The Brown School Muse, Happiness & Poetry

I wrote my first poem in college under the guidance of David Bosnick. After, I worked with Dr. Art Clements. I found my way to Ruth Stone. In graduate school, I went to Jeff Skinner for fiction, and by that time I was hooked on reading and writing poetry on my own. I'm not EMO. I'm not high art or academic. When I sit down, I become Dr. Seuss meets Walt Whitman. I don't know where it comes from, but it makes me happy.

I've been writing with and for my students since I began teaching. By 2003, I started writing acrostic poems for every graduate of the Brown. It felt right to do that. The summer before, an English teacher at another school made fun of students trying to write acrostics in their State portfolios. She said an acrostic could never be proficient and I disagreed. I went home and wrote one with her name. It's been a hobby of mine since that day.

I've also fallen in love with what I call poetic drivebys. I write on anything I can find and when I'm bored I doodle only to leave my scripted games for others. At times, I deliver them to fast-food drive thrus only to say, "I don't want a Value Meal, I just wanted to drop off this poem." It's silly, but it makes me smile. It's ridiculous and I imagine it's something for the employee to talk about later. (Alex Shulz of 2004 has begun doing random poetry on sidewalks with chalk -- Go, Alex!)

I'm providing a link to a blog I've begun (you can get to it on the right, too), callled "Poetic Doodles." I've put my 2003 to 2007 acrostic poems aboard that space, and will add other poetic doodles when the time allows.

Since poetry, at times, makes me content, I thought it should be attached to my Happiness blog.