As I wrap up my residency at Taft High School with their 8th Grade students, I have tremendous hope for our future. Surprised? Don’t be. 8 weeks ago, I entered a room of squirly teens, and left a room of deep thinkers. They were, arguably, deep thinkers all along, but now they may proudly add Poet to the mix. I titled the syllabus for this Residency: Eat, Pray, Love…and it was to be a journey into the ‘said’ and ‘unsaid’ of poetry moving toward the spoken word. Ms. Taylor’s 8th Graders all along created new language, and looked at some not so new. They performed, improvised, deconstructed Dickenson and Shakespeare. They listened to soundscape ‘person on the street’ interviews about what the everyday person thinks about Poetry. They wrote and studied poems inspired by Headlines, and those taken from YouTube interviews. Each scratch of the pen or pencil during our writing time, moved us closer and closer to poem making, and it is without hesitation that I salute each effort.
We began our last class by playing a game where one student was asked to create a new language and relay a message to the rest of the class which they needed to interpret. It fell right into our final lesson on lousy language, oxymora, and a return to made up words. In e.e. cummings, [love is more thicker than forget] we came across all of these. Here are some of the final poems from Taft. Enjoy!
Ms. Taylor, 8th Grade
1st Period
[Volleyball Is More Better Than Everything]
Jackie L.
Volleyball is more better
than everything
more better than too
little
more better than a
lot anything
volleyball is more sport
than always never art
more bigger than small
ocean
more funner than
[my alone group]
Mikaila R.
my alone group
always alone but together
my alone group
its just me forever
my alone group
most alone than ever
my alone group
will be always with me?
[More]
Morgan W.
Running is more opening than an open secret
More funner than a bouncy house
More energized than a battery
More hated than gym class
Running is more loving as an only choice
Morel naturaler than a job
More adrenaling than in a non-competitive competition
More happiest when angriest
More love, loved when with others alone
Ms. Taylor, 8th Grade
3rd Period
[Friendship Can be larger than]
Prisila D.
Friendship can be bigger than love
more temporary than people
more short-term than life
It is thorny and knotty
Friendship is larger than lies
Lies ae now massive
than sincerity
[Fashion]
Andreen I.
Fashion is more complicated than your body parts
more overthought of than asking a girl out.
More fashion forward than your future.
Less more covering your body
Different same fabric
Fashion…
[NA-NA-NA-NASCAR]
Mathew A.
More cooler than fire
more wet than the sand
more people than watermelon
less dead than alive
less now than then
Less peace than war
is higher than sky
Ms. Taylor, 8th Grade
6th Period
Untitled
Matt C.
Football is more harder than diamond
more faster than a plane
more slowerer than molasses
more more than less.
it is crazy and fiery
and greater than money
than the world’s powers
is deeper than the sea.
Football
Daywon R.
Football is like
made of skin pig
more lighter than rocks
[love is a peace that won’t let rest]
Trang N.
Love is a peace
that won’t let rest.
Love is a pride
that makes you shy.
Love is feeling
that forces you
Love is chase
that makes you stay.
Music
Tabitha L.
Music is more larger than towering mountains
more prickly than thorny cactuses,
ore cold than homework is hard
more soft than fire is hot.
It is more open than a cardboard box.
Music is more silent than the moon,
more lonely than the sun,
and more hard than sand.
Ms. Taylor, 8th Grade
7th Period
[Football is gooder]
Sam K.
Football is more bigger and better
It is a lot more exciting than [school].
You have even odds or winning or losing
You even are gooder than other teams
You might be more better at basketball
You might be gooder at track
But when it comes to football
You better step back.
[Music is me]
Marcus W. (m.h.w.)
Music is more bigger than
skyscrapers, it touches the
skyreachers, overachievers
avid readers, word un-bleepers
Music makes the box tip
toers jump outside the box
Music is warmer than a
Mother’s embrace more clear
than the best crystal more
savory than a glass of crystal
Music is more you than your ma or pa
Make you clap and say ‘ta da’
music is me, music is you
it makes you happy
which is reason enough.
[less, more]
Michael B.
Math is less farther than darts,
(not) small than earth,
less binary than metaphor is Math
as rhyming as this
that insults my pronunciation
as less focus than ramblers
Math is more abstract than art,
(not) larger than birth
more naturaler as a tree
[coffee is more or less better than day sleeping?]
Kelly T.
coffee is more better now than anything
more comforting than waiting in pouring rain
more funnier than blackly focused on a conversation
less awakening than silent screams.
bothering less than surely not.
almost more than better than day sleeping.
less boring than being cautiously careless.
and more better still moving.
Ms Taylor, 8th Grade
8th Period
[soccer]
Richard M.
Soccer is more bigger than cereal
more thundering than a wall
more slim than a hard rain
[less than a now’s later]
Sarah B.
Softball is more bigger than the least sport
more thinner than a open secret
more alone than a as together
more now then when later
Softball is less always than never
less lose than win
less of loud’s silence
less a no’s later’s maybe
