Has anyone ever written anything for you
In all your darkest hours
Have you ever heard me sing
Listen to me now

-Stevie Nicks

When I was younger I used to write because I didn’t know how to speak. I didn’t know how to tell anybody anything worth listening to, or, even then, were they listening?

ᗯᖇITᗴᖇ

I am a prolific writer. When I was younger I used to think that meant you were a successful writer or you wrote well but I soon realized it just meant you wrote a lot. And then I thought, that was fine with me if I just wrote a lot for the rest of my life. Maybe amidst all that writing someone would read it and it would be good enough. Perhaps it would be published. Publishing means something like validation. Then again it doesn’t mean anything at all. If all I ever wanted to do was right I could do just that.

Tᗴᗩᑕᕼᗴᖇ

So I became a teacher. I had thought of being a teacher when I was in high school because I had a savior complex, a need to be needed, because I wasn’t needed so much elsewhere. This is always been an issue within the relationships I have carried on. Offering far more of myself than what is reciprocated. I digress.

So I became a teacher to offer young people the opportunity to speak. I even thought it would give them the opportunity to dream. If they could speak of their ideas and their dreams then maybe they could manifest them and this is the goal. The goal is to live your dream.

I’ve had so many dreams over the years that I have forgotten almost all of them. They’ve become a muddle of comedy and tragedy and more tragedy and sorting out which is PTSD. Through all of this I’ve learned how to teach. And learning how to teach is a whole different business then improvising a teachable moment. Sometimes the teacher is the one learning the lesson whether or not the students realize.

ᗰIᖇᖇOᖇᔕ

My colleagues and students have been a reflection of the people in my former life. I am always reminded of who I have known, who I have been, and what may possibly come. I have no children of my own but I’ve helped rear 2,000 young people in the classes I’ve taught. Some graduated. Some died. Some had children. Some got married. Some went to college and got degrees. Some came back to visit to show me they became an EMT. Some ran away. Some were kidnapped. Some you only teach for a month. But they all reflect and at times the refracted light is blinding.

ᑭOᗴT

I am a poet. And like the many things I’ve been running from my entire life I didn’t want to admit it. It’s a different kind of writer or artist. It’s ambiguous. It’s earning a degree in something for which capitalism has no use.

I write like my life depends on it. Now I’ll consider writing because I love it and I need to and…why not.

I only have today. 📝