students, honesty, poetry

have i mentioned how fierce my students are?

i was just reading the latest on the class blog, and the courage and honesty particular students bring to this space truly awes me. someone will sit almost silent in class and i'll think there's a wall, and then they'll write it out in this different space and i'm just taken aback.

I'm also reading June Jordan's Poetry for the People, which makes me wanna jump up and start a workshop next semester.

L* said something to me the other day. She had earlier shared Aurora Levins Morales's fierce poems "Statistics" and "Resurrection." And I said "I wish I could write good poems."

[Obviously I was pms-ing and this was a shameless ploy for attention]

and L* said that I do write good poems, but that sometimes I stop when I get them down. and ALM clearly makes her poems her full-time job.

And that's what I need, or as June Jordan says (on p 63)

        Once the poem is out,
        you have to worry the lines

Sometimes i just wanted to be patted on the head and told what a good girl i am which is fine for a moment (and sometimes a blog), but not for a poem.