though brief, to be memorable, and for that to happen, I know I need to be productive, to use my gifts, humble and few as they may be, to make a difference in the world, no matter how minute or seemingly insignificant or isolated that difference may be. Last year, I lingered in “the waiting room of the world,” as C. S. Lewis put it. This year, I want to trade each gold coin, as Dr. Barfield describes, for pursuits that have me smiling, not wincing, as I lay my head upon the pillow each night.

Thanks for showing up, 2016, and not a moment too soon.

Good riddance, 2015

Good-by, 2015, and good riddance. I am relieved to be shed of you.

Good-by to all the grief that came in this year—the deaths of two beloved cousins, the anger and fear of a cancer diagnosis in someone I cherish, the stress-related illnesses that attacked two loved ones with a vengeance. Go away. Expecto patronum! I hereby summon the patronus that will block and defeat you. (For anyone wondering, I have no doubt that my patronus is a California black bear.)

Good riddance to the first semester of my last year of teaching (well, in three more weeks). I thought you would be great. You sucked. Hit the road.

And let me bid a fond and highly sarcastic farewell to the words of a parent, a teacher and an administrator who suggested, at various times about three separate students, that the student in question would be more successful in a male teacher’s classroom. Yeah? I’ve got your male teacher right here, pal. Do you really think genitals and hormones make a difference in managing that spoiled child’s behavior? Bite me.

Good-by to all the lost days I spent on the couch, first with pneumonia, then with C. Diff. You may be lost forever, but I can still make up the time in productivity in the new year, so go ahead, slip away. I refuse to obsess on you.

And as of this day, a huge and heartfelt good riddance to the worst publishing company in the history of the planet. Our contract has expired, thank heavens, and I can now take back the rights to my book, my author persona, my destiny as the independent publisher of my own work. Adios, you greedy bastards. May a class action lawsuit find its way to you soon.

Hallelujah. The countdown begins!