Teachable Moments While Writing a Good Omelet.

Yesterday, I wrote a good omelet, and ate a good poem... goed on red, stopped on green- lingered somewhere in between...while driving my Bentley Coupe on Giovanni's
In the midst of this, a student asked if she could interview me. She asked a myriad of questions concerning my decision to become a teacher in our district, known for its failing test scores.
--"Do you ever learn from your students?"--

I learn from my students every day. We all grow together as a result of our interactions. We all learn alongside each other. Quid Pro Quo. Everyday I see students who possess the kind of strength, determination and courage most adults would envy. I learn how to stand strong in the face of adversity.

I talked a good talk. and on the whole, it's true. I do learn those things.

But today I also learned that I'm a Bad-Ass-Reading-Fucking-Superstar!
(and an asshole)

Wanna know how I learned this?

I exclaimed it to a student during class today.
Seriously.

He was grating my last nerve. After one too many disruptions and multiple redirections, I looked him coldy in the eye and asked if he wanted to come up to the front and finish the reading for me. He gave a flat "No" and snickered. I didn't look away, I didn't blink- the stare was on, my eyes locked on his. He tried to smile again and as he did I kept a calm cool even tone- and slowly stated "I got nothing but love for you, but right now, I want your diploma more than you do and that's not okay. I'm trying to teach you how to read so you can be more successful when you graduate in two years and I'm a Bad-Ass-Reading-Fucking-Superstar. I bet I can take anyone on, and win. In fact, I'm such a badassreadingfuckingsuperstar they let me teach this class. I'm just that good. So you can either: shut up, look at your damn paper and follow the rules of this classroom; or can step to me and prove your a badassreadingfuckingsuperstar and move on to the next class."
With that, he said he'd prefer if I finished the reading; his gaze searching the page for where my words left off...

Something else happened too, all the other kids seemed relieved that he had finally been reprimanded. I learned a lot from that. I'll be a better teacher because of that awareness.

I didn't do the right thing- but I'm not upset with myself. I learned from it. They learned from it. Mission Accomplished. Could I have done it differently? of course. But i didn't and I learned how to do it differently next time.

climb the moment

hello girl
hello soft brain
hello men that take her name,
tonight you will not climb

hello sea of drowning ink
hello hands
hello fingers taking commands
and occupying land.

you were soaking
and i
was talking with my tongue,
words hanging on your lips

slowly
sliding
down
you fed me your fever

and now i have the strength
to be loved
and love back
in truth;
no clouds to tuck me in,
no tears to cry that hurt
my eyes.

when we climbed the moment
and fell back in,
our eyes were rolling
backwards

and the children bathed
in sin.

cycling.

pick your gender kids
and press down hard
heed the warnings
and make a choice
you must,
you must...


i have found
no sudden movement easy

nor heart to give

or heart to scar

because we -
though a siblings distance apart -
were the best thing i ever did
in straight honesty
and now you want to be thirty
and i,
i just want to go back to the start.

and when the two roads diverged
the second time
i took the one less traveled;
righting the wrongs of the past...
here you are with demands
you aren't old enough to make
placing another candle in my cake

and I want to be thirty
but you're still stuck at the start.

presently
I've tossed my compass
and found my torch;
in the light my heart
knows the way
absent of rules...
and I found myself
in authentic bliss
over your fingertips kiss
that brought

us

here,

at the start
ready to be thirty.

mourning Time

I'd love to say
I painlessly awoke
in the early hours of the morning,
our legs entwined,
my body cradled in hers,
arm resting on her shoulder,
head tucked under her chin
and my face taking in
the soft scent of her skin...

but I haven't,
not yet...

but I did survey the tokens around us
in our makeshift bedroom that gradually changed
from threatening shadows
with long forest fingers
and wide mouthed faces
to tender and fragile representatives
of a desire that will defer across continents.

we fit in this space-
with my shoes hiding outside,
her watch among the necessities hanging overhead,
a pair of her jeans
unbuttoned atop her bag...
they mingle with
my shirt, panties
and a single barrette
that rests along the edge of this bed
hoping to be found-
we fit.


this scene-
as the morning light
crept along her face,
her hand limply resting in the curve of my hip-
this scene was vulnerable,
hauntingly significant
to me,
to us,
yet utterly unimportant
to the rest of this unfeeling world
in which we live and struggle to breathe.

this dawn would be captured by Time
and ripped down to flecks of unrecognizable dust
by his devilish claws in a matter of seconds.

someday spaces will appear in our memory
and this cool morning with its clear skies
and dew resting upon rugged leaves of weeds
around the tent,
will be locked away from us forever.

this tenderness will never be matched,
the sheets will never fold in the same way.
take it in-

stay the night-

take in every moment...
soon they will be gone,
and all you will have left
is a stomach-knotting recollection
of something so distant
that you begin to wonder whether it was reality,
or just a blissful dream...

maiden voyage

the lamplighters come
one by one
putting their iron nightcaps
over the dawdling gaslights
as the morning peels the stars from its back.
weathervanes point their black,
accusatory fingers
like viewers of a hanging,
and the streets
lie in their purple veils,
doorways yawning,
footfall in the alleys and the thoroughfares –
the shh-ing
and readying that comes backstage
before a rising curtain...
 
the flowergirls shuffle out,
faces bowed, their basketfuls
of sloop-tongued blossoms,
clustered and gossiping like busybodies –
they were gathered in the early morning,
bunched and congested
in their meadows like snores,
picked by rough hands
and serenaded by labor songs,
their heads nodding in the baskets like
prisoners in paddywagons.
the dark meridian coronating the horizon,
sneezing in their bushels,
they are rudely stolen from their stems –
kidnapped,
they fly their trodden skirts.
 
and now, into the scrubbed london streets,
they stick their tongues out at each other,
as the flowergirls haggle.
some of the blossoms
still budded and knotted-
unfulfilled promises-
lie at the bottom of the basket,
swooning – maidens in the heat,
with no one to catch their weak and toppling bodies.
the more sensible posies flirt their brown-edged petals,
knowing this may be their last chance.
 
pressed to noses, strewn in gutters –
by mid-morning
the flowergirls holding their warm coins,
having half-emptied their baskets.
and the remaining flowers shivering,
wonder if they're next...

oh please,
 
let me

be next.