Month: April 2018

First Person: An Oklahoma Teacher Speaks Out

First Person: An Oklahoma Teacher Speaks Out

Posted by | Apr 6, 2018 | , |

Three weeks ago I was teaching in my Oklahoma City classroom when a voice announced over the intercom that our school was going on “lockdown.” In the moment, I thought little of it. Then a principal ran to my door, banged loudly on our window and frantically motioned for us to hide. I stood in a dark room huddled with my terrified students for 30 minutes before we received any word from the outside world. At that point we didn’t know that a student brought a gun into the school. We didn’t know that he dropped the weapon and ran....

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Red Rambler by Joel Long

Red Rambler by Joel Long

Posted by | Apr 5, 2018 | , |

Installment 18 is Joel Long’s “Red Rambler,” a poem whose speaker travels the hypnotic road of sense memory. One minute, we’re driving along in the present, tempted to look over bridge rails at water; the next minute, something triggers and we take flight, returning to the sights, smells, and sensations of a past we can hardly know. And yet we do know it intimately. *** Red Rambler My brother left the roach clip in the sun visor in grandma’s car. Though I never use it, I leave it there beside mirror and compass sphere, egg which rotated in fluid...

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Julian Calendar: Parallel Collage

Julian Calendar: Parallel Collage

Posted by | Apr 4, 2018 | , |

Julian Calendar Parallel Collage Independent Julian Calendar describe themselves as making ‘dark music for dark times.’  That’s the thing, they aren’t that dark, though I won’t argue with the comment about the times.  Coming from the purple state of North Carolina, the members of Julian Calendar have seen some pretty nasty and stupid political wrangling of late.  Based in the big city of Charlotte, the band is an amalgam of musicians, novelists, and first time singers.  You can read our feature on the band here. Band leader Jeremy Fisher came up with the structures of these songs a few...

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From the Picket Line: A Kentucky Teacher Speaks Out

From the Picket Line: A Kentucky Teacher Speaks Out

Posted by | Apr 3, 2018 | , , |

I’m not really sure how to put into words what today meant. It’s hard to sum up something that started just over three weeks ago and see it come together so quickly and perfectly. I got to the capital before the sun had even fully arisen, about an hour before the start of the protest. The group that has served as a sort of leadership think tank, of which I am a member, for KY 120 United met briefly, and for the first time in person. And then we walked together toward the front of the capital building. When...

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Teacher Protests Spread To Kentucky

Teacher Protests Spread To Kentucky

Posted by | Apr 3, 2018 | , |

It is a cliché to point out how hard teachers work.  The thing is, though, this isn’t a cliché.  And teachers are getting screwed.  When I lived in Alabama, my friends and former students who taught spent their meagre wages buying supplies for their classroom, and by that, I mean chalk and erasers.  Even in liberal Massachusetts, my friends and former students who are teachers are left to do the same.  One actually bought his class a set of textbooks, out of his own pocket, because the ones he had were falling apart and there was no money to replace...

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