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it didn't feel like being crabs in a bucket
too lonely an experience for a plural metaphor.
though definitely there was a dragging down experience:
I expected we'd be raising each other up
not pulling someone back to toe the line
I expected us all to reach for the stars
not speak only when spoken to
I didn't realize my teaching internship
landed me in a diploma-mill
churning out inferior product
with very few value-add options
Should I have known better?
I didn't.
I have always been too trusting.
I was sent into the trenches
to build bridges with cardboard
and I was guilty when the bridges failed.
when I asked for lumber they said
"There's no budget for that
You'll have to find that yourself."
And some of them smirked.
I was a hero
but I couldn't see it
all I could see was
muddy trenches and disrespect
for miles in every direction
and when I was discharged
grateful and ashamed
I took my papers and went away
glad and sorrowful
that I was too soft for these wars.
I tend my garden on this faraway hillside
watch the struggle from a distance
climb the cliffs seeking perspective -
and maybe some new way to stop the war.
(this is my entry for this week's![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
therealljidol.)
too lonely an experience for a plural metaphor.
though definitely there was a dragging down experience:
- anything exceptional
- anything experimental
- anything that broke the status quo
I expected we'd be raising each other up
not pulling someone back to toe the line
I expected us all to reach for the stars
not speak only when spoken to
I didn't realize my teaching internship
landed me in a diploma-mill
churning out inferior product
with very few value-add options
Should I have known better?
I didn't.
I have always been too trusting.
I was sent into the trenches
to build bridges with cardboard
and I was guilty when the bridges failed.
when I asked for lumber they said
"There's no budget for that
You'll have to find that yourself."
And some of them smirked.
I was a hero
but I couldn't see it
all I could see was
muddy trenches and disrespect
for miles in every direction
and when I was discharged
grateful and ashamed
I took my papers and went away
glad and sorrowful
that I was too soft for these wars.
I tend my garden on this faraway hillside
watch the struggle from a distance
climb the cliffs seeking perspective -
and maybe some new way to stop the war.
(this is my entry for this week's
therealljidol.)Tags:
- another fucking opportunity for growth,
- biographical details,
- endings,
- epiphany,
- forward momentum,
- fucked up,
- grief,
- i need,
- i want,
- interior monologue becomes soliloquy,
- lj idol,
- pathwork,
- personal cartography,
- poetry,
- quit shoulding all over yourself,
- sad,
- salmon of wisdom,
- self-examination,
- stomping brain weasels,
- teaching,
- unhappy
no subject
no subject
Choosing to write about it, so, it was needed. And it feels really healthy. That school was a dysfunctional relationship for me. The students were great, and I feel so fucking privileged that I was able to be there for them, for so many of them that needed me.
but the school? and the district?
*exhale* there is something so broken, about all the systems of education I have worked in. (four districts, plus at least ten others I've substitute taught in). And after 5 years I think I understand more about WHAT is broken but it's the whole system.
If I can find a place to start a ripple effect from, to make things better, I think that would be an excellent life's work.