Snow Day

DELAYS TODAY


Prince of Peace delayed two hours,
Crownpoint and Gallup Public, Hobbs Municipal
all delayed.  Pecos Valley closed.  Battaan, Mountain
Academy, Bernalillo, Bosque, all delayed. 


School of Dreams Academy, I did not make this up,
Sierra Blanca, Hope Christian, Horizon West.
Silver Consolidated School, Immanuel, Jemez Valley,
two hours.  Sky City Community School, South Valley.


Academy de Esperanza, Laguna all delayed two hours.
Saint Bonaventure, Thoreau, buses delayed, Lovington,
Saint Michaels, Saint Pius, Saint Thomas Aquinas.
Sunset Mesa, Taos Day, the schools scrolled across


the bottom of the screen.  Tatum Municipal
staff must report. The Tutorial, Mora and Moriarity,
imagine the students dreaming late, Tierra Encantado,
All staff report.  Tohatchi, Village Academy.


West Las Vegas closed.  Wagon Mound no evening
activity. Santa Fe delay. Institute of American Indian Arts
delayed.  Luna Community College, Albuquerque 
Academy, Albuquerque Public and Sandia Prep.


But nothing about my sweet Pojoaque or Espanola,
So I scrape the ice, sweep the snow, and go.    2.1.2011

I got to go and teach poetry to two groups of seniors at the Pojoaque Valley High School.  It is the school where my two oldest children attended grades 6th through graduation. All the students showed up, 11 at the early morning hour of 7:40 and 18 at the second period class.  Last week I'd told them a Grimm's fairy tale, The Devil's Sooty Brother, and we had a common experience, the image of the young soldier sweeping the shavings behind the door, scraps and detritus which later in the story turned to gold.  I felt the day unfold in a simliar way, the tatters of a frigid day they all wanted to be a snow day became the gold of poetry.  Teens in the teens, they wrote pantoums. Even the hip hop guy, Forest, who doesn't write in forms, wrote one.

Here is one student poem and one the teacher wrote. Here's Patrick's:


Exhilarating cliff faces in the sun
Random thoughts entering my mind
Deep breaths of the early mountain air
Info pumping through my digital veins


Random thoughts entering my mind
The mezmerizing smell of roasting chile
Info pumping through my digital veins
Half my life livingin the cloud


The mezmerizing smell of roasting chile
Mouth watering sensations of Christmas
Half my life living in the cloud
Helping others wth my knowledge


Mouth watering sensations of Chirstams
Deep breaths of the early mountain air
Half my life living in the cloud
Exhilarating cliff faces in the sun



And by amazing teacher Kerry Benson who keeps chewing gum in his desk
and laminates the student's drawings of cars:


Black Mesa rising up out of a morning fog
I drive down the hill into the valley
My beautiful girls- wife, daughters, grandchild
Run through my mind as I cross the Rio Grande


I drive down the hill into the Valley
The Jemez behind me pink in the early sunlight
Runs through my mind as I cross the Rio Grande
It's like living in a painting, Que no?


The Jemez behind me pink in the early sunlight
A stray beam catches the vanes of a windmill off to the south
It's like living in a painting, Que no?
A driver ahead pulls out of El Rancho without looking, swerves into my lane.


A stray beam catches the vanes of a windmill off to the south
The driver slows down- no brake lights reveal his plan
The driver ahead pulls out, swerves into my lane
Hey bro, you got turn signals on that pickup?


The driver slows down- no brake lights reveal his plan
My beautiful girls, wife, daughters, grandchild
Hey bro, you got turn signals on that pickup?
Black Mesa rising up out of a morning fog.