Best Textbooks Poems
Not to be taken lightly, I burnt all my clothes
Cut the tattoos off my back, tore pins from my nose
Foraged for food particles, where wild beasts reposed
Lapped water vapour off thorns, when the thirst arose
My identity gone, I herded mountain goats
Built a makeshift altar, one by one, slit their throats
Looking to the heavens, chanting primeval quotes
Tell me what to do, this sacrifice I devote
But silence returned, I knew nothing else mattered
The goats now all dead, my hands blooded and spattered
A local tribe watched on, their souls not so shattered
Idolised me, then to the four winds they scattered
After two score and ten, they returned unforetold
Carrying symbols, textbooks, diamonds, and gold
Smiling in joy, I asked what stories they behold
All wrote versions of my life in books, but mistold
Some had butchered nations, said it was in my name
Others brainwashed little children, feeling no shame
The rest knocked on doors, telling lies they heal the lame
Scamming billions of sesterces, their one true aim
I condemned the lies, but was a very bad call
They burst into laughter, and pointed to their haul
Just then everything made sense, as I do recall
Killing goats made me, the biggest scapegoat of all
He lived a simple life
He was a simple man
He never had a wife
He had a different plan
He wore the priestly collar
He lived a life of service
You never heard him holler
Nothing made him nervous
Several pulpits did he refuse
Summoned by a worldly muse
Radical students would he infuse
With old-fashioned values and views
At an East-coast college he did teach
Engaging students with humble manner
Principled, rational; he never preached
Didn't wave religion on a banner
I took his course; so glad I did
He personified what was kind and good
Though I was steeped in sin, God forbid
He treated me as a father would
Invited me into his home
Holy books crammed into every nook
We talked and dreamed, together roamed
Beyond dry lessons and textbooks
I'll never forget this gentle saint
As long as I do live
With humanity did he (me) acquaint
Taught me from my heart to give
July 16, 2019
Favorite Poem in Rhyme from July, 2019 Contest
Sponsor: Julia Ward
Tis a lovely day for students are glad
The last day of the school year is anything but sad
No more assignments to study nor papers to write
Students can deal with William Shakespeare at next year’s fight
Textbooks have been returned and stored away
Lockers are cleaned out with nothing to stay
The students rejoice with the last bell’s ringing
But the teachers are doing a happy dance
And tis they who are doing all the singing!!
An auto rickshaw, a carriage
Like a tortoise
Returns
Along my obsolete graveled
Road.
The auto rickshaw rolls on:
My bucolic
Rocks
Mirth of a birth,
Rapturously.
The auto rickshaw passes by a
Nuptial hall :a
Bride
Stands in the splendor
Borrowed.
The auto rickshaw pauses before a
Rural maze :
My
Career knocks get
Mocked.
The auto rickshaw, the three
Wheeled, creeps through the
Nostalgia
Scenting textbooks
New.
The auto rickshaw halts now
On a lap,
For
The road is lost in
Fog.
A miniature Australian Shepherd
Is the best companion for me
As we sit together on the couch
Watching afternoon TV
She does not sit for long
This hyper ball of fur
When Mom walks in the door
She jumps all over her
The attack of the Aussie Shepherd
Is a daily event around here
Yapping, jumping and bouncing
She moves like a white tail deer
Her big brown eyes
And fluffy chocolate fur
Make me want to hug and kiss her
That is for sure!
Chewing on my textbooks
Chasing the family cat
What do you do
With a dog like that?
A drink and a treat
Will calm her down soon
We throw a biscuit in the kennel
Watching her star in her own cartoon
A blanket placed over the top
Will find its way in by morning
But we will have peace for now
As soon as she starts snoring
Good night my little friend
Sleep well and pleasant dreams
Tomorrow we will play again
When the sun through the window gleams
Gathering dust on my bookshelf,
Old textbooks from my past major,
Reveal something about myself
(Never read again, I’d wager).
Attached in place by hidden tacks,
Gathering dust on my bookshelf,
Paper mache’ Mardi Gras masks
(I never really wore myself).
Gardening books share the top shelf
With outdated references;
Gathering dust on my bookshelf,
Indicating preferences.
Genealogy, mysteries,
Fantasy tales of dwarf and elf,
And science fiction histories--
Gathering dust on my bookshelf.
It was unnerving
a growling demon of
deprivation,
an
enemy that lurks
in shadows, but
the eyes don't lie
silver spoons
do tarnish
with lack of use
they're tucked
away from public eye
shamed by the ideals
of the elite
without capital leverage
they can't bargain
for slices of pie
alone,
starving souls
often remain on
the threshold of pain
reaching for anything
to fill the void, to
cease the sound of
Hungry cries
the soul, the stomach,
the heart, the mind
all needing substenance
to sustain the firm form
Significant Human dignity
Poverty leaves souls
in the frigid cold
it's hold sounds
like empty stomachs
in Public Schools
Empty minds, and
wagons rattling
needing to be heard
"Feed Me"
even the scraps
will do like
outdated textbooks
and budgets
The elite always has more
A brewing storm
if the belly isn't
fed the norm
hungry they are
the forgotten faces
sifted out via
The Politics of
Education
Urban and Rural
The Hungry bottom
Forced Servitude
Or they hide in
the park after dark
under Bridges
swept and mopped
into Shelters,
or hidden shantytowns
What happened to
The Highest Ideals
of Man?
On Loans,
Or Dream Deferred
and the best
eat and the least
wait in stale
Souplines
while hunger pangs
wale into the night
2 Fish, 5 Loaves
Considering the consciousness
Of America still has a Heart
To feed all that Freedom
That's reached when
All have reached
Satiety
Let us all be
Full and fed
Led the sound
Of hunger be dead......
Kevin Guru © 2019
Students at Work
See them work!
Studious looks,
Buried in books,
Leaflets flipping,
Binders snapping,
Pencils tapping,
Textbooks slamming,
Nick-knacks toppling,
Back-packs rummaging,
Noses rubbing,
Nail nibbling,
knees flapping,
Foreheads scrunching,
Eyebrows rising,
Lips compressing,
Faces scowling,
Chins supported,
Tongues catapulting,
Coughs echoes,
Work Accomplished!
Curl me up a tree
Wrap me into a bundle
Light me up like a candle
The warmth of my joy
Kills the carvings you fear
Yes, it bothers me
How you take pleasure in my pain
We are paperless in this age
The pen is made useless on a page
This knowledge falls on deafness
Enlightenment ends in blindness
Scientists, powerless
Fear big business
Imagine the textbooks in the toilets
Education flushed down the drain
The empty classrooms
The air thick with ignorance
The stench of a mental disease
Written on the chalkboard, “REcyKiLL”
FAX me to your heart’s content
The pulp, I hope he gets a paper cut
I wept until my roots were uprooted
My leafless branches dried up and twisted
My timber became rooftops
At least cultivate me an artificial forest
A sort of vegetation urbanisation
Then my offspring would grow
To see the light of day
Taller than the black clouds of smoke
I couldn’t clear
Textbooks,
chalk dust,
young men
full of lust.
School bus,
school bag,
mathematics,
what a drag!
Woodwork,
English lit,
some pass,
some quit.
Autumn leaf,
summer sun,
playin’ truant
on the run.
Fibrolite
prefab,
bunson burner,
science lab.
Trampoline,
gym rope,
girls flirt,
boys hope!
Written: 1992
———
I attended “Rangi”
1974 ~ 1977.
Coffee
By Samantha McCune
I am in love with Sami and she with me,
My name is Coffee.
We meet in the early mornings and sometimes in the afternoon,
Without me, I’m afraid she’d act like a complete loon.
Our devotion for each other began in college
Heavy textbooks, extensive lectures, stacks of knowledge
As she embarked on the new and exciting journey of teaching as her profession,
Her love for me grew like a relentless obsession.
When her lovely little boy Jacob was born,
I asked myself, “Could this love be torn?”
“No, no, no” what was I thinking?
This love between us was forever ours for keeping.
I am the number two product sold in this world.
Some like me hot, cold, or swirled and twirled.
Beware, I cautioned her, six cups or more,
You may end up a coffee whore!
You will need my caffeine,
Like a druggie needs his morphine.
So please, do not abuse our love when we meet
I am here for you as your sweet treat to keep!
Do you recall being in school?
Learning many lessons;
obeying all of the rules;
absorbing each lecture and each page
of your textbook;
adding to your storehouse of wisdom.
If you stayed and finished school, you were wise;
It always pays to stay in school.
As you build your own life’s book,
You’ll learn many life lessons.
Every turn of your life’s next page;
must comply with some sort of rule.
People live and create hoards of rules;
Living by them can make one wise.
Turn carefully the pages,
while you’re still in school;
and you can avoid some hard lessons
which, are not in your textbooks.
If your life is a tightly closed book,
you live by a personal rule;
you may get frustrated with your lessons.
Sharing with others can make you wise;
Not all education is gleaned in school;
Education has many unconventional pages.
Every time you turn a page,
in any kind of book;
you’ll learn things, in lifetimes school;
including the golden rule.
Living this rule is quite wise;
it’s the kindest lesson in life.
Pay close attention to your lessons
and those on other people’s pages.
Everywhere you’ll locate wisdom;
Someday you may write it in your own book.
Every king or queen that ever ruled,
Started out, being schooled.
Wisdom comes from a lifetime of learning lessons.
Stay in school till it’s time to turn another of life’s pages.
Study your books; live by the rules for success.
No form, no organization, no verse.
A crescendo followed by silence and screams.
A wooden home locked inside of a concrete tome,
With a world collapsing while we keep relapsing
And again the past resurges; what we bury tends not to stay that way,
After all, the piper must have his pay.
A dark closet and we’ve seen fit to rot in it
The Devil in the details told me to be his advocate.
And El Dorado’s gone because a city of gold just wasn’t sustainable
But if it’s attainable then you’re damn right it’s going to be painful.
And death isn’t an option for those of us who feel compelled to keep walkin’
On the sand-- or is it ash? It doesn’t really make a difference while they slash
Their prices by depriving kids of rice and pin open their eyelids
For their twenty hour shifts ‘till they try to plummet themselves off of
Concrete cliffs.
And Macondo is Columbia, unless it’s in the Gulf of Mexico,
but you already knew that, Mr. Critic.
But what are you going to do with it?
Frankenstein was the man, not the monster
The confusion first came when our blame ceased to reclaim
An association between dissociation and our relation
To whatever the truth may have been
‘Cuz it certainly isn’t the truth anymore.
Blank pages in our textbooks and you ask me to memorize it
Regurgitate it and tell you what you want to hear--
My foods teacher says no eating in her class
And sees fit to harass her students with her utter lack
Of discernible knowledge while we cook some Kraft Mac and Cheese.
But who can blame her with the pay she’s getting?
No Telemachus on the television—Nor do we see Stephen
Not while the Situation is breathin’, cuz that’s what’s loved by the station.
Where’s the frustration? The indignation with the ignorant elation
That comes with living in a used-up world?
Dig a treasure map out of the trash and get it unfurled,
You walk to the ‘X’, but it’s been dug up—no wonder it was in there in the first place.
And the esoteric is what they find hysteric ‘cuz they’re all in on the joke
That they find so funny ‘cuz the system is broke.
Politics in work, in life, in marriage, in LIFE,
The wall of separation was torn down it seems, and soon you’ll find them tapping your dreams.
Enjoy watching your people’s nightmares, O Creators.
Tell us it’s what we want.
What will you do to be remebered;
to become important?
Cure cancer, save lives, be the next Albert Einstein?
When you pass on will others think of you as
influential and amazing or unnoticeable and dull?
Is it important to be important;
do you need to do something great?
How do we view influential people, important beings?
The scientist who discovered a way to use less fossil fuels,
or the mother who cared for her family her whole life
just to be killed in a horrific car crash,
leaving everyone she loved behind?
The question is:
How is greatness measured, who will be remebered?
In later years, who will be heroes of the medical field now in
textbooks worldwide,
or the unknown,
the unmarked grave?
Lockdown over, I had to head to school
my pupils waiting to learn the golden rule
I got ready and put on that mask
following the health protocols is a must
How would I each word articulate?
and those whole lessons explicate!
***
Principals in their towers have their say
and teachers, Skills For Life, have to convey
So eager to see my pupils and join the classroom
no time to spend with colleagues in the teachers room
Just virtual wishes.. Love and hugs
and the joy of all the social media tags.
***
I looked weird, in need of a breathing space
with that mask and my glasses, nothing remained of my face!
High time I proceeded with the warming up
avoiding to preach or give a negative heads up
A perplexed look in my pupils eyes I could see
a strong desire to build in them a motivational esprit
***
Nothing has changed, me doing all the talking
in day dreams they seemed to be sinking
My voice in the void echoed, "am I speaking Chinese?
I'm afraid, these are but the English language abcs!"
'If you can't turn the page, burn the book'. "Would you please paraphrase?
not all at once, please, one at a time as always!"
***
"Sorry teacher, we didn't bring our textbooks"
I was maddened but they got nothing from my looks
"Teacher, isn't burning books wrong and bad?!"
I felt deeply disappointed but could nothing add!
I see you've been learning English off by heart!
and with revision you've torn your minds apart!
***
We are wise and curious, teacher! glued to our smart phones
learning from Peaky Blinders.. Breaking Bad.. and Game of Thrones!
I thanked God I was wearing that shielding mask
I could resist my rage and carry off the teaching task.
To my pen, a deep gratitude for such a relief
such a consuming task could make funny and brief.