Sharing Time

I've been having two of my students work on poetry for the last few days. They both complained bitterly about it. I've tried everything from luring them into it with song lyrics to threatening them with a lifetime of darkness and self hatred if they do not embrace poetry.

Nothing is really working. One of my snot-nosed freshmen thought he was awfully clever when he chirped up, "What, Teach? What poetry have you written?"

Rather than trying to defend myself and validate my authority (and with maybe just a little B.S. to cover up for being put on the spot), I coolly stared at him and replied, "I doubt you'd understand it. Now get to work."

He deserves so much worse.

Still, I rant and rave about poetry on this blog even though I never start out with the intention of ranting and raving, but I have yet to post anything original. Until today. Yes, today is the Big Day. I will . . . . . . share a poem that I first wrote as a senior in high school and have since edited to my liking.

The background:

'Tis a temperamental, autumnal day. Musty sweaters are making their first appearances of the season, and the smell of mothballs permeates the room. Seniors are chatting superficially, awaiting the presence of their teacher - nay, their mentor. Their leader. Their prophet.

He appears at the back of the room, emerging suddenly from the shadows of his office to the pounding bass line of Pink Floyd. We turn in anticipation. He waits until all eyes are fixed on him, all mouths are hanging open, and all minds are craving his words of wisdom before stepping forward.

He strides to the front of the room, the power of his footfalls sending pencils clattering and blinds swaying. Inches from the blackboard, he pivots and swirls around, a beauty queen pandering to her judging panel.

"Hello, children," he booms, snatching his sidekick from his worn podium. He raps it smartly on the dented wood. "Attention," he demands from the silent room.

With a satisfied twinkle in this be-windowed eyes, he faces is blank slate once more and writes in sloppy, large, eye-sore letters "WAR."

He proceeds to scar our young minds with poetry from Wilfred Owen about men choking on gas and falling to their deaths on the battlefield for love of country, Sigfried Sassoon's legless war heroes hating life and wanting death, and Michael Rutter's own creations of exploding landmines sending hunks of flesh into spinning helicopter blades.

Our turn. "Write me a war poem that makes me want to melt down my guns!"

We collectively gasp--no force on earth has ever been able to part Michael Rutter from his weapons.

Challenge accepted.

The following is the fruits of my war-torn labors, recently edited and rewritten. I based it off of the Vietnam War, when so many men were dying, the government sometimes hijacked taxis to deliver death telegrams, notices of sons and husbands killed in action.

Enjoy.



Taxis

Out of place
Idles the burning chariot,
Blackening fumes spewing
From an ailing exhaust,
Engine resounding through cramped houses,
Painted grey
In the whited dawn.

Cracked pavement
Leads a passing angel
From one barred door to another,
His message left propped
Against the threshold,
No red paint
To block his path.

Stark cards,
Etched with dooming messages,
Wait with godly patience
While women push open mesh screens,
Excited hope of word
From a silent battlefield
Glowing in weary eyes.

-Rosemary Larkin

Eternal Battle

I used to be a hard-copy fanatic. I would keep a paper trail thick enough and long enough to put most libraries to shame. While computers were still tentatively making their way into my life, I trusted the permanent quality of paper. After all, paper-like documents have been found dating back millenia. And I, being the intellectual idealist I was, adored the idea that my 3rd grade penmanship homework would some day provide archaeologists with key insights into 1995 culture.

Computers were good and well for the lesser and mundane tasks of writing emails, school papers, fliers, and other dull yet necessary functions. Being a child of one of the first real technological generation, I remember the spread of computers--the way they were reluctantly allowed to creep into daily life, the way school time was set aside to educate students and teachers alike, the way adults advised caution while using the most simplistic of programs, the way logging onto to internet was a huge deal, the way Microsoft Word used to have competitors.

It seemed every little change in their software and every advance in their usage was monumental. And each time, we had to practically relearn how to use the programs.

But since college . . . ah, since college. Immersing myself in a culture of technologically addicted youth has fed my computer savvy and addiction. My computer contained my life. CDs became archaic, as did TV. Why bother to work my schedule around watching something when I could look it up on surfthechannel.com and watch it in the dead of night as my roommate innocently slumbered on? No need to expose my new friends to the creepy world of monsters getting their heads shot off by salt-packet cartridges.

I admit it: I became addicted to immediacy. My computer remembers my preferences. Waiting 5 seconds for a page to load seems like an eternity. I've gotten to the point where even paper seems redundant and wasteful. Paper takes up space. Literal, physical space, not just the imaginary idea of space that exists within the two inch height of my laptop.

Those were the good days. My computer has since died (R.I.P.), but I still consider technological solutions as the primary ones. Technology is so easy.

So easy, in fact, that I believe my ability to physically hold a pen and write on paper is deteriorating. I was scribbling on some blank pages in my notebook the other day, and I was astonished to find that my hand was spazzing after a mere two pages.

Thus the conundrum is born of which is worth more: typing or handwriting. My conclusion? Typing on a computer throws me under a more technical influence while hand writing makes me think more carefully. Plus, sometimes it's just fun to get a little ink on my fingers. It makes me feel young again.

Imagine Your Imagination . . .

"Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine, and at last you create what you will." -George Bernard Shaw

Since I was a little girl, I have loved stories. I think my fascination derives from my mother's bedtime readings of such classics as The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, and Winnie the Witch. Our family bonded over the impossible worlds of star destroyers, warp power, and fantastical magic. Rather than telling us to grow up, my mom encouraged us to believe in things outside of ourselves.

And none of us have turned into violent serial killers or whatever.

The cynicism that arrives with each birthday has forced me to consider this world more. It's easy to start from scratch and make everything the way you want it to be in a magical land with clouds for pillows and skittles raining from the sky, but to find the good in what surrounds you and use that to imagine this world as something else . . . that takes some real imagination.

While in high school, I fell in love with literature. Not just with reading, but with the tortured artist and the wide-eyed idealist and the incurable cynic. Stories are found everywhere. Stories are found with no real effort. Pick up a newspaper or magaxine, turn on the tv, look out your window, walk past a conversation, enjoy a piece of art: these stories are found anywhere you look.

To take a story and develop it . . . to have an entire generation identify with your telling . . . to unveil meanings beyond the mere facts . . .. These skills are how literature sweeps me away by.

Before I was told that I probably wouldn't cut it, I wanted to be a writer. In fact, just the other day I found a letter I had written when iw as 14 to my 19-year-old self. I had sloppily inquired if I had yet published a series of fairy tale parodies I had been working on. While it is still a buried desire of mine to be a published author, I am not tempted by the prospect of publishing a much loved and much read popular book that holds no value beyond a mildly diverting story. (You know I'm talking about Twilight.) I don't want to be well-known or highly paid. I have my editing career ahead of me for that. As a writer, I want to change someone's life.

I want to help someone like me. I found my answers through literature. It helped me ground my beliefs to the reality around me, and it helped me to sympathize with others and consider individuality. My heroes are long dead writers, most of which as still not acknowledged as giants in their own time. However, their impact was on the small scale that keeps the world from imploding in on itself. I mean, if individuals aren't strong, what holds up those lofty ideals? Nothing.

And we individuals do what we can to keep the world on our shoulders.


The Poet: A Fragment

WHERE'S the Poet? show him! show him,
Muses nine! that I may know him!
'Tis the man who with a man
Is an equal, be he King,
Or poorest of the beggar-clan,
Or any other wondrous thing
A man may be 'twixt ape and Plato;
'Tis the man who with a bird,
Wren or Eagle, finds his way to
All its instincts; he hath heard
The Lion's roaring, and can tell
What his horny throat expresseth,
And to him the Tiger's yell
Comes articulate and presseth
On his ear like mother-tongue.
-John Keats


Maybe I'll post something original next time.