Poems:
1. Billy Collins, Introduction to Poetry
2. Sharon Olds, First Hour
3. Ted Hughes, Hawk Roosting
4. Mark Doty, Golden Retrievals
5. Andrew Marvell, A Dialogue Between the Soul and Body
6. Richard Wilbur, Advice to a Prophet
7. Taylor Mali, What Teachers Make
8. Eric Pellerin, Reading Gatsby
Introduction to Poetry
by
Billy Collins
I
ask them to take a poem
and
hold it up to the light
like
a color slide
or
press an ear against its hive.
I
say drop a mouse into a poem
and
watch him probe his way out,
or
walk inside the poem's room
and
feel the walls for a light switch.
I
want them to waterski
across
the surface of a poem
waving
at the author's name on the shore.
But
all they want to do
is
tie the poem to a chair with rope
and
torture a confession out of it.
They
begin beating it with a hose
to
find out what it really means.
“First Hour”
by Sharon Olds
That hour, I was most myself. I had shrugged
my mother slowly off, I lay there
taking my first breaths, as if
the air of the room was blowing me
like a bubble. All I had to do
was go out along the line of my gaze and back,
feeling gravity, silk, the
pressure of the air a caress, smelling on
myself her creamy blood. The air
was softly touching my skin and mouth,
entering me and drawing forth the little
sighs I did not know as mine.
I was not afraid. I lay in the quiet
and looked, and did the wordless thought,
my mind was getting its oxygen
direct, the rich mix by mouth.
I hated no one. I gazed and gazed,
and everything was interesting, I was
free, not yet in love, I did not
belong to anyone, I had drunk
no milk yet—no one had
my heart. I was not very human. I did not
know there was anyone else. I lay
like a god, for an hour, then they came for me
and took me to my mother.
“Hawk
Roosting”
by Ted
Hughes
I
sit in the top of the wood, my eyes closed.
Inaction,
no falsifying dream
Between
my hooked head and hooked feet:
Or
in sleep rehearse perfect kills and eat.
The
convenience of the high trees!
The
air's buoyancy and the sun's ray
Are
of advantage to me;
And
the earth's face upward for my inspection.
My
feet are locked upon the rough bark.
It
took the whole of Creation
To
produce my foot, my each feather:
Now
I hold Creation in my foot
Or
fly up, and revolve it all slowly -
I
kill where I please because it is all mine.
There
is no sophistry in my body:
My
manners are tearing off heads -
The
allotment of death.
For
the one path of my flight is direct
Through
the bones of the living.
No
arguments assert my right:
The
sun is behind me.
Nothing
has changed since I began.
My
eye has permitted no change.
I
am going to keep things like this.
“Golden
Retrievals”
by
Mark Doty
Fetch?
Balls and sticks capture my attention
seconds
at a time. Catch? I don’t think so.
Bunny,
tumbling leaf, a squirrel who’s—oh
joy—actually
scared. Sniff the wind, then
I’m
off again: muck, pond, ditch, residue
of
any thrillingly dead thing. And you?
Either
you’re sunk in the past, half our walk,
thinking
of what you never can bring back,
or
else you’re off in some fog concerning
—tomorrow,
is that what you call it? My work:
to
unsnare time’s warp (and woof!), retrieving,
my
haze-headed friend, you. This shining bark,
a
Zen master’s bronzy gong, calls you here,
entirely,
now: bow-wow, bow-wow, bow-wow.
“A
Dialogue between the Soul and the Body”
by Andrew Marvell
O
who shall, from this dungeon, raise
A
soul enslav’d so many ways?
With
bolts of bones, that fetter’d stands
In
feet, and manacled in hands;
Here
blinded with an eye, and there
Deaf
with the drumming of an ear;
A
soul hung up, as ’twere, in chains
Of
nerves, and arteries, and veins;
Tortur’d,
besides each other part,
In
a vain head, and double heart.
O
who shall me deliver whole
From
bonds of this tyrannic soul?
Which,
stretch’d upright, impales me so
That
mine own precipice I go;
And
warms and moves this needless frame,
(A
fever could but do the same)
And,
wanting where its spite to try,
Has
made me live to let me die.
A
body that could never rest,
Since
this ill spirit it possest.
What
magic could me thus confine
Within
another’s grief to pine?
Where
whatsoever it complain,
I
feel, that cannot feel, the pain;
And
all my care itself employs;
That
to preserve which me destroys;
Constrain’d
not only to endure
Diseases,
but, what’s worse, the cure;
And
ready oft the port to gain,
Am
shipwreck’d into health again.
But
physic yet could never reach
The
maladies thou me dost teach;
Whom
first the cramp of hope does tear,
And
then the palsy shakes of fear;
The
pestilence of love does heat,
Or
hatred’s hidden ulcer eat;
Joy’s
cheerful madness does perplex,
Or
sorrow’s other madness vex;
Which
knowledge forces me to know,
And
memory will not forego.
What
but a soul could have the wit
To
build me up for sin so fit?
So
architects do square and hew
Green
trees that in the forest grew.
“Advice
to a Prophet”
by
Richard Wilbur
When
you come, as you soon must, to the streets of our city,
Mad-eyed
from stating the obvious,
Not
proclaiming our fall but begging us
In
God’s name to have self-pity,
Spare
us all word of the weapons, their force and range,
The
long numbers that rocket the mind;
Our
slow, unreckoning hearts will be left behind,
Unable
to fear what is too strange.
Nor
shall you scare us with talk of the death of the race.
How
should we dream of this place without us?—
The
sun mere fire, the leaves untroubled about us,
A
stone look on the stone’s face?
Speak
of the world’s own change. Though we cannot conceive
Of
an undreamt thing, we know to our cost
How
the dreamt cloud crumbles, the vines are blackened by frost,
How
the view alters. We could believe,
If
you told us so, that the white-tailed deer will slip
Into
perfect shade, grown perfectly shy,
The
lark avoid the reaches of our eye,
The
jack-pine lose its knuckled grip
On
the cold ledge, and every torrent burn
As
Xanthus once, its gliding trout
Stunned
in a twinkling. What should we be without
The
dolphin’s arc, the dove’s return,
These
things in which we have seen ourselves and spoken?
Ask
us, prophet, how we shall call
Our
natures forth when that live tongue is all
Dispelled,
that glass obscured or broken
In
which we have said the rose of our love and the clean
Horse
of our courage, in which beheld
The
singing locust of the soul unshelled,
And
all we mean or wish to mean.
Ask
us, ask us whether with the worldless rose
Our
hearts shall fail us; come demanding
Whether
there shall be lofty or long standing
When
the bronze annals of the oak-tree close.
“What Teachers Make”
by Taylor Mali
by Taylor Mali
He
says the problem with teachers is
What’s a kid going to learn
from someone who decided his best option in life
was to become a teacher?
He reminds the other dinner guests that it’s true
what they say about teachers:
Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach.
I decide to bite my tongue instead of his
and resist the temptation to remind the dinner guests
that it’s also true what they say about lawyers.
Because we’re eating, after all, and this is polite conversation.
What’s a kid going to learn
from someone who decided his best option in life
was to become a teacher?
He reminds the other dinner guests that it’s true
what they say about teachers:
Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach.
I decide to bite my tongue instead of his
and resist the temptation to remind the dinner guests
that it’s also true what they say about lawyers.
Because we’re eating, after all, and this is polite conversation.
I
mean, you’re a teacher, Taylor.
Be honest. What do you make?
Be honest. What do you make?
And
I wish he hadn’t done that— asked me to be honest—
because, you see, I have this policy about honesty and ass-‐kicking:
if you ask for it, then I have to let you have it.
You want to know what I make?
I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.
I can make a C+ feel like a Congressional Medal of Honor
and an A-‐ feel like a slap in the face.
How dare you waste my time
with anything less than your very best.
I make kids sit through 40 minutes of study hall
in absolute silence. No, you may not work in groups.
No, you may not ask a question.
Why won’t I let you go to the bathroom?
Because you’re bored.
And you don’t really have to go to the bathroom, do you?
I make parents tremble in fear when I call home:
Hi. This is Mr. Mali. I hope I haven’t called at a bad time,
I just wanted to talk to you about something your son said today.
To the biggest bully in the grade, he said,
“Leave the kid alone. I still cry sometimes, don’t you?
It’s no big deal.”
And that was noblest act of courage I have ever seen.
I make parents see their children for who they are
and what they can be.
because, you see, I have this policy about honesty and ass-‐kicking:
if you ask for it, then I have to let you have it.
You want to know what I make?
I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.
I can make a C+ feel like a Congressional Medal of Honor
and an A-‐ feel like a slap in the face.
How dare you waste my time
with anything less than your very best.
I make kids sit through 40 minutes of study hall
in absolute silence. No, you may not work in groups.
No, you may not ask a question.
Why won’t I let you go to the bathroom?
Because you’re bored.
And you don’t really have to go to the bathroom, do you?
I make parents tremble in fear when I call home:
Hi. This is Mr. Mali. I hope I haven’t called at a bad time,
I just wanted to talk to you about something your son said today.
To the biggest bully in the grade, he said,
“Leave the kid alone. I still cry sometimes, don’t you?
It’s no big deal.”
And that was noblest act of courage I have ever seen.
I make parents see their children for who they are
and what they can be.
You
want to know what I make? I make kids wonder,
I make them question.
I make them criticize.
I make them apologize and mean it.
I make them write.
I make them read, read, read.
I make them spell definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful
over and over and over again until they will never misspell
either one of those words again.
I make them show all their work in math
and hide it on their final drafts in English.
I make them understand that if you’ve got this,
then you follow this,
and if someone ever tries to judge you
by what you make, you give them this.
I make them question.
I make them criticize.
I make them apologize and mean it.
I make them write.
I make them read, read, read.
I make them spell definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful
over and over and over again until they will never misspell
either one of those words again.
I make them show all their work in math
and hide it on their final drafts in English.
I make them understand that if you’ve got this,
then you follow this,
and if someone ever tries to judge you
by what you make, you give them this.
Here,
let me break it down for you, so you know what I say is true:
Teachers make a goddamn difference! Now what about you?
Teachers make a goddamn difference! Now what about you?
"reading gatsby"
by
eric pellerin
i
read it when i was 14
well
i am not sure
the
book was there somewhere
in
my ll bean backpack
initials
engraved
got
it for christmas
i
remember daily quizzes
we
cheated
there
was a multiple choice exam
aced
it
an
essay on the american dream
my
sixth
is
everything about the american dream
it
meant a great deal to mr canepa
standing
with a tattered copy of his own
in
his cotton dockers
simple
dress shirt
wide
matching tie
boat
shoes
20
dollar watch
john
lennon spectacles
pontificating
spit
droplets
how
i hate the front row
there
was a big party
a
car crashed
daisy
her
mean husband
a
billboard with a doctor
donning
john lennon spectacles
his
name starts with an h
has
two gs in the middle
that
was symbolic of something
robert
redford
who
somehow failed
to
capture gatsbys essence
a
green light
also
a symbol
that
meant everything
or
nothing
which
is existentially
everything
or
something
and
it made mr canepa
look
sad
because
it was so beautiful
like
amy
who
sat in front of me
dangling
her shoe on her toe
tanned
legs
shoulder
straps
i
loved seeing her face
when
she handed papers back
to
me
did
i mention
i
got an a on that essay
i
do not remember
anything
actually
i
just always got an a
on
my english essays
and
amy was hot
so
i guess i became an english teacher
at
23
taught
Gatsby to sophomores
i
knew what it meant
now
i
told the kids everything
i
knew
in
a more meaningful way
than
old mr canepa
the
novel is told from nicks perspective
a
third person narrator
who
acts as our eyes and ears
tells
us that he is trustworthy
but
he is an unreliable narrator
though
he wants us to look at gatsby
we
are really forced to take a hard look at
nick
symbolically
ourselves
as
he walks the streets of new york
like
a ghost
without
a home to haunt
consumes
our dreams
as
the eyes of dr tj eckleburg
watch
over our collective consciousness
symbolically
from
high above
through
foggy spectacles
and
gatsby
the
beautiful man
in
the cool suit
old
sport
his
party
his
death
daisy
daisy
daisy
the
green light
he
did it all for her
but
it was too late
so
tragic
what
we dream
what
we achieve
desire
acceptance
to
be loved
they
got it
i
got it
together
in
the classroom
one
collective
unconscious
experiencing
itself
as
one
peering
across the bay with nick
at
a green light
that
may never be ours
bear
that in mind
as
you read
kids
old
sport
hahaha
at
40
i
read the great gatsby by f scott fitzgerald
for
the first time
daisy
is careless and disgusting
like
amy
gatsby
sad
nick
too much myself
the
new film
leo
and tobey
remember
them
romeo
and spidey
now
they have crows feat like
me
now
a
husband
a
father
an
old sport
too
young to die
too
old to live
again
what
does the green light symbolize
i
do not know anymore
what
i know
experience
when
i read the last page out loud
i
never used to do that
i
find myself
standing
on the dock staring
across
a sea of young people
who
dream
with
everything ahead of them
i
do know
i
must look sad
like
mr canepa
staring
at a light
that
can
no
longer
be
mine
