YOURS

I like to write poetry from time to time.  There are no rules, no limits, no reason to give all the details. It packs a punch. It allows white space and things unsaid to be loud, loud, loud! So anyway, I write it when my gut tells me that too many words will kill my idea. Ironically, I'm about to launch into a small introduction before sharing my poem.

I wrote this poem at the end of last year--probably my hardest year of teaching to date.  Teaching felt thankless, like I was continually whipping up the meringue and it still remained slimy and flat.  I wanted to see the results of my work.  I needed to know that what I was doing was impacting my students.  Even just one student!  Every teacher struggles with this, by the way.  Any teacher who denies it is still a miracle-worker, but a liar. The reality is, though, that we don't get to see the benefits of our work, even within one school year.  Our work builds on the work of others--mom and dad, other teachers, society at large.  Skills learned in our classes weave with other classes.  Social/emotional/physical development impedes or enhances our efforts. It's a cocktail of factors that sometimes manifest into something beautiful before your eyes, or not for three more years. And it's always the hardest kids that take a few more years to bloom.

So, it occurred to me one afternoon after I felt like I spent more class time correcting behaviors than inspiring educational enlightenment: I was a pain, too, in seventh grade. How did my teachers do it and remain sane? In fact, my favorite teacher seemed to handle me with grace and care. I am betting that by the end of the year, she wondered which students she had really impacted. I wonder if she knows that here I am, seventeen years later, a rather normal human being who thinks of her fondly? Even more so, I have thought of her often when managing my classroom. I wrote this poem initially with that tough kid in mind, the one that I was waiting to see bloom before my eyes.  But strangely, it also evolved into an ode to a teacher who influences me still today.  

I sent it to her with more powerful results than expected.  Turns out, teaching has its victims whether you're seven years in or twenty five. She said the timing was impeccable, which I'm gradually learning is the case with teaching.

YOURS

You know how you’re explaining an activity

and that one kid

is kind of talking to that other kid

and you ignore him for a second

and then the talking continues

and you look sideways at him real menacing-like

and he doesn’t notice

and then you “Ahem” the heck out of him

and then he still doesn’t notice

and at this point the rest of the class

finds his ignorance hilarious

and so you have to walk right up to his desk

 and practically slap him with the words,

“Pay attention!”

and then your only reward is

these half-annoyed-half-amused

eyes that say, “What?”

indignant that you interrupted his conversation,

and then you give him the ol’ verbal one-two,

“Listen up or you’ll have to complete the activity at lunch”

and he’s like, “What activity?” 

And then all the other kids in the class

swell up like wet sponges with delight

in the power you just gave that kid

when you were trying to assert yours? 

You know?

Well,

Yesterday, I sat down after class

Instead of calling the parent of the aforementioned child

asking her to join me on my quest for a life preserver

during her child’s class,

Instead of doing that,

I wrote a letter to my seventh grade teacher. 

It started like this:

Dear Sweet and So Under-Appreciated Savior of the World. 

You are a god.  

I have to ask you,

teacher to teacher:

was your journey teaching us sometimes

like walking barefoot on a bed of coals you ignited yourself? 

On some days,

with painstaking effort,

you’d set our hearts aglow and

would nurture us until

we were brilliant and orange. 

On those days, did it feel like

you could walk across, as if the laws of physics couldn’t touch you?

Did it feel like we were all untouchable? 

But then on other days,

no matter what you did,

did your little bed of coals become weak and fading?

On those days, did the walk burn your feet? 

Did I burn your feet? 

Because I want you to know

to this day,

you are my favorite teacher,

despite the fact that you had to teach

quite possibly

the worst version of me I can think of. 

Wouldn’t you know,

I don’t actually remember a lick of content

that you taught me,

but I remember that being in your classroom

felt like home.  

You looked us in the face like we deserved your attention. 

You enjoyed us. 

I don’t remember a nanosecond of your struggle—

just that you were a human being

whom I might like to resemble some day. 

And now I do what I do

because of you.   

But you know those days

when that one kid forgot his pencil for the 45th time this semester

and that other kid made an awful choice to hurt another child

and that other kid is reaching for the stars

but his circumstances are pulling on his shoulders like a 50 lb weight

and America wants to know when kids will do better on their tests? 

I know those days. 

They burn. 

So do you think,

maybe,

on those days when I’m jumping across the coals,

do you think my students won’t notice

my singed toes or the beads of sweat dotting my forehead?

Please advise.  

I sign the letter,

YOURS

in all capitals

because I understand now

that to a teacher, her students are always hers. 

I always was hers,

just like they are always mine,

and I can’t think for one second

that that fabulous seventh grade teacher

isn’t still walking with me in the flames. 

I’m going to tell that kid

When we drive each other crazy,

I’m going to tell him this:

You and me,

we’re walking together through these flames,

Don’t you think for one second

That you’re not mine.

In the flames,

above the flames,

we are the flames. 

 When I’m in front of the class

Or behind my desk

Demanding your attention

Or giving you mine,

Every minute since August

Until seventeen years from now

When you’re sitting around

And think of your seventh grade teacher

In a fleeting moment,

Ahem

Pay attention:

For you, on my heart

Glows this word:

YOURS