2006 Arizona English Teachers Association Poetry Winner
A Slam Poem to Be Recited Aloud
What Are We Feeding These Kids?
A School Teacher's Change
“What are we feeding these kids?”
That’s a question breathed
By a colleague intrigued
Eyes budged with impression
As he watched my students
Roll up their sleeves, wipe their feet
To spit beats of expression
I mean last week
The writing whined anorexic
So pale and bleak
Like a bunch of anemics
Milking hope from a dead poet’s last red blood cell
What are we feeding these kids?
Shakespeare and Paz
Alexie and Morrison, not TOO much anymore because…
The best meals are made of cannibalism!
There, I said it
The trick is to eat yourself alive
Before a blood thirsty throng
Beating chests with tongs
Gnashing teeth with desire as you plunge the knife deep
What do I feed ‘em?
I feed them me
Watch me spew
Don’t you wish you knew how to do it too?
Slam is as easy as vomit, got it?
What? You spit up in your mouth, no joke?
Too uptight you swallow it and choke?
I dare you to get over yourself
Grow a backbone and a blistered finger
And acid it up the vocal chords
Let it roar and pour it to the floor
Last night’s spaghetti and this morning’s grits
Let it out
Drink a soda? fuci
Thought I smelled it
Puke it out, let it roll
Let all the sights, tastes, smells, colors and textures unfold
Dance with the spirits that live within
Your ghosts: dare them to sing, dare them to swim
What are you feeding these kids?
Dinner served! Pull your chairs up to poetry’s word
Students serve yourselves your selves
Heap your plates full and suckle on the last words of your classmates, unnerved
Pour gravy on verbs heard as emerged
A sophomore’s heart opened with paper and ink, breathed out and purged
Yesterday we ate Johnny’s heart
A delicate taste of bitter meat
And Chavo’s love of poetry so sweet
And Ms. Piper’s Release
The words slipping and dripping down her chin to her knees
And we wanted more but the bell rang...
Please…
What am I feeding these kids?
My heart? My blood and guts?
No. Before, I lied,
Pushing my deepest thoughts and feelings aside
Cuz teacher training preaches: don’t get close
Keep your distance or you’re toast
So, I deferred to throwing out my prepackaged ‘Tootsie Rolls’
Because I know
They’ll eat ‘em up
Are you crazy?
I can’t take the same risks I ask of my kids
Cuz my stuff’s not sanitized, I’m too wise and I want to retire someday
Wanna roof over my head
And maybe a gray-haired boyfriend
To stay through the news and dinner
What are you feeding our kids?
You! I’m talking to you!
Don’t feed me no pearls
Round and glassy
Strung and hung to be admired, uninspired
A white straightjacket of grammatical correctness
Each pearl looking like the rest, shined up
Like some old lady’s white gloves and Sunday morning heels
No! Spill your pockets. Now.
What you got?
You hoarding a quarter pound hamburger, dripping with cheese
With guacamole and crunchy greens?
Put it on the table now
Or is yours more like the lemon drizzle on a high calorie
Slice of New York cheesecake
Or you got some French fries, the homemade kind
Sliced up, different sized
Red skin still stuck, and salted
They slide, slide, slide
You got some ketchup? (Well, I tried)
What you say?
You got a buffet stored up in that backpack you clutch like a tumor
Up and down the hallway
Is it getting too heavy? Is it weighing too much?
Well, stop guarding it like a dog with his last bone over there
The rest of us are waiting to share
Your fluffy white bread rolls, your golden round symphonies of taste- real butter melting
We’re waiting, our palettes palpitating
What am I feeding these kids?
Okay...
I made a small feast last night
Sitting at my computer to type
T.V. off, kids at their dad’s, I composed this tiny offering of words for
And they ate!
I hope it’s not too late for them to trust me as a writer
Just like them!
So? What you got cooking, good looking?
What you got?
Copywright 2006 Deborah O'Dowd
Written after a challenge made by my students who entered their own poems into contests.
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