Soft ivory pages, crisp and new.
Insulated from the world's harsh truths,
Snuggled in the comfort of rote learning, it waits.
Protected from challenging ideas,
Camouflaged as a bastion of knowledge,
Ignoring sounds of a changing world outside.
Each lesson absorbed, concepts released,
The slightest spark of curiosity dimmed,
Minds anchored to standardised forms.
Slow to evolve, the system creaks.
Returning to the safety of metrics,
Covered in a shroud of false contentment.
Coal-dark ink scans the ledger,
Nourished by the currency of test scores,
Effortless, true learning slips into the abyss.
A place where wisdom once flourished,
Embraced by the essence of inquiry,
Now mechanical, measured, misguided.
We too must remember,
The embrace of knowledge's true essence,
Living beyond the melting ivory tower.
Again and again, the teacher enters the classroom.
Her lessons are heard by the eager but also fall on distracted minds.
The teacher reaches out to students and then loses their attention again.
Day after day the teacher rises above the noise,
carries the hopes and the potential of all children,
and each time we burden her with more paperwork.
Time and again society demands better education,
reaches from policy heights to the crowded classroom,
longs as an eternal ideal to ignite young minds.
The teacher is always moving among the desks,
to guide us today and prepare for tomorrow.
She looks with patient eyes straight into
our confusion, boredom, struggles, and dreams
but we do not dare to meet her expectations.
Only the spark of curiosity can match her dedication,
yet it flickers and fades in the face of rigid systems.
Bell after bell rings, marking time's relentless march,
as another day of possibilities slips away,
lost in a maze of standardised goals and distractions.
The teacher persists, her spirit unbroken,
while childhood's fleeting moments vanish,
sacrificed on the altar of misguided priorities.
we’d not many luxuries in life
the one I remember most
was sitting by the fire
turning bread into toast
not the homogenised
standardised loaf of today
but Granny Barker’s bread
made the old fashioned way
each slice slathered with butter
which I may have seen turned
bobbing and thickening
as Mrs Bulson churned
nice salty country butter
running from the heat
and to top it off
my very special treat
gobs of brown sauce
to make the taste divine
not to everybody’s fancy
but very much to mine
lots of love but no money
lots of warm sensible care
hordes of toast and brown sauce
a mam and dad always there
the wife says I’m just a peasant
and I must say that I agree]
as I eat my special treat
somewhere where she can’t see
I'm part of your world of Strangers,
Intensively,our focus are metered,
Over the hilly regions,we keep flopping from discovery,
The discovery is about our self realisations,
"Who are you?"
I won't answer you rightly when I'm demanded of my being,
Maybe because we're humans,time can design a new key,
Come closer to me,
Want to feel your nice shown grin,
Fetch a cup of water from your fresh and standardised reen,
They feel shy to ask from the Queen,
On certain areas,...we'll soon know ourselves,
Black nation for white races...,the music brought help,
Look at me from your bossy counter,
Gracefully,I'm giving you a dose of laughter,
"Sorry...sorry,didn't know you're such hilarious",
She said to that champion,
Sensations gave birth to friedship upon soft iron,
We've got to commune as posterior,
She now know my name,
I have now identified her outside rame,
I'm no more a stranger in her lane.
Since conviction had come to solidify your sight in the midnight rain.
Words forbidden to be expressed
A dangerous fact to be disclosed
Making the whole world depressed
I am sorry that you are so obsessed
With the words never to be expressed
The words are secretly decomposed
Scattered around after being recomposed
Spread like bean paste after being compressed
Taste like sweet chilli that’s been reprocessed
Eaten by idiots who are systematised
The paste lost its nature but it’s flavour is militarised
For the nations, hatred was perfectly modernised
Effectively fighting in the war that was standardised
Such usable propaganda must be fully released
Please sleep on people and be hospitalised
Don’t worry, you will soon be desensitised
Words forbidden to be expressed
A dangerous fact to be disclosed
Making the universe so confused
Wake up, ladies who were hypnotized
Come out, gentlemen who were fictionalised
From where you were unfortunately misdiagnosed
Where “I love you” is forbidden to be expressed
It's Parent/Teacher interviews today,
Come along and share the blame,
They're graduating just the same,
Kids have a teacher free day,
We gave them Standardised Tests,
Their self-esteem needs a rest,
That's why this school has a fence,
Who's got the common sense?
Yes, the P/T interviews are today,
Come along and share the blame!
Christians, fundamentalist and evangelical,
Have their own music, which is loud and clear,
But although it’s repeated monotonously every week,
It always excites them so, when they draw near.
Their music stimulates them unfailingly,
I mean, the preaching concepts and doctrine;
They even embrace and trophy dogma as helpful,
To it they are faithful, absolutely fine.
I used to think that strange and unacceptable,
To admit to a dogmatic conceptual model,
And now I consider it extremely weird,
To normal standardised frameworks toggle.
It’s unhealthy to resign the many to hell,
To want to gel with a king who's dead,
To only ever have one conversation aim,
And to desire a book you've already read.
For every such Christian I meet and interact with,
I just remember that they listen to their own music,
And even though they may each be hearing it themselves,
I'm sure that for such twaddle there’s a linguistic.
30/9/2015