End-of-Course Reverie
End-of-Course Reverie
I watch my students
click and decide
if I am a good teacher.
My voice is now silent,so I try to stir them using only my mind
(but I don’t see anything happening).
I think about what I didand what I didn’t
and wish I had a few do-overs
until my aching head
reminds me what a bad idea
that would be.
So I tell myself“It’ll be alright–
or if not, it doesn’t matter (eternally).”
But unfortunately,I don’t really listen to myself
any better than my students do.
So it comes down to the fruits of a thousand hours,
being placed in four bins to produce one number.
Pretty coarsely-weighed for so dear a harvest.
WDS 4/20/2013
Alberton Gorge: A beautiful painting by Tim McMahon
Betty in Paris – a film by Olive Us
Betty In Paris from Olive Us on Vimeo.
I love all of the Olive Us films on Vimeo. This is one of my favorites. Check out “Stacking Wood” and “Pottery Lesson,” also.
Bambi meets Godzilla
What I’m listening to: January 2013
I’ve exchanged some iTunes plastic (from Santa) for some excellent music that I’m really enjoying. Here’s a brief rundown of what’s playing in my house, car and head these days.
The Head and the Heart (The Head and the Heart album)
These guys play smart, rootsy alt folk (or something like that). I had heard of them but had somehow missed listening to them. I like how they still sound like musicians, not overly-precious, cleaned-up bits.
John Ellis and Double Wide (Puppet Mischief album) – These guys really swing. John Ellis is a great tenor saxophonist, but the sousaphone player (Matt Perrine) is what really drives them. I’d love to see these guys play live.
Mumford & Sons (Babel album) I know how late I am to this party, but this is good music that makes me think.
Philip Glass (Metamorphosis: 1-5) The minimalist giant playing his best piano pieces.
David Byrne & St. Vincent (Love this Giant album) Two unique musicians collaborating to make surprising and wonderful music. I hear new things each time I listen.
Chilly Gonzales (Solo Piano 2) I saved the best for last. If you like playing the piano or just listening to piano music, then this is what you are looking for. I hear echoes of Ernesto Nazareth, Eric Satie, Philip Glass and the Terra Verde composers David Thomas Roberts and Scott Kirby. These are the kind of quality, uncategorizable pieces the world needs more of.
Are you color blind (or just color ignorant)?
This is a very difficult but fun and fascinating color skills quiz.
***Click here to give it a try***
my dot – where each of us lives in the U.S.
The Census Dotmap by Brandon Martin-Anderson is pretty amazing when you think about it — it gives each of us who live in the United States (all 311,591,917 of us) a dot right where we live.
***Click here for the real map on which you can zoom in all the way to your very own dot.***
persimmon haiku
[painting by Susan Goldsmith — see her work here]
orange persimmons
dot the tree’s black skeleton
a lifetime of moons