I admire the religions that are heavy on works. Which reminds, I should start going back to church. It's just really hard now and taking Frick and Frack does not make it easier.

Children might be a choice, and I get the peeved about a tax benefit that others have that I don't qualify for. But really? That's the quibble? Taxation. How about the fact that parents get a pass on leaving work and meetings early because of the kids. (often because they need to! I get that and am guilty).

I yelled at a coworker who called me on my class phone during class today. In front of my students. Then I slammed the phone down and hungup on her before she could reply. My students, who were a little afraid before are now terrified. I had a day where I was VIBRATING with anger.

But I also taught a beautiful lesson on ekphrastic poetry which was AWESOME and which, I hope, will result in a great essay tomorrow.

ekphrastic poetry

Explain?

Well, they'll hopefully know not to mess with you!

Do you like talky church or quiet church? One of the things that I always liked about our quaker meeting is that the first 20 minutes, give or take, included the kids. Which meant it was noisy. But the adults would still be moved to speak, just inclusive of the kids. After that, the kids moved off to "sunday school" (quotes because my bible knowledge from that is atrocious. Lincoln logs and fischer-price!)

But I've never liked being preached to, even when I'm in 100% agreement. So sitting down and shutting up appeals to me. Of course, the first, last and only time I spoke up in meeting was to say that I loved the culture and community, but I was neither christian or believer in god. Whoopsie. My hometown meeting had no issue with that, but it felt disingenuous to keep going to meetings after that. I did, and it was just not right.

It's poetry that is inspired by a piece of art. So we looked at Brueghel's painting Landscape with the Fall of Icarus then read "Musee de Beaux Arts" and William Carlos William's poem "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus." Then I showed a slide set of artwork of Icarus through the ages. Then we read "Flight 063" and "To A Friend Whose Work Has Come to Triumph." Tomorrow, they will write to Edward Field's poem, "Icarus" which because I love I will post in the serial post to this.

Icarus by Edward Field

Only the feathers floating around the hat
Showed that anything more spectacular had occurred
Than the usual drowning. The police preferred to ignore
The confusing aspects of the case,
And the witnesses ran off to a gang war.
So the report filed and forgotten in the archives read simply
“Drowned,” but it was wrong: Icarus
Had swum away, coming at last to the city
Where he rented a house and tended the garden.

“That nice Mr. Hicks” the neighbors called him,
Never dreaming that the gray, respectable suit
Concealed arms that had controlled huge wings
Nor that those sad, defeated eyes had once
Compelled the sun. And had he told them
They would have answered with a shocked, uncomprehending stare.
No, he could not disturb their neat front yards;
Yet all his books insisted that this was a horrible mistake:
What was he doing aging in a suburb?
Can the genius of the hero fall
To the middling stature of the merely talented?

And nightly Icarus probes his wound
And daily in his workshop, curtains carefully drawn
Constructs small wings and tries to fly
To the lighting fixture on the ceiling:
Fails every time and hates himself for trying.

He had thought himself a hero, had acted heroically,
And dreamt of his fall, the tragic fall of the hero;
But now rides commuter trains,
Serves on various committees,
And wishes he had drowned.

I like talky church. The one I've been going to has the pageantry I love, plus a really loving and welcoming community. But I don't take communion and I do like the sermon. The priest at this church, Amy, is WONDERFUL. She should be back from the Tai Chi conference in China she went to a few weeks ago.

Interesting, Kat! I'd never heard that term before.

sara, my mom teaches at the Friends school in town, and she's always impressed with how well the kids, even the little ones, do in morning meeting.

I think I would love a meeting if there was a brief prompt. Something to focus my thoughts anyway. Otherwise I'm not sure it would be for me, although I agree with you about being preached to. Even when it's a great minister, it always irks me halfway in.

Guh. That is a powerful gut punch of a poem, for all that it's quiet.

! ?#$$$^^$^$^

death by baseball

msbelle, I can sympathize despite our difference in, uh, sympathies. This game has me twisted up in eight different directions.