Why revise? After all, the poem was sent by the universe..

What is fascinating to me about writers (not professionals) is that there is some kind of mythology out there about the place where writing emanates which leads them to think (and actually believe deeply) that their writing is so inspired as to warrant leaving it alone once it is initially on the page. I've been doing this thing (writing, editing) for a long time and I see this phenomenon over and over, in fact more now than ever.

Here's a true story to illustrate:

I received a submission for Pulse Online Literary Journal a few weeks ago and decided the poems had something to say, but needed a little tweaking to say that something better. Being the kind of editor I'd want to have myself, I suggested a couple small edits and offered to work with the poet on larger issues (line break, diction, etc). I found an email from that writer in my inbox yesterday with the following:

Dear Mrs. Bachofner,
Thanks for your "acceptance" if that's what you call it.
I cannot believe you would have the nerve to say the poems
were not finished and needed some polishing. When I write,
I am inspired by the universe, my muse or whatever. It is just
wrong to slap that being in the face by changing what was 
sent to me. You call yourself an editor? YOUR JOB is to print
the inspired words you are lucky enough to be sent. You should
be more careful of messing with fate the way you are trying to.
So, to be very clear: print the poems as they are. Oh, and I believe
a thank-you is in order, not the raking over the coals I got from you.


I have to say I am surprisingly shocked whenever I get this kind of email. I can hardly grasp the idea of speaking thusly to someone I'd hope to have publish my work.

I publish the exchange here so you can see the issue up close and persona.

I went back to my sent file to see what possible "raking over the coals" I had sent this writer. Here it is:

Dear __________, Thanks so much for sending the poems. I see potential 
here and would like to accept the following poems [a list follows] IF you are willing 
to do a little revising. While the poems have good bones, there is room to tweak 
in terms of line breaks and removing clichés. I'd like to see a bit more concreteness 
and not quite so much abstraction in ___________ for example. This particular poem 
blocks the way in for readers with its vague references. I hope you will accept my offer 
to work with you on making the poems shine as I believe they can. Please get back to me
if you want to work with me on these poems.

CWB


My final reply to this person was "Sorry you are not taking advantage of my editing help. Good luck with your writing." Where else could I go with this? Sigh.

When I first started publishing poems by others in my zine, I saw this kind of thing from time to time, and our fiction editor saw it even more. Mostly however, poets seem more willing to revise than fiction submitters. Lately, however, there is a resurgence of submissions with "this came from the universe/God/muse and I am not going to change a word I got from [that entity] because it would be against nature." I muse (pun intended) over why this might be happening. I wonder if the social/political/economic climate is so horrid that these folks are turning to poetry as some kind of prayer call and response scenario (a friend suggested this might be the case) and if so, is there a place for the poems that are springing up from this?

I wonder also about the glut of MFA grads being "churned out" from the plethora of universities and colleges which have developed MFA programs in the past decade or so. My zine partner, Lizzie, tells me that she gets so many story submissions that are a mess from MFA grads. She has suggested that these folks are not even close to knowing what makes a good story and how to write one. I admit I do not know what is going on with the fiction folks (why I leave that up to her).

What concerns me here is the bubbling up of poems where it is fairly obvious that the "poet" spent very little time after the initial inspiration to write. I know a man who belongs to a writing group (one I used to attend out west) who would get absolutely insulted when suggestions for revision were made by his peers. Why go to a writing group where critique is a factor and then refuse to consider revisions? I concluded that, for him, he wanted the social part of being in such a group, and was hoping for praise and validation as a poet. He too felt that the poems came from somewhere "out there" and should not be "messed with by others."

I am also amazed by how many "poets" who write prolifically do not have the slightest notion of how to describe the parts of a poem or how to discuss poems using the language of critical assessment. Several years ago, I was having lunch with a man who considers himself a poet. He gave me a poem and I read it right away. It was not what I think of as a publishable poem, but had some good parts, including some fairly fresh language. He is a poet of cliché mostly, so I was very happy to see this poem's language. Wanting to encourage more of this, I said to him, "I admire the diction in this poem." His reply was that he didn't know what diction was. OK, the man has not been formally educated in poetry. He writes "inspired" poems. However, wouldn't you think that a person who claims to be a poet, sees that as his calling in life, would take the time to educate himself in the nuts and bolts of it? This is what concerns me: so many people writing without a clue about what it takes to make a poem a poem, much less a good one. To me, these are hobbyists, not true poets. Nothing wrong with that by the way, but please don't send me your poems for publication.

I do not think a person needs an MFA or take on a formal program in order to become a true poet. A college professor I admire (a really GOOD poet) asserts that the best teacher of poetry is the poetry itself, urging us to read and read and read, then ask "how did ______ DO that? How might I do that in my own poems?" I have to agree with my former professor here. But I believe this method of learning poetry is slipping off the map, at least for some of the "poets" I encounter. And why, when encountering a poem that seems to be organized in a way that is unfamiliar, would one not search out what that might be in order to try it him/herself? Puzzling. Extremely puzzling.

So what to do with those who resist revision? Pretty much nada, nil, zip, bumpkus, zero. I conclude that leading by example is the only thing to do, i.e keep offering workshops on writing and revising. That and holding my ground with the submitters who try to slip a little cosmic dust into my inbox.


I'll end this blog entry with a thumbs up to the poetry group I attend, High Tide Poets. These amazing women are the opposite of what I describe here. The many many many revised versions of poems we share with one another is simply heart-warming to see. These woman WORK. I am up to my elbows in editing an anthology of the writing this group has produced over the past years. Will keep you posted on the details as the project unfolds.

Poetry Challenge, Week 4

NOTE:

I have put 5 days here as week 4, and will post the remaining 4 as week 5, simply for a little balance in numbers.

Day 22

Dream Job in Maine

Simple, you think, to sit

all day and take people’s money,

allow them to drive onward,

to visit the places they’ve only dreamed

of seeing up close. Onward 

to Khatadin, Baxter State Park,

Down East to Eastport with its tides

rising 32 feet, boats on long leashes,

up and down with the moon’s pull.

Simple, you think, to clock 

in and sit. It’s my dream job

I tell people who laugh out loud

until they get that I am serious.

Oh no, not that I want to sit,

or to collect coins, make change

for a twenty, or suck in fumes

from traffic. It’s a way of seeing

that I want, a way to be more.

I want to see people, relaxed 

or stressed, angry or in love, all

driving somewhere, maybe escaping

from lives they’ve sunk to over time.

I want to be able to watch

them eating their sandwiches, slurping

coffee, putting on lipstick, hear music

that keeps them awake as they drive. 

I want to see parents quieting kid uprisings,

or changing diapers leaned over

back seats as they whizz through my gate.

Poet-in-Residence at Exit 7, I’ll write

this microcosm of driving and living.

I’ll make you understand

how all of us are driving somewhere,

all of us have to pay the toll.

Day 23

Flags

Red, white, and blue, waving 

at every ball game or parade.

We stand, hands over hearts, tears 

streaming like the banner itself.

But what of the humble purple flag

flower that grows in the garden, 

raising itself to the sky

without a single hand over a single heart?

How short the life it lives, how much

it depends upon the passion of bees

to carry itself forward another generation, 

how it lives in the shadow of broader blooms

with more impressive leaves. Is the flag

it waves, each petal it presents to the sun,

less important than a patriotic thrill,

a political review? I venture outside today

to drop a tear on it, to water it well

with my admiration, to see it’s brief day

as something blessèd. This is my patriotism. 

Day 24

Night Music, circa 1973

When the quiet hours that wait 

beyond the day...

music plays on the stereo

and in my head, burning from too much 

of too much. The songs try to settle me,

but rain storms my memories, 

making sleep unlikely. I shut off the light, 

try to banish visions

I can’t control, the shade of you 

in the corner that won’t leave me alone tonight. 

I curse you and pray for quiet sleep. 

Love steals my dignity. I watch the fools’ circus 

play on and on. Here’s to the songs 

we used to sing, the times we used to know. 

I hear it. I hear it. 

Your breathing fills the house.

Amazing grace is all I need, 

what I am denied tonight.

There is such a lot of world, so many

lovers, but all I see, all I hear

are ghosts and clowns as the past

floats in through the window, keeps me

awake, falling into nightmare.

NOTE: italicized phrases come from Neil Diamond’s lyrics in If You Know What I Mean

Day 25

Notes on Notes

I am Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, play

past bedtime and into moonrise,

my notes on notes that cleave time

and leave me dangling on twine

above the bed, like a dreamcatcher

with spider weaving mad music

to keep all of us safe in darkness,

to filter carnival dreams from nightmares.

I am strains of melody, running

under stars dead already — beyond

the 186,000 miles it took them

to get their light here for us to admire.

If you make note of my notes, play

them again in daylight, they have flattened

or grown too sharp for your palate,

for the smell of bacon frying

or the splash of juice in the jelly jar

your mother calls “glasses.”

I am fine-honed music, or jazz or rap,

but always playing at night, in shadow.

I am not a brass band on the street

or a booming car stereo. I am steady

bars, glissando or lente. No fortissimo

will do for my score. Eine Kleine Nacht

a little bit of note on notes, a little musik

to make it worth opening your eyes, singing.

Day 26

How To Do It

When you wake up lonely, feel yourself in quicksand

or a bowl of stars a few light years away

from midnight, grab the last thread of the last dream

you remember, hold on and swing down 

into a pond or the edge of a still pool, where trout

can fill in the blanks, hold up a mirror

to show you where you’ve been and the way home.

When you fall asleep lonely, feel a sucking sensation

in your feet, or a sudden lift of your body

onto the lip of the universe, grab the first hot beam

of light that goes shooting by, hold on tight.

Think hard, recall the names of all your lost loves,

say them aloud as you begin to rise and go.

Keep your eyes open as long as the clock chimes.

Losing all senses one at a time, 

finding them again in reverse order —

A dance or a kiss, a wrench or a bullet. 

A rolled out blanket of stars.

AWP, a community of writers

This weekend is the annual AWP (Associated Writing Programs) conference. This year it is in Boston. It is one of the two or three annual events that keep me going as a writer. This is a rarefied experience where I get to listen to panel discussions and talks and readings while spending quality time with other writers, most of whom I only see once a year.

I am nearly packed for my trip, going down on Wednesday by train. No parking issues, no driving in the city. Ahhhh. And then there is the hotel stay. Pricey sure. But totally worth it. I am feeling great about the events and the dining and the drinking of fine wine. I am looking forward to seeing fellow alums from Vermont College and some poets whose work I admire. All in all, I am fired up, ready to go.

I hope to be blogging the conference this time... something I haven't done before. So stay tuned.

Pluralism is born in schools; but are we killing it at its source?

I've been thinking heavily about the problems with our larger society, relating to the stalemate that exists at every level of government. We seem to be (again) a deeply divided country over issues like gun safety (school safety is a huge part but not all of that heated debate at the highest levels) and budgetary concerns, and on and on, often ad nauseum.  We are divided on the role of government in the daily lives of citizens, voting access, and access to quality education for our young people. We seem to be on a continuous loop and cannot extricate ourselves from the "problems" long enough to sit down and think them through rationally (in many cases). I am left wondering where the fissure opened and swallowed reason, which used to be a virtue and now seems utterly vilified by the "powers that be" in DC and state legislatures. When did the funhouse mirrors become the lenses through which we observe and engage?

I believe with all my heart and mind that education is the last best hope for solving our problems. However, we can't seem to agree upon what constitutes "quality" education in this country. We measure and measure and grind our teeth to stubs over scores. We blame and shame. We revile teachers and accuse them of being "the problem" along with their unions. There is plenty of blame being slung and teachers have become easy targets. I have ideas about why, but the purpose of this entry is not that... stay tuned though as it is coming! For now I want to address something that may be a can of wriggling worms unless it is actually a safe harbor where we might moor this sinking ship and regroup.

We open for-profit charters thinking businesses must know how to educate, how to run schools, how to weed out the best and brightest from the chaff of the ordinary. We blather on and on about curriculum and standards. What I am not hearing is a solid mission statement that outlines in PLAIN language why we educate in public schools at all. Oh sure, there is the flavor-du-jour message about "preparing today's students to compete in a global economy (or "on the global stage") message that seems to have gotten huge traction in the media and at school boards and education committees across the land. BAH. This is what I'd call a load of bullshit, but just say psycho-babble if you are not into expletives.  Let's unpack that message for a minute:

Prepare our students... :  This sounds like we are operating a training facility of some sort, a place where the only thing that matters is rote performance of tasks. I can't help but question this. I am also reminded grimly of the final part of that old B & W movie, The Day the Earth Stood Still, where we see the cookbook which says it all, portrays the real message that was so understood: To Serve Man. I personally prefer the word, "empower," but maybe I am being too lacking in commercialism here. Can't have that.

to compete... : We must ask ourselves whether we believe education is a zero-sum-game? Is it an event or series of encounters where there are winners and losers? We have gone from a country of states and towns and cities where local schools were the norm to large conglomerate systems of unified districts and consolidated schools. We believe, or have come to believe, that we must make it a race to some finite goal line. Arne Duncan has dismantled the notion that smaller is better. He has promoted this new flavor du jour, Race to the Top. It is  putting lipstick on the pig yet again, making No Child Left Behind into Some Children Will Be Ahead while all others do get left behind. For a race, is by its very definition and denotation comprised of a top few "winners" and a bottom multitude of "losers."

in a global economy... :  How's that global economy principle working out? Ask Greece, Spain, and others whose economies fall or rise (so far none of that rising part) by ties to a "global" monetary unit (the Euro). It seems to me that economic motives in education are less about personal and community success and esteem than the more rote, competitive motives that pit people against one another in a zero-sum game modality. We say we are looking for students to be "successes," but our plan to get them there is more like a series of job-tied constraints with a different label slapped on the process for education to make it palatable. Ask whether it's our end result to gin out worker bees who are measured by what monetary contributions they might make later on. Are we asking our young people to settle for an education that will assure they work in jobs that bring home a basic salary? Are we dressing up the model in order to "feed the queen bee" with skill sets and production figures as measurements? I think we are. It is worrying.

I did not take up writing as a way to earn a living wage, although it would be nice to have a society believe that this thing I do has economic benefit for me and for all. For the "earning" part, I turned first to nursing, then to teaching. Always however writing was part and parcel of who I am as a human being. Yes, I admit it: I am first and most of all a human being.

and on the global stage:  Perhaps most insidious and sinister of all the psycho-babbled parts of our "message" is this idea of humans as mere actors in the schema of society. In all plays and films etc there are the protagonists, the villains, the do-gooders who are just too nice to survive, and above it all the director and the producers. Is this thing we like to call education some grand production, and we the players? What script are we following and who is in charge? Is this a grand comedy where all of us are fools who manage to marry and ride off into the sunset at the end, or a tragedy where everyone dies?

I am worried. I am deeply worried. Gone are the days where children/students went off to school to improve their minds and learn citizenship and other community-based values along with languages, penmanship, math, science, and clear thinking. CRITICAL thinking it is called now and yet so many people give it lip service and fail to see it AS critical, other than as a piece of a resumé that lands a good job perhaps.

Seemingly gone too is the garden of ideas that flourished over discussions and debate. We have enmeshed ourselves in the process of actually smothering pluralism by insisting upon the artificial values of competition and one-upsmanship, brinksmanship, and rigorous high-stakes testing that competes for instructional time and blurs the lines between true success and pseudo-success. Pluralism is the belief that there may be several good ideas and good approaches and good points of view that are valid. Sounds good. Is good. But...we have allowed ideologues to replace a search for larger truths with fact-absent rants and verbal bullying tactics that can only polarize and enforce a me vs you, a we vs them life. Pluralism has become a bit of an archaic term and certainly is not at all the focus of an educational message coming from boards and school committees. More often than not, when I use the term, I get quizzical looks, raised eyebrows, and the question: what is THAT?

Civics is dead, and in its place AP History (US and World) that only marginally passes for anything related to how people co-exist in a much more immediate and smaller political environment. It is AP because that label certifies an excellence, an ADVANCED PLACEMENT in the competing arena of education. It is a please pass go, please collect $200 School Monopoly game. The problem with that is that it leaves behind many bright and accomplished learners who do not have the AP opportunity, or who do not fare well on the artificial instrument that is the exam. But AP "success" is a meat and potatoes entity for school systems. It beefs up school numbers and reputations. It just plain looks good for a school to have large numbers of AP students who do well on the exams. Money follows. Loads of money. This is true for the rest of the high-stakes testing panoply. In resisting high-stakes testing (which leads to more testing, less instructional time beyond test prepping), schools actually LOSE funding. "We have to do it or we don't get the money," is what I hear over and over from school board members and not just a few administrators.

We tout STEM courses as what is "the" important curricular thrust, ignoring the fact that we have a Congress that refuses to accept the outcomes and findings of Science and Mathematics. The Engineering and Technology sides of the rectangle are utilitarian enough to be acceptable because they can be justified in that they fit the business model that is so popular today. Social studies, all social science, is suspect and looked at as some kind of witchcraft in terms of trustworthiness.  Social Studies is not even ON the SAT now. There is a writing component, because there was an outcry for it a few years ago, but it is a joke. Rubrics developed for scoring are artificial touch points and do not allow for any kind of writing that shows creativity or thought. If the rubrics' buzz words are found in the writing, the score is high even if the writing completely lacks style, mechanics, or creative thought. It's just too damn bad for that student who dared to take any kind of out of the box approach. We do not reward thinking whatsoever in our quest for "success" on these tests.

Where is the chance for healthy debate of ideas here? At this rate, it is seemingly nowhere. But why does it matter in the short term if our long term goals are purely utilitarian or commercial? It matters because we are human beings, each of us somewhat unique, with common needs for our shared planetary existence.

But unless and until we turn this train around, we are headed over the cliff. Not a fiscal cliff but an intellectual one, right down into a chasm of group-think destruction. STEM is a good thing: See, Think, Experiment, Mess up, then start again with fresh ideas and approaches and help from the ideas of others. My GRAND WISH for my children was that they learn to stand apart from me, their own legs firmly planted on the ground, doing their best and hashing out their errors with the help of great arguments and collaborations. It is the same wish I have for all of our children.

So what to do now? Indeed what the hell to do? Be a promoter of pluralism in your community. Share openly (with excitement, but not with arrogance) when you have an opinion, but by all means, talk to one another. That person in front of you might just have something important to say.

Truancy; not an old problem

It's a sad state of affairs that, in 2013, truancy is not a faded memory but rather an active problem. There are parents of young children (elementary school age children) who simply do not see it as a value to get their children up, dressed and to the bus in the morning. As a young mother, a single parent with no nearby help, including from the children's father, I got my four girls up, fed, dressed, and to the bus on time every day. Their homework was done, checked, and in their backpacks or book bags. I saw that as the primary responsibility of my adult life. No matter how stressful MY life was (and it was in those days), I knew for my own children to have any kind of futures I had to step up and make that happen for them. My own mother was always there for me while my father earned our living, working long hours and much overtime. They both valued education and saw it as a pathway to the future for me and my siblings. It was not MY responsibility at age 7 or 8 or 9 to get that handled. That job belonged to my parents, more specifically to my mother. And never was there a report card that came home unexamined by my parents in detail, with follow-up conversations with our teachers.

Fast forward to 2013 and my shock to discover there are students in our school district who have missed between 30 and 70 days of school already this year. I was shocked to hear too that there are parents who never look at the report cards of their children, never attend a parent-teacher conference. How can this be? What are these parents doing other than parenting?

I certainly understand that it often takes parents cobbling together several jobs to make ends meet. They are living on a thin string. Often one or the other works nights and both work days. It is hard to live under such stress, in such dire conditions. It is depressing, demoralizing. But the children of these hard-working parents deserve to be top priority, deserve the sacrifice of time and effort by their parents to engage with the process by which their children can break the cycle of poverty and stress in their own lives.

In our school district most children travel to school by bus. Unlike California where so many districts have opted OUT of transporting students, we still do. We provide breakfast and lunch for over 60% of our students, at a free or reduced cost. We put great effort into our curricula and our teachers work very diligently to meet academic needs with rigor and with increasing innovation of methods.

So, what's wrong? Why are so many students in our district and other districts staying home in epic numbers? They are not, in most cases, "ditchers" who go to school and skip out after getting off the bus. No. They never get there in the first place. They are captives in a culture of truancy imposed upon them by the very people who ought to be nurturing them.

As a school board member, I am disturbed and disheartened. I worry about these children. I am angry with their parents. No little girl ought to stay home from school and sit in her parents' apartment all day without playmates, without being part of a classroom of learners. What is WRONG with parents who cannot be bothered to get her up, dressed, and off to a bus that stops two houses away from their apartment?

The State of Maine is in the midst of a fresh look at how to help. I wait to see if help will come. In the meantime, I think it is time for someone to talk turkey about the problem here. It's way past time. This problem will not go away on its own.

A new blog —please visit, comment, and follow

Announcing my new blog Poetry Zone: http://write365poems.blogspot.com

I hope you will enjoy reading the poems of my 365 Challenge. As of today, I am at 102. I am posting them on the blog weekly, after having posted everything from November, December, and January.

Enjoy!

What I can do without

Today, post blizzard, is sunshiny and calm (no wind). The neighborhood men are out throwing and blowing and shoveling. No trees came down and no one in the neighborhood lost power. But oh those drifts! From my bedroom window (2nd floor) there is 24 inches up against the screen. My hubby had to dig his way out of the barn to even get the snow thrower out and running. There is so much snow that it is hard to find space to put it.

It's a pain to deal with the stuff, but it is beautiful. There is a magic to the gleam and glitter of it in sunlight, and when late afternoon comes, the blue fingers of tree shadows will inspire me to write. I took tons of photographs from the safety and warmth of the house, posted a few to our kids and grandkids.

What can I do without? What is my complaint?

I can do without six more weeks of winter. I can happily call this the final storm of the season. But will it be? Or will we be "graced" with more snow? True enough, we live in Maine. We are used to this. We have also had a very mild winter. A week or so of sub-zero temps, a couple small squalls, now this major NEMO event (no trouble FINDING him, he rather found us). But it is also true that by February, we are al tired of the heavy coats, the crap on our shoes, the endless rumbling of our furnaces. Glub, glub, glub.

I can also do without complaining. So, if more winter is coming, I need to think of it as "material" and just write.

Glass of old wine, Stroh Rhum and writing

I've just had the Maineuh's Breakfast of Champions: blueberry pancakes and Moxie.  I've written the poem of the day (60 in 60 days so far and onward!). At this point, you must be asking: what can possibly be the QUALITY of these poems, written daily? How much time, attention to detail, and hard work could possibly be produced in volume like this?

My answer is simple:

1. I am not settling for low poems or striving for high. I am working a discipline.
2. I go for finding one phrase or (if I'm lucky), one line that pleases my palate as a poet.
3. I am exercising my poet's muscle.

This morning's poem is a premonition or warning. I took on the task with a memory from sailing on the Heritage, the Great Windship Heritage out of Rockland, Maine. I added in a memory from childhood when I heard all my fishermen friends repeat the superstitious ditty found below the poem. I also fed off the image of weather as animal (clouds bucking) and got into a rhythm of 9,10, 10, 9 for the stanzas' meter. Meter is a metronome in my head — one that, to be sure, I check as I write/revise.

I'm also thinking of a song by Neil Diamond that has been playing in my head all morning: If You Know What I Mean.  

Took a drag of my last cigarette, took a drink from a glass of old wine.

On my desk is the remains of my Moxie, laced with Stroh Rhum (you can only get it IN Austria) and the remains of last night's wine. I took a picture of the two glasses. My rum and moxie is in a RED SOX glass, my wine in a glass that says, live your life. I am truly in love with the irony of the life of a poet.

So here I am, in my garrett, (translated: my office) while the snow lies all about in drifts so beautifully pure and soft. I am warm with a  fluffy purple blanket around my shoulders. I feel satisfied. My hubby and grandsons are downstairs gearing up for the day's football games. They are being manly and I am being "me-ly." Life is great. 2012 is winding down like a dysfunctional clock. I look forward to what's next. January is my birthday month (yes, I celebrate all month) and I am rushing to meet it with poems in both fists. I will complete the Wilbur manuscript this year (hopefully by May) and will surprise myself with whatever's next.

So a sip of Moxie Stroh to all of you who are wondering where the next poem is, whether you will be up to writing it, and if it will be good enough. I say it will be right where you last thought of an interesting word; it's waiting for you to pick it up, stretch it and write it on a page. It will be good enough because you encountered it and welcomed it. Go find it. Pick up the pen.


Happy New Year!

Carol



The Day 30 (December) Poem:

Day 30 Write about a premonition or warning

Red Sky at Morning*

Clouds bucking the surface of the sea

buckling its skin, taking on water,

evaporating hopes of mariners

heading for home after their big haul.

In the eastern sky, daybreak flares out

with its warning: bad storm’s a-coming lads,

bad storm’s a-coming and you’d best get home

where the fire’s laid and the mugs warmed up.

Steady eye, unsteady wake and all

hands on deck for the run to the harbor,

the hold teeming with early morning catch;

what a day’s pay we’ll fetch from this lads

if we can git this girl t’home, git 

this girl t’home. Else we’ll go down singin’

meet th’others at the bottom o’ the sea.

So haul away, Joe and Tim and Mike.

Clouds bucking the surface of the cold sea.

Sky’s warning disasters yet to be told.

Bad storm’s a-comin’ lads, better head home.

Bad storm’s a-comin’, lads, she’s a-comin’

*from an old sailors’ verse of superstition:

Red sky at night, sailors’ delight; 

Red sky at morning, sailors take warning

Post Marathon Wrap

Yesterday was an amazing day for poetry. I accomplished my "marathon" reading at our library: 8 hours nonstop. I was fortunate to have great support by the library who put up signs, allowed me to inhabit the fireplace room (reading room) and generally direct people to me. There were requests for specific poems to be read by random visitors to the library, including two young girls (probably aged 10 or 11) who brought me poetry books and asked for specific poems. I also met a woman who brought me the works of Anna Emma Coughlin to read. This poet (Coughlin) was a beloved teacher in Rockland (Maine) in the 20s and 30s. Her poems are lovely. Our local high school principal sent a student emissary to deliver a book of poetry by his mother (the principal's mother). Her poems are great and I can't wait to meet her. Another person (thanks Tessie) requested I read the traditional waiting for Santa story/poem (The Night Before Christmas). It was fun to do that. All in all, it was a great day for poetry and for Rockland. I must thank too the graciousness of Dagney Ernest who reported on the story of my marathon (Going Long on he Shortest Day) in the local papers. She is very supportive of what I am doing as Poet Laureate. Thanks, Dagney for coming on your day off to do the photo shoot at the library!


MOMENT OF SILENCE OBSERVED:

At 930, the librarian rang a little bell for a moment of silence for the victims of the horrid tragic shootings in CT. I observed that silence and read in a barely discernible whisper. Immediately afterward, I read aloud those two poems which were written specifically about the shootings, one by me (Lessons From First Grade) and another by our previous Poet Laureate, Kendall Merriam (Agony: a Prayer for the Children, Parents, Teachers).

What about bathroom breaks? you may ask. I was fortunate to have people spell me for that necessity. They had to read in my place while I handled the situation. I had a lobster roll for lunch brought in by my husband (who stayed most of the day and hauled in and out my bags of books and shoes - 5 pairs of sparkly shoes in black, silver, and purple). Another person (thanks Margie!) brought me chocolate-dipped strawberries as a treat and my neighbor brought me throat drops to keep my mouth moist. I never did lose my voice! I was definitely a little raspy by 430 but...

I might mention here, in keeping with the contemporary scene, that I read using multiple methods: from printed papers, from hand-written papers, from books, and from my iPad. Here is s short list of poets I read:

Dana Gioia, BH Fairchild, Seamus Heaney, Millay, Bishop, Michael Dennis Browne, Jennifer MacPherson, Elizabeth Garber, Jacob Fricke, Elizabeth Tibbetts, Larry Kramer, Kristin Lindquist, Auden, Plath, Elizabeth Barrett-Browning, Kathleen Ellis, Gayle Portnow, Wendy Rapaport, and many many many more. I discovered new poems by some of these, and enjoyed returning to poems I have long loved. I began and ended the day with sonnets. Seems only right.

When I got home my hubby made dinner and I retired early. What a good night's sleep I got!

So what is next for this Action Figure Poet Laureate?

I hereby declare January to be RAP Month in Rockland and beyond...

no! not THAT kind of RAP... I am referring to Random Acts of Poetry. I will start things by delivering a "money poem" to local banks on January 2nd when they re-open after the holidays. I encourage poets and lovers of poetry to accomplish some random acts throughout January and to report to me the who what where and when of it. I'll post the "acts" here on my blog in early February.

Also, I invite poets and lovers to an upcoming event in February (exact date and place and time TBA): a Sweetheart Poetry Tea. Poets and lovers will read poems of love and devotion to and about their sweethearts. Valentine cookies and tea will be served and the mood will be romantic. This will be a way to focus on love in a world so seemingly over-focused on everything else.

So, watch FB and this blogspot and my author page: www.carolbachofner.com for details.


That's it for now... time to decorate the Christmas tree and so some wRAPping.

Merit Pay, or let's belittle teachers AGAIN

I am a teacher, by profession and nature. My husband too, and our eldest daughter and our daughter-in-law. But this post is not about us. It is about what is happening to teachers across this nation and this state. There is a piece of legislation up for consideration in Maine and other states (being rammed through?) that would tie as much as 25% of teachers' pay to high-stakes testing (called "student outcome" by our DOE commissioner and others).  It is at times like this when I begin to wonder if there is any logic left. By the way, I see no "bonuses" in the proposed rule, like so many dollars extra if students get so many points on these hideous tests that drive everyone crazy other than bureaucrats.

I would begin here by asking a simple series of questions:


Do doctors get paid based on "patient outcomes"? READ: lab test results for example. (If a patient gets sick do they get their pay docked?)
Do firefighters get paid based upon the numbers of fires they stop before any loss is incurred? (Do they have pay docked when a building or field burns?)
Do cops get paid based upon the numbers of criminals who do not commit crimes? (Are they docked pay when a criminal commits a crime?)

I could go on.


NO. All these people who are professionals get paid based upon negotiated salaries or costs or prices.  We are their fellow citizens and we pay for their services with our taxes and our moneys. We expect them to do their best, but do not expect them to be monetarily evaluated. Why then would we even CONSIDER merit pay for teachers? Parents send their precious children to these hard-wrking professionals for 8 hours a day — to care for them, instruct them, mold their characters, inspire them, assist them in developing thinking and reasoning skills, prepare them for the working world, and would take a bullet for each and every one of them (lest you forget, think of Newtown CT). But we are going to get punitive with their paychecks because of test scores?  No student or family is a consumer of education. Education is a process: of learning to think and learning to improve the mind and society. We don't have a business here, we have a system of education.

The "what is wrong" is not at all the "fault" of teachers. Teachers have to teach in an antiquated system,  a system that was developed and has persisted since the 1890s. Admittedly it has become quite the bureaucracy. That is a problem. But the problem lies within the system itself. Docking teachers' paychecks will not fix the systemic problem, the ingrained foolishness of not updating the system itself. Inserting punitive "merit" pay into this system that is so filled with error already would be the height of error. And unless every teacher has the right to expect bonuses equal to or higher than CEOs of companies, we must stop this ridiculous plan for "de-merit" pay. And unless we put education back into its rightful place of honor and respect, we are going to stay foolish and stay in the blame game.

Yes, there are teachers who are not living up to the title of "teacher" by being stuck in an old groove, not moving forward with the latest and greatest techniques or technologies. There are teachers who are burned out and ready to stop teaching. There is a way for that to get solved. But punishing teachers everywhere for the few who are deficient is a mistake. Would any of us wish to be punished for the shortcomings of others? Would we want to be disparaged for the faults of others? I think not. So why are we so willing to lay the blame and levy punishment on teachers who have done nothing to deserve it? Truly this baffles me. This kind of thing exists nowhere else in our society.

STOP the madness. Oppose any and all efforts to put into place any sort of meritocracy in our school systems.

Education ought to be our top priority in this country and in this state. We ought to pay teachers what Wall Street gets paid, with all the perks they get. But we choose instead to vilify and punish them. Wrong, just wrong.

Education, the silver bullet we turn on ourselves

OUTING MYSELF: I admit it: I am a school board member. I am happy to be a school board member. I love working for our students and seeing their successes. However, I wonder after every meeting if there is a 12-step program for us. While it is good work to be doing, it does get discouraging. Last night was one of those occasions when I came home very discouraged.

Last night was a public forum on our district's proposed Strategic Plan. This forum was well-advertised. It was well-organized. It was a poorly-attended gathering of fewer than 75 people INCLUDING some staff, the superintendent, administrators, student helpers, and some (not all) board members. The draft of the plan has been up on the district web site for quite a while with a "survey monkey" for the public to be able to weigh in on the details from home if they could not attend public meetings on this. I was shocked to learn that only 16 people have taken the survey, which closes before Christmas break. I can pretty much guarantee that our 6 towns have more than 16 people who will grouse loudly in the future as we implement (and try to fund) this plan. Discouraging to say the least.

We were asked last night to speak to any concerns we might have with the plan and its components. Several people did speak. It is notable that these are generally the same people who come to board meetings from time to time to speak on issues of concern to them. I applaud all who came and shared. But...

It became clear to me that we are like scattershot in terms of these concerns. One woman thinks the thing we ought to be doing is hiring more teachers to create additional sections of classes that get filled up (she doesn't mention the cost involved that might sink our budget). While I agree with her (I do agree), I have not seen her at ANY of the budget meetings and wonder if she thinks teachers are free. Another woman who does come to board and budget meetings complained that the plan is too long. She held up a two-sided laminated (in bright colors) chart that apparently was the plan for a now nonexistent district. Yet another woman said the plan was not specific enough and doesn't have dates specific wherein each goal would be finished. None of these women understands that this is a living document, a set of goals toward which we will strive or that it is not also a legally-binding document whose tenets must be accomplished. It is a plan, not a mandate. None of these women, and not too many others in the room, understands the components of a plan. OK. Not a problem. We can (and should) educate them and the rest of the citizens as to what a plan means and does.

My greatest joy last night was a set of comments made by a teacher (from another district but who resides here). He urged us to get busy on implementing Standards-Based leaning and reporting. He made the point that we (all the US) have been teaching and learning under antiquated models where there is not fairness in grading and expectations of time vs accomplishment, and where there is a punitive system of grading that discourages success for the long haul (read: lifelong learning and self-esteem here). He is right. 100% right. I commented (and I know there were some who are probably pretty mad at me for saying it) that we have been "talking about talking about" standards-based and it is time to actually DO it, for the benefit of all students and their futures. The gentleman who spoke pointed out that taking action on this will cost us (financially) way less than new buildings and we can accomplish it in a relatively efficient manner and in a relatively short period of time. He is 100% right there too. We need to be looking at other districts already on board with this. I have been saying this for over a year. We can accomplish this not by talking but by digging in, rolling up our sleeves and focusing like a laser on DOING. Talking about baking a cake doesn't get the cake on your plate. Assembling the ingredients helps but won't get the cake baked either. You have to DO the work of the cake. It is the same with Standards-Based learning and reporting. And as for cost: it will be minimal relatively speaking, and over time will so simplify the system that it will pay for itself.

My biggest irk last night was the comments of one man who droned on and on and on about our buildings and how old they are. He cited 3 or 4 specific buildings that are over 50 years old. His imperative to us was that we need to close old schools, reduce the number of buildings, and build new (and fewer) more up-to-date facilities. It is odd to me, since this man is a number-cruncher, that he doesn't see the elephant in the room: the cost of new buildings. I agree that it seems (at the face) odd to have 10 buildings for 2000 students. But what he misses (other than the cost) is that, for our 6 towns, these buildings represent community education and community spirit. He states that he cares about children, but his speech is all dollars. Oh sure, it would be great to have brand new state-of-the-art schools. Nearby Camden got one of those fancy-schmancy building complexes, financed by MBNA before it pulled up stakes and bailed on the area. But do the students in that luxury building fare better or have better lives than students in aging buildings? There are certainly some high-end programs there (because the town is affluent) that our district cannot fund. But in the basics, the subjects and the culture and the happiness of students, do our aging buildings cause a lessening of success for our students? I don't think so. We have, for the most part, dedicated faculty, staff, and administrators. We have students who, for the most part, work hard to learn. The truth is that there is unrest and unhappiness in even the grandest mansion and overflowing happiness in even the most dilapidated hovel. Why affluent support gets tied to happiness is beyond me, but it so often is. I say that good things can (and do) happen in old buildings and not-so-good things can (and do) happen in new buildings. Once safety has been established as a baseline for both, it is about what goes on INSIDE that counts.

So, I am a bit discouraged. Education truly is the silver bullet for ALL our citizens and for success in every aspect of life. An uneducated or an undereducated populous is one easily controlled and manipulated. An educated workforce (I do not mean to say everyone needs an academic post-secondary experience) is more efficient and happier and therefore more productive and prosperous both financially and personally. We all know this and pretty much agree, but what seems to be missing is the will to make it happen. We are in essence committing national suicide by ignoring our schools and tying funding to silly entities like property taxes. Education, pre-K through college or tech schools, ought to be FREE to all. It ought to be that teachers are once again given the respect they have earned rather than vilified and threatened by stupid things like merit pay, union stripping, and ridicule.  It ought to be that EVERYONE in a community would see it as their civic duty to participate in making school the hub of the community. Instead we make restaurants and bars our hubs. What is wrong with that picture? We are turning the silver bullet on ourselves people. We will not solve problems with only a handful of frustrated, over-burdened people working on the solutions while the uninvolved complain bitterly on the sidelines.

Meanwhile, I will stay on my soapbox and fight for our students' right to the best system we can forge for them.

William Dunbar's The Thrissil and the Rois, The Thistle and the Rose

The Poem, unpacked, with some translation from medieval Scots English to English.

The Thrissil and the Rois (Thistle and Rose), composed by William Dunbar of Scotland, is comprised of stanzas in rhyme royale form. To clarify, rhyme royale stanzas consist of seven lines, usually of iambic pentameter (typical for narratives of the time). The rhyme scheme is a-b-a-b-b-c-c and is normally made up either as a tercet with two couplets  (a-b-a, b-b, c-c) or as a quatrain with a tercet (a-b-a-b, b-c-c). 

This allowance for variance is particularly helpful in longer narratives. 

Notice that the poem uses aureate vocabulary (using both Latin and French) to glide it forward. Aureation is seen nowadays by some critics as being pretentious, however it is a method not of embellishment for embellishment’s sake but as necessary dressing. The narrative of Dunbar’s herein is presented via a quite common medieval device: dream vision. Since the poem was written to celebrate/commemorate a wedding (James IV of Scotland and Margaret Tudor of England), the embellishment of aureation and the dream vision device are appropriate.

Let’s look at the poem itself now, beginning with Dunbar’s description of Spring (also emblematic of the beginning of a married life).

Quhen Merche wes with variand windis past,

And Appryll had with hir silver schouris

Tane leif at Nature with ane orient blast,

And lusty May, that muddir is of flouris,

Had maid the birdis to begyn thair houris,

Amang the tendir odouris reid and quhyt,

Quhois armony to heir it wes delyt,

The sleeping poet has a dream in which he is addressed by the personification of May.

Me thocht fresche May befoir my bed upstude

In weid depaynt of mony divers hew,

Sobir, benyng, and full of mansuetude,

In brycht atteir of flouris forgit new,

Hevinly of color, quhyt, reid, broun, and blew,

Balmit in dew and gilt with Phebus bemys

Quhill all the hous illumynit of hir lemys.

"Slugird," scho said, "Awalk annone, for schame,

And in my honour sumthing thow go wryt,

Quhairto quod I, Sall I uprys at morrow,

For in this May few birdis herd I sing?

Thai haif moir caus to weip and plane thair sorrow,

Thy air it is nocht holsum nor benyng,

May reminds him that he had previously promised her to write a poem about the rose. 

With that this lady sobirly did smyll

And said, Uprys and do thy observance,

Thow did promyt in Mayis lusty quhyle

For to discryve the ros of most plesance.

Quhen this wes said depairtit scho, this quene,

And enterit in a lusty gairding gent.

And than, me thocht, sa listely besene,

In serk and mantill, full haistely I went,

Into this garth, most dulce and redolent,

Of herb and flour and tendir plantis sueit,

And grene levis doing of dew doun fleit.

In the garden, Nature (seen of course as a woman) sends messengers to the animals, birds and plants of the world, requiring their immediate presence, their homage. [All present were in twinkling of an eye, both beast and bird and flower, before the queen ... as embodied in the last couplet of this part.]

Scho ordand eik that every bird and beist,

Befoir hir hienes suld annone compeir,

And every flour of vertew, most and leist,

And every herb be feild, fer and neir,

All present wer in twynkling of ane e,

Baith beist and bird and flour, befoir the quene.

Nature calls the Lion forward, described as the Lion Rampant standard of Scots Kings. Notice the rich description of this kingly beast and know Dunbar, as poet of the Court, was wont to thusly honor James:

Reid of his cullour as is the ruby glance,

On feild of gold he stude full mychtely,      [on field of gold he strode most mightily.... think of royal banner]

With flour delycis sirculit lustely.

This lady liftit up his cluvis cleir,

And leit him listly lene upone hir kne,

And crownit him with dyademe full deir,

Of radyous stonis most ryall for to se,          [of radiant stones most royal for all to see]

Saying, The king of beistis mak I thee,

And the chief protector in the woddis and schawis.

Onto thi leigis go furth, and keip the lawis.

Exerce justice with mercy and conscience,

And lat no small beist suffir skaith na skornis

Of greit beistis that bene of moir piscence.

The lion is the embodiment of the duty of the King to bring justice to all of his subjects,

the humble and the more powerful.The animals therefore acclaim their new King. 

The Eagle appears to symbolize the King's plan to keep the peace within Scotland and,

perhaps, with England. Nature crowns the Eagle King of the birds, sharpens his feathers

to dart-like points, enjoining him to let no ravens, or other birds of prey, make trouble.

All kynd of beistis into thair degré

At onis cryit lawd, Vive le roy!

And till his feit fell with humilité,

And all thay maid him homege and fewté, 

Syne crownit scho the Egle, king of fowlis,

And as steill dertis scherpit scho his pennis,  [pennis = feathers]

And bawd him be als just to awppis and owlis 

As unto pacokkis, papengals, or crennis, 

And mak a law for wycht fowlis and for wrennis. 

And lat no fowll of ravyne do efferay,

Nor devoir birdis bot his awin pray.

Nature then inspects the plants and judges the spiked thistle to be 'able for war'. The thistle is crowned King of all plants with a gleaming crown of rubies.

The thistle seems to represent the King's determination to defend his Kingdom.

Nature then advises the Thistle to show discretion when judging other plants.

Upone the awfull Thrissill scho beheld

And saw him kepit with a busche of speiris.

Concedring him so able for the weiris,

A radius croun of rubeis scho him gaif.

And said, In feild go furth and fend the laif.

And sen thow art a king, thow be discreit,

Herb without vertew hald nocht of sic pryce

As herb of vertew and of odor sueit,

And lat no nettill vyle and full of vyce          [and let no nettle vile and full of vice]

Hir fallow to the gudly flour delyce,

Nor latt no wyld weid full of churlichenes

Compair hir till the lilleis nobilnes,          [compare her to the lillies’ nobleness]

Dunbar is a not-so-subtle admonisher to the King in this next part, wherein he seems to be warning the King to be done with the practice of having mistresses. He does this in the voice of Nature who praises the red-and-white rose over all the other flowers.The rose represents Margaret of England.

Nor hald non udir flour in sic denty

As the fresche Ros of cullour reid and quhyt,

For gife thow dois, hurt is thyne honesty,

Conciddering that no flour is so perfyt,          [considering no flower is so perfect]

So full of vertew, plesans, and delyt,          [so full of virtue, pleasance, and delight]

So full of blisfull angelik bewty,                  [so full of blissful angelic beauty]

Imperiall birth, honour, and dignité.               [imperial birth, honor, and dignity]

It is clear that these lines are meant to praise the lovely Margaret of England, and to serve as a warning to James that he has it all at home, and should not stray. Nature addresses the rose directly, praising her and calling her forward to be crowned.

Than to the Ros scho turnyt hir visage

And said, O lusty dochtir most benyng,

Aboif the lilly illustare of lynnage,

Fro the stok ryell rysing fresche and ying,

But ony spot or macull doing spring,

Cum, blowme of joy, with jemis to be cround,

For our the laif thy bewty is renownd.

A coistly croun with clarefeid stonis brycht,

This cumly quene did on hir heid inclois,  

Quhairfoir me thocht all flouris did rejos,

Crying attonis, Haill be thow richest Ros,

Haill hairbis empryce, haill freschest quene of flouris!

To thee be glory and honour at all houris!

The birds join the acclamation of the new Queen who is compared to a pearl which is totally expected in the poem as 'Margaret' is derived from the Latin term (margarita) for a pearl.

The commoun voce uprais of birdis small

Apone this wys, O blissit be the hour,

That thow wes chosin to be our principall,

Welcome to be our princes of honour,

Our perle, our plesans, and our paramour,

Our peax, our play, our plane felicité:

Chryst thee conserf frome all adversité! 

Now the poem switches from the dream of Dunbar to Dunbar himself.  Birdsong merges with the dawn chorus. Dunbar awakens and looks for the garden he saw in his dream but finds it gone. While half-frighted, he “begins” to write the poem. This is reminiscent of what would later be seen as a magical realism poem, much like Xanadu.

Than all the birdis song with sic a schout,

That I annone awoilk quhair that I lay,

And with a braid I turnyt me about,

To se this court, bot all wer went away.

Than up I lenyt, halflingis in affrey,

And thus I wret, as ye haif hard to forrow,

Of lusty May upone the nynt morrow.

It is the ninth of May.

This poem may be one of Dunbar’s best. It certainly engendered a fairly robust admiration for his work from James IV, who appointed him as Poet to the Court. Dunbar’s ability to connect nature (with a capital N) to the monarchy is without reproach, either then or now. I am reminded of Sir Elton John’s remake song sung at the funeral of Princess Diana, wherein he refers to her as England’s Rose. I’d like to think Sir Elton has read Dunbar’s Thrissil and Rois, but I’m not taking that leap. But I will happily claim a certain visceral intertextuality that comes from the collective unconscious. In the world of magical words and symbols, we can rest assured that there is more “out there” waiting for us if we allow ourselves to be dreamers and writers, and to pay attention to the issues of the day, happy and not so... all is the stuff of poetry.