Line Eight

Here's the eighth line. Can't wait for the ninth!

Leaving Haiti, Leaving Japan

On my computer I keep a file called "Blog Ideas." For two years now there's been a question in that file. "Was it right to leave Haiti?" Even now, twenty-six months after the earthquake, I still feel deeply conflicted about our family's decision (really, my husband's decision) for the children and me to go to the States on the Saturday after that Tuesday, January 12th, 2010. I agonized about it here on this blog many times, and in private many more times. My friends and family got tired of hearing about it, I'm sure. And everyone has moved on, including, most of the time, me. I don't think as much as I used to about the way I abandoned my post, jumped ship, hopped in a plane and flew to safety.

Nobody ever criticized me for leaving Haiti; most people told me I had been right to do it. The woman who works in my home cried, and later when I spoke to her on the phone from the US, she told me that someone had asked her why I had left, and she had told them that I was afraid. That hurt a lot, but she didn't mean it to; she didn't think it was foolish to be afraid, although she never seemed to be.

My family and I have been in Haiti a long time, and there have been other occasions when many foreigners have been evacuated; each time, we stayed. I didn't realize until after the earthquake how much pride I took in staying. I didn't fault others for leaving; usually it wasn't even their decision, since organizations they worked for made the call. But I felt that I was somehow steadfast, trustworthy. During the political unrest in 2004 when the country erupted in chaos, a friend was robbed at gunpoint and the police didn't even answer the phone, and we spent days listening to the radio as people called in and described the destruction of their homes and property, I wondered whether staying had been the right thing to do. But that week our relationships with those in our neighborhood strengthened, as we stood on the street in little groups discussing what we should do, offering help, exchanging phone numbers.

After the earthquake it was different. But also not so different. Those who stayed gained stronger relationships and many great stories to tell in exchange for the fear, lack of sleep, and shortages. Those of us who left will never fully understand all that the steadfast experienced, no matter how much we try. And in some ways I still regret leaving. I wish I could have been here in solidarity with my Haitian friends and colleagues. In other ways, I know that leaving was the right thing to do. I won't go into all the reasons why, to justify myself, make myself feel better. We did what we thought was right at the time. I gained stronger relationships too, and became a different person in many ways. I came to a greater awareness of God's love for me. All of those things I have written about many times.

Today I read this article by American Anna Kunnecke, who lived in Japan most of her life and who left it after the earthquake of 2011. So many of her words ring true to me.

"There’s a strange thing that happens when you feel connected to a place that doesn’t love you back. It takes on a kind of hold over you, like the haunting presence of an unrequited love. ... Right after the earthquake, people posted on Facebook about ‘standing strong’ with Japan, differentiating themselves from flighty folk like me who jumped ship. I admire their fortitude. They are beautifully living up to the Japanese ideal of ‘gambare,’ which is an untranslatable concept that includes doing your best but also means gritting your teeth quietly no matter what, even if they are operating on you without anesthesia. Nothing the WSJ could call me, and nothing my friends could post on Facebook, was worse than the words in my own mind: Traitor. Coward. Deserter. ... But when I began to mourn, when the silent keening started up inside, another voice hissed in rebuke. How dare I feel bereft? I didn’t lose my house in the tsunami, and my loved ones were all alive and safe. Everything I lost, I walked away from."

I came back to Haiti, after only six months away. Anna Kunnecke has chosen to remain in the United States and seems to have made peace with leaving her home in Japan. But I think both of us will always think about those days, those decisions, and how our lives were changed.

Line Seven

Penny has the seventh line of the progressive poem here. Mysterious! I'm wondering what's next!

Poetry Friday, Good Friday

I am enjoying the Progressive Poem; aren't you? Here it is today, hanging out at A Reading Year. Who knows what will happen to it before it comes to visit me on the 15th? It's absurd how excited I've been every day to track its progress.

We had a half day yesterday. Today and Monday are holidays. Most schools in this country are on full-blown vacation right now, so our students are not at all satisfied with the four and a half day weekend we're getting.

The sakura is in bloom in Tokyo, and I've been enjoying photos from various Japan-based Facebook friends. I'm thinking of this poem:


Loveliest of trees, the cherry now...
A.E. Housman

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.


But it's not time for "wearing white for Eastertide" yet. First we have Good Friday, and the long wait, the grave. Before the triumph is the suffering. Before the resurrection is the death. Before the joy comes in the morning, there's the night of weeping. So here's a poem about grief.


'No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief.'
By Gerard Manley Hopkins

No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief,
More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring.
Comforter, where, where is your comforting?
Mary, mother of us, where is your relief?
My cries heave, herds-long; huddle in a main, a chief
Woe, wórld-sorrow; on an áge-old anvil wince and sing —
Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked 'No ling-
ering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief."'

O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall
Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap
May who ne'er hung there. Nor does long our small
Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep,
Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all
Life death does end and each day dies with sleep.


The mind does, indeed, have mountains, and there are times when no comforting is to be found. Hopkins knew this; he suffered with depression for much of his life.

"According to his own testimony Hopkins was subject to melancholy all his life, but his 'terrible pathos,' as Dixon called it, is most obvious in these late sonnets. Following Saint Ignatius, Hopkins defined 'spiritual sloth' or 'desolation' as 'darkness and confusion of soul ... diffidence without hope and without love, so that [the soul] finds itself altogether slothful, tepid, sad, and as it were separated from its Creator and Lord.' Called acedia in Latin, this sin is differentiated from physical sloth by the fact that the victim realizes his predicament, worries about it, and tries to overcome it."

(You can read this passage, and much, much, much more about Gerard Manley Hopkins here, at the Poetry Foundation website.)

I am thankful that Good Friday's sadness gives way to Easter's rejoicing, and also that poetry expresses both.

Here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.

Line Six

Here it is, at A Reading Year.

Line Five

Susan Taylor Brown has the fifth line! Go check it out! (The plot thickens...)

Line Four

Shhh, I'm sneaking in here while eighth graders do silent reading to post the fourth line! Robyn at Read, Write, Howl contributed today's addition. The poem now reads:


If you are reading this
you must be hungry
Kick off your silver slippers
Come sit with us a spell...


OK, off to patrol the silent readers!

Line Three

Here's the third line of the progressive poem.

Now it goes like this:

If you are reading this
you must be hungry
Kick off your silver slippers...

Tuesday Morning

Line three isn't there yet. While you wait, Author Amok is posting 30+ Habits of Highly Effective Poets this month. What are people's strange writing rituals? Find out!

I'll be back later to link you to line three. Just in case you're anywhere near as excited about it as I am.

Line Two

Dori has added line two to the Progressive Poem. Go take a look!

It's April!

"April is the cruelest month, mixing memory and desire," wrote T.S. Eliot. Maybe that's why April was chosen as National Poetry Month, since one of the best ways I know of to deal with memory and desire, and the havoc they can wreak on me, is by reading poetry. Why else do you think a whole section of the Bible - including the longest book - is dedicated to poetry?

This year I'm getting three daily poems in my inbox, and I wanted to share them with you in case you'd like to sign up.

You can subscribe here to the Academy of American Poets' "Poem-A-Day" email. I get this one year-round.

Knopf Poetry is also sending out a daily poem during April, and you can sign up for that here.

You can also get a daily poem year-round from Your Daily Poem. Your Daily Poem tends to be by far the most accessible of these three, and today's email says:

"Welcome to Wordwoman's Parade of Scintillating Springtime Poetry, my annual tribute to National Poetry Month, in which I attempt to prove that there's poetry out there for everyone. If you think you hate poetry, you just haven't found the right kind. There are poems for fishermen, for people with ADD, for nurses, for athletes, for construction workers . . . if Beowulf and Browning aren't your cup of tea, try Budbill or Bierce instead! Poetry should be a source of pleasure--and it will be, once you've found the right fit."

Ah, a woman after my own heart.

This year I am stepping out on a limb and participating in a "Progressive Poem." Irene Latham invited fellow poets (including a lot of actual published ones) to contribute a line. My day is April 15th. Here's the whole schedule:

2012 KidLit Progressive Poem: watch a poem grow day-by-day as it travels across the Kidlitosphere! April 1-30

Schedule
1 Irene at Live Your Poem
2 Doraine at Dori Reads
3 Jeannine at View from a Window Seat
4 Robyn at Read, Write, Howl
5 Susan at Susan Taylor Brown
6 Mary Lee at A Year of Reading
7 Penny at A Penny and her Jots
8 Jone at Deo Writer
9 Gina at Swagger Writer's
10 Julie at The Drift Record
11 Kate at Book Aunt
12 Anastasia Suen at Booktalking
13 Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference
14 Diane at Random Noodling
15 Ruth at There is No Such Thing as a Godforsaken Town
16 Natalie at Wading Through Words
17 Tara at A Teaching Life
18 Amy at The Poem Farm
19 Lori at Habitual Rhymer
20 Heidi at My Juicy Little Universe
21 Myra at Gathering Books
22 Pat at Writer on a Horse
23 Miranda at Miranda Paul Books
24 Linda at TeacherDance
25 Greg at Gotta Book
26 Renee at No Water River
27 Linda at Write Time
28 Caroline at Caroline by Line
29 Sheri at Sheri Doyle
30 Irene at Live Your Poem

This is going to be fun! Irene already started with this line, full of possibility:

"If you are reading this..."

There are many more poetic activities this month, too. Irene Latham has a whole list here (scroll down past the Progressive Poem schedule), and I just found out that my friend and colleague Robbie is posting a new poem each week this month, plus something from his archives every day. Check that out here.

I already read a poem every day with each of my classes, and was once happy to hear a student say, "Mrs. H. has a poem for everything!" But National Poetry Month is always welcome, since it's an extra opportunity to appreciate poetry. Nancie Atwell says that reading poetry is like eating chocolates, so you can't do too much of it at once. Here's to gorging on poetry, at least once a year!

Poetry Friday: Hope

In the spring, a teacher's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of finding other employment. I was moping about teaching to a friend, and he said, "This is exactly what you were saying last March." Ah, the gentle rhythm of the seasons...

The thing about teaching, though, is that you get a new chance every day. I guess that's true of life in general, but there's something about the way teaching is divided up into finite class periods. And my middle schoolers are forgiving. I may have been impatient yesterday, but today they bound in, crowing, "Hello, Mrs. H!" as though nothing happened. They may have whined about the assignment I gave them, but most of them did it anyway.

This week the outgoing Executive Director of the Academy of American Poets wrote a goodbye email; she's leaving the position and moving back to Seattle. She quoted this poem, and when I read it, I felt hopeful. Hope is important; it's what keeps you coming back day after day. It's what keeps you reading student writing. It's what prevents you from giving up. There's a reason why every third organization working in Haiti has the word "Hope" in its name.

Here's the poem:

Horses At Midnight Without A Moon

by Jack Gilbert

Our heart wanders lost in the dark woods.
Our dream wrestles in the castle of doubt.
But there's music in us. Hope is pushed down
but the angel flies up again taking us with her.
The summer mornings begin inch by inch
while we sleep, and walk with us later
as long-legged beauty through
the dirty streets. It is no surprise
that danger and suffering surround us.
What astonishes is the singing.

Click here to read the rest.

And here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.

Poetry Friday: Billy Collins

"Bugs Bunny is my Muse." - Billy Collins

For more great lines like this, plus Billy Collins reading six of his poems, five of them set to animation, check out this video:

Just what the doctor ordered after an afternoon of conferences. I'm ready for the weekend.

Here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.

Bird Watching at Lunchtime

I have lunch duty this week. And about 50% of the time. I've made no secret of my lack of love for lunch duty. In addition to writing Lunch Duty Haiku, I have taken to photography at lunchtime to help pass the time away. That's why today I had my camera handy when I saw a Hispaniolan lizard cuckoo. Much good did having my camera do me, though. Most of the photos ended up being of attractive but birdless tree branches. I did get this photo, but this was my best effort:



See the tail? Kind of? I know, it's a rotten photo. So here's one by someone who knows how to take pictures of birds:


Photo Source

What a beautiful bird! And especially, what a beautiful sight for the middle of an ordinary day, in the center of Port-au-Prince, a city of two million people not known for its bird life. The students gathered to watch me snapping photos madly. "What are you looking at, Miss?" They were not impressed when I told them it was a bird. But this bird lifted my spirits and filled me with gratitude.

Not only that, but today is Bird Day.

More Links

Lately I have been just gathering links and not taking the time or energy it would require to synthesize my thoughts. I haven't been writing much, either - mostly reading my students' writing. I hope to get back to my own writing soon, but meanwhile here are some links.

Two Ways To Think About Nothing. An excerpt:

"We are surrounded by Nothing. Everywhere we go, we have no idea what we're not seeing.... [I]f we lean in, and pay very close attention, sometimes what looks like Nothing is the best place to find the most interesting...somethings."

Religion for Atheists: God, What is He Good For? I watched de Botton's talk a while ago here. His smugness annoys me a lot. However, many of the qualities he points out about religion are things I value. But I think that without the truth of God and His love for us, they would be pretty empty.

The Parent Interview #5: Irrational Love. This is beautiful.

So there you go - more Stuff Ruth Thinks is Interesting. Enjoy.

Poetry Friday: Time

Photo Source

In last week's Poetry Friday post, I shared a James Taylor song. A line from that song has been going through my head all week: "The thing about time is that time isn't really real."

This week time felt very real, an entity that was out to get me rather than help me. My grades were due, including narrative evaluations and conduct grades, so I was wrapping up the third quarter while starting my units for the fourth quarter. And as I was doing all that work, I was contending with Daylight Savings Time.

You have to understand, I live in the tropics. The length of the day varies very little where I live. My husband asked Mr. Google and found out that on June 21st we have 13 H 14 M 40 S of daylight, and on December 21st we have 11 H 1 M 05 S. (For comparison purposes, in Chicago the longest day is 15 H 13 M 31 S and the shortest day is 9 H 7 M 54 S.) There's really no need for Daylight Savings Time in Haiti. And most of the time we don't change time. But every once in a while we have a government that decides to be in line with our Great Neighbor to the North, and then that year we do change. I've speculated if it has something to do with an inability to get much accomplished, and the sense of achievement it must bring to be able to control the time (even though, of course, it isn't really real).

So this past weekend, when you folks in the United States changed time, we did too. Now we are getting up in the dark. Ugh! One reason for living in the tropics is not having to get up in the dark! My son began sharing melancholy memories of living in the States after the earthquake, getting up for school in winter darkness, shivering at the bus stop.

You wouldn't think that extra hour would make much of a difference. You lose an hour of sleep, and then you make up for it Sunday afternoon and you're set. But it does; I remember when my children were babies, it seemed it took them weeks to get back in any kind of rhythm. (I certainly couldn't use the word "schedule" about the babyhood of either of my children.) And this week as I've been rushing about, trying to accomplish all my tasks, I've felt like that missing hour could have made all the difference. My 9-year-old asked me, "Mom, in the fall are we going to go back to having 24 hours in every day?" I hope so, Buddy, I hope so.

One of the daily emails this week from Your Daily Poem was a poem about time.

Analog Time
by
Tamara Madison

Your new watch can tell
what time it is right down
to the second, the split second.
Your new watch has no face;
instead there’s a blinking grill
where the numbers change
constantly. I would like to say
that in this rapid split-second
parade we can see the flow
of time — always changing,
never changing, a river slipping
over rocks and sand – but it’s
only time, a human concept
after all, not a real river.

Follow this link to read the rest of the poem.

I especially love the end of the poem, where Madison writes:

the real tellers of time
are the sun, the sky,
the wrinkles on our faces,
the bruises on our souls.

Here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.

Some Links for Sunday

I tend to gather up links for days and days until I have way too many windows open, so I'll just post a bunch of them today.

First of all, this is the one year anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Many words and photos have been shared, but here's a post that especially resonated with me. I'm praying for the people in Japan as they relive the memories and the terrible grief. We in Haiti stand with you in the fellowship of earthquake survivors.

From the sublime to the ridiculous: an ad campaign for diapers featured mockery of dads. These diapers are so good, the ads told us, that even foolish, clueless dads can use them. A backlash from dads who are neither foolish nor clueless led to the cancelling of the ads. Hooray for involved fathers!

I loved Sarah Bessey's post about what a Biblical woman looks like. I spend so much time feeling inadequate and comparing myself to others, and I needed her reminder that

"when your heart, mind and soul is deep within the reality of living loved, we discover that those 'rules' are really just characteristics, the natural fruit to be borne out of a meaningful life changing relationship. And there are many expressions and ways to live out love, joy, kindness, patience, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control, peace and goodness - as men, as women, as mothers, as fathers, as friends.

After all, if we one believes that Jesus is a relationship then there must be room for each of us having a unique relationship, vocation, season or calling."

I just read P.D. James' latest novel, Death Comes to Pemberley. My daughter laughed at me for reading "fan fiction" (since I laugh at her for the same thing). At some point I'll post a review, but meanwhile a friend sent me this one, which I thought was wonderful.

And here's another NPR link, this one to an interview with Alan Shapiro about a book I haven't read. I just liked his quote about how art works on the artist:

"But, you know, writing is a way of being happy even if what you're writing about is how unhappy you are, because - and not in a therapeutic sense, but in the sense that you get to convert things that you have to in life perhaps passively suffer into something that you can actively make on the page. And so it can give you some sense of agency and power. You know, I'm an easily distracted person. I've been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder. One of my children had it and so the doctor had us tested as well. It's the only test I've ever aced. Elizabeth Bishop has a wonderful line. She says that the thing we want from great art is the same necessary for its creation, and that is a self-forgetful, perfectly useless concentration. And that's that kind of deep Zen-entranced experience that I have when I'm writing. You know, I sit down at the desk at 9 o'clock, I look up and it's 4 o'clock suddenly and all those hours have gone by as in a single moment. And, to me, that's paradise. That's heaven."

So there you go: a lot of unrelated links that won't all matter to anyone but me. Hope you, reader, found at least one you liked!

Poetry Friday: Secret o' Life

It's been a bit of a rough week, and one proof of that is that I'm doing my Poetry Friday post at 6 PM. I just staggered home from work. There's plenty still to do, and I'll be going in again tomorrow, but I've had enough for today. I started out the week sick, and finally started kicking my killer sore throat on Wednesday, after ten days of sucking down lozenges, when I went on antibiotics. I fell twice this week; once I missed a stair and once I just lost my balance because the pole I thought was behind me turned out not to be there (who moved it?). I have a skinned knee and a nasty bruise on my arm. I have so much grading that I wonder if I'll ever get it done. Oh yeah, and Wednesday night we had an earthquake.

It's time for some James Taylor to mellow me out. Here he is sharing his secrets.



Secret o' Life
James Taylor

The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time
Any fool can do it
There ain't nothing to it
Nobody knows how we got to
The top of the hill
But since we're on our way down
We might as well enjoy the ride

The secret of love is in opening up your heart
It's okay to feel afraid
But don't let that stand in your way
'cause anyone knows that love is the only road
And since we're only here for a while
Might as well show some style
Give us a smile
Isn't it a lovely ride
Sliding down
Gliding down
Try not to try too hard
It's just a lovely ride

Now the thing about time is that time
Isn't really real
It's just your point of view
How does it feel for you
Einstein said he could never understand it all
Planets spinning through space
The smile upon your face
Welcome to the human race

Some kind of lovely ride
I'll be sliding down
I'll be gliding down
Try not to try too hard
It's just a lovely ride

Isn't it a lovely ride
Sliding down
Gliding down
Try not to try too hard
It's just a lovely ride

Now the secret of life is enjoying the passage of time...



Here's today's roundup, at Gathering Books.

Tremor

Last night I was in bed when there was that horrible sound, a grinding, groaning noise, and the house shook. I was online, chatting with a friend, and I immediately typed "earthquake."

Earthquake. It turned out to be 4.6 on the Richter scale - not a huge earthquake but plenty big enough to set the adrenaline pumping and the brain wondering what comes next.

We were able to sleep, and no more tremors came. But it is terribly unsettling to feel this familiar sensation, after all these months.

Poetry Friday: Snow Globe

Last weekend I was traveling, and I saw a sign I hadn't seen before. Apparently it's been around a while, in the airports of the United States. I did take a picture of it, but it's still on my cellphone, so here's a picture someone else took.



Source: this blog post, from all the way back in November 2010.

I wrote this poem about snow globes:


Snow Globe

As soon as I read the sign in the airport forbidding snow globes
I longed for one.

I didn't have one in my bag,
And in fact I don't own one at all.
But suddenly I imagined miniature towns
Shaken into winter wonderlands,
Delicate cottages covered in white.

I imagined the whole building shaken by some divine hand,
And the Fort Lauderdale airport giving way
To fluttering white feathers
Frosting
The hair of travelers,
The laptops in their grey plastic bins,
The matching t-shirts of mission groups.
The official yelling about people with water bottles in their carry-ons
Mellowed as he gazed about at the Christmas card scene,
The lovely snow-globalization of his workspace.
There was much ooh-ing and ah-ing
And the restaurant on Concourse E sold out of hot chocolate.

But no, snow globes are not allowed.
There will be no wintry vistas,
No sleigh rides,
No jingle bells
No cool wind except what comes out of air conditioners.
Instead the TSA will continue to remove our shampoo and toothpaste from us
(Our safety is their priority),
And the X-ray machine will continue to scan passengers,
Each one unique,
Like a snowflake.

2/27/12


I also thought about this song when I saw the snow globe sign:


Here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.