A few weeks ago I had written about an email that I received from an eighth grader in Colorado. Jake, a budding poet, was interested in learning more about me in the context of some palindromic poetry I had written many years ago. I wrote back to Jake (you can see the correspondence here) and a couple of days ago I received another email from him, this time containing a palindromic poem written by him. With his permission, I am including his email and poem below:
Punya,
Here is the palindromic poem that I wrote recently, but I made it so that the words are reversed instead of just the lines. It adds another layer of difficulty to creating it, and I recommend trying it if you get the chance.
Falling Snow
snow falling gently
on stomping feet
cold stinging
the teasing and laughing children
sculpted beautifully – crystals form
flakes dancing gracefully
tumble and spin
spin and tumble
gracefully dancing flakes
form crystals – beautifully sculpted
children laughing and teasing the
stinging cold
feet stomping on
gently falling snow
How awesomely cool is that! I wrote back to him right away saying
Jake. This is awesome!!!! I just shared it with my family and we were unanimous in our appreciation and praise for your achievement. Not only is it a doubly palindromic poem, an achievement in and of itself, it is a wonderful poem in it’s own right….
Thank you so much for sharing this with me. It completely made my day.
Don’t you just love the open-architecture of the web (and why I resist the closed worlds of Facebook).
Thanks Sean. I am in complete agreement with what you wrote.
I have been wanting to write a longer rant about these “closed” spaces – don’t we have too much of that already… maybe some day when I get a moment (or two). ~ punya
Awesome. I too, think this is a fantastic poem. And really, your testimony to the open world of the Internet (as opposed to walled gardens of many flavors) is 100% in line with my feelings on that topic. I’m pretty sure I just stated the obvious. However, even in those places where teachers are themselves allowed to share openly, as well as to bring their students into that philosophy… such openness is not s static state.
You might be surprised at how (even in open places) much constant hard work it takes to continue to maintain such openness. It seems that many of the pockets of openness we see in educational spaces today are places where teachers seized an opportunity to do an end-around on sleeping tech departments who allowed the web2 revolution to pass unfettered beyond their watchful eye.
Here’s betting we soon see significant “power grabs” emerge all over as traditional tech departments struggle to regain control over the information landscape in our schools. Preventing that eventuality, and stepping back to a simpler age might seem easier and safer to many in position to do so, but in my opinion, this is not a best-case scenario. I will continue to use my influence to insure that students are given agency over the tools they wield and the spaces in which they interact, learn, and thrive.
Thanks again for championing this sort of sharing and collaborative inspiration.
Sean