Poetry as Billboard

Our Host’s Classroom

Eat Here
Get Gas

That “jokey” (and a bit hokey) sign got me thinking about today’s prompt.  Oh, I’m Scott, by the way, English teacher at a local (for me, but not for you (probably)) high school and an adjunct instructor at a local (again, it’s local for me but not for you (probably)) community college.  And now, of course, I’m thinking the decision to put a picture of my classroom above the phrase “Eat Here / Get Gas” is a bit odd.

Inspiration 

Anyways, I was thinking of the signs that I currently have up in my classroom:

“You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.” – Jack London
“Cut a good story anywhere and it will bleed.” – Anton Chekhov
“Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat.” – Robert Frost

Why are these so violent?! I also have a few gentler passages, though, too:

“The best writing is rewriting.” – E. B. White
“Poets deal in the particular to discover the universal.”
“Prose proceeds, verse reverses.” – Richard Howard
“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.” – Oscar Wilde

And two full poems: “Why Some People Do Not Read Poetry” by W. S. Merwin and “Why Are Your Poems So Dark?” by Linda Pastan

These posters and wall verses are periodically swapped out, so I got to thinking, what if I shamelessly used this opportunity to elicit and solicit some more!

This, of course, is not something new, this “poetry as billboard.”  Poems have replaced advertising on some buses (and other forms of transit) in Washington thanks to the Poetry in Public program. https://www.4culture.org/poetry/ And over thirty years ago, The Poetry in Motion folks did a similar thing, placing poems in various transit systems in Los Angeles, New York City, Nashville, and San Francisco (among many, many others).  https://poetrysociety.org/poetry-in-motion

I’m not looking for anything “as grand” as that, though.  I mean, just looking at a small sampling of the poems from the New York Poetry in Motion selections https://poetrysociety.org/poetry-in-motion/category/new-york you’ll see some heavy hitters: Charles Simic, Audre Lorde, Tracy K. Smith, Maya Angelou, Seamus Heaney, Shakespeare, Sharon Olds, Billy Collins, Walt Whitman…look, I could just keep naming them, and you’d recognize all of them!  You’d also notice that their topics (and size of selections) are as varied as the poets themselves.

I would just like to cover my walls with more verse.  Your verse to be more exact.  (And selfishly, I’d also like to be able to say – when a student asks about your offering and reads your name – I can say something like, oh, yeah, I know her, she’s a poet friend of mine, we go way back. We’re in a writing group together. 🙂 ) 

So, that’s today’s ask.  Could you create a short-ish poem that could live on the walls of my classroom: A-220?  (Could you, essentially, help me redecorate my room?)

Process

Since “your audience” will be seniors in high school, your poems could be about a number of things: ELA content-based topics, student motivation, fighting writer’s block, general life advice, prom, the weather in Michigan, the weather in places that aren’t Michigan, graduation, MLA formatting, why “we” took away two spaces after the period, the joys of reading, why there is no frigate like a book, and, while you’re at it, you can explain to them what the heck a frigate is, see the topics are endless really.

And know that I’m only being (partially) facetious with all of this.  I don’t want you to not write something for fear that what you write will end up plastered on the walls of my classroom.  If something seems too poet specific or not a “fit” for the culture of my class or if you explicitly say, hey, hands off! or words to that effect then I will totally respect your wishes!

Or you might want/need to take your writing today in a different direction completely, and that, of course, is perfectly acceptable, too.

Scott’s Poem

If you have
the wherewithal
to use the word
wherewithal in
a sentence,
thank a teacher,
or rather, blame
him because it
makes you sound
a bit pedantic.

Your Turn

Now, scroll to the comment section below to write your own poem. (This is a public space, so you may use only your first name or initials depending on your privacy preferences.) Not ready? That’s okay. Read the poems already posted for more inspiration. Ponder your own throughout the day. Return later. And, if the prompt does not work for you, that is fine. All writing is welcome. Just write something. Also, please be sure to respond to at least three writers. Oh, and a note about drafting: Since we are writing in short bursts, we all understand (and even welcome) the typos and partial poems that remind us we are human and that writing is always becoming. If you’d like to invite other teachers to write with us, tell them to subscribe.