Best Poems Written by Rien Vanb

Character

Character 

If ever I will reach my pension of all ages
And leave the town, where I a teacher was,
My heart will – if they pay my wages,
Be stamped a lot, like in a pass.

Even the youngest child that ever markings made,
Its inerasable mark on every edge;
Some marks a mortal never will translate.
Character, children, no more than a scratch. 

So be it – But I really get upset,
If pedagogues do talk in ways that one too bad
Of what a teacher only children gives.

God willing – He will  give to all the classes
A stamp that’s good or bad in all their passes:
For it is he who owns a thousand stamps and lives.



Translation (!) of Ida Gerhardt's Sonnetten van een leraar 32 into an English Sonnet by RienB (2014)

Copyright © Rien Vanb | Year Posted 2015