English Class - "Five Ways" Poem

My English teacher is great. Some students disagree with me and say that he talks too much, but I like it because we can discuss things aloud as we read them, and not just writing journals at the end of each chapter, where the only person who ever reads them is the teacher, and you can't learn from what your classmates have to say. Besides, I feel like I can express my thoughts better orally than in writing sometimes, and while reading a book is one of those times.

The other thing is that instead of writing our assignments and book responses on paper and handing them in to the teacher, we post them on a blog. The advantages to this fall along the same line as the in-class discussions: other students can read your work and critique it, and you can learn from other students' writing.

Anyway, I'm going to show you a poem I wrote for English class. The assignment was to choose a poem from a book he gave us and write a pastiche, a copy of another artist's style, based on the poem. Here is the original poem, followed by my own pastiche:

Five Ways to Kill a Man EDWIN BROCK

There are many cumbersome ways to kill a man.

You can make him carry a plank of wood

to the top of a hill and nail him to it. To do this

properly you require a crowd of people

wearing sandals, a cock that crows, a cloak

to dissect, a sponge, some vinegar and one

man to hammer the nails home.

Or you can take a length of steel,

shaped and chased in a traditional way,

and attempt to pierce the metal cage he wears.

But for this you need white horses,

English trees, men with bows and arrows,

at least two flags, a prince, and a

castle to hold your banquet in.

Dispensing with nobility, you may, if the wind

allows, blow gas at him. But then you need

a mile of mud sliced through with ditches,

not to mention black boots, bomb craters,

more mud, a plague of rats, a dozen songs,

and some round hats made of steel.

In an age of aeroplanes, you may fly

miles above your victim and dispose of him by

pressing one small switch. All you then

require is an ocean to separate you, two

systems of government, a nation’s scientists,

several factories, a psychopath, and

land that no-one needs for several years.

These are, as I began, cumbersome ways

to kill a man. Simpler, direct, and much more neat

is to see that he is living somewhere in the middle

of the twentieth century, and leave him there.

Five Ways to Fail in Life EMMA

There are many cumbersome ways to fail in life.

You could claim inheritance to the throne

of an empire, and wreck the whole place.

You would require numerous mistresses, a case of

megalomania, a controlling mother, a way to kill

said mother, and an utter lack of talent in the

arts, which you would deny.

With no claim to a throne by birthright, you

could declare dictatorship anyway. You would

be self-conscious about your lack of height, not to mention

being at war with everyone at once, invading

Russia in the dead of winter, and refusing to

quit while you are ahead.

When destroying a nation is out of your reach, you can

lead a large army to their deaths instead. For this

you should have big and fluffy sideburns, a

vital battle, a gigantic crater, 3793 troops to

sacrifice, and a reputation to shatter.

Another way to fail is by becoming a famous

mobster. This would require one giant crime

organization, Thompson sub-machine guns, lots of

money with nothing to show for it, a prison

sentence to Alcatraz, and a case of syphilis.

These are, as I began, cumbersome ways

to fail in life. Simpler, direct, and much more neat

is to sit in the middle of a sea of

opportunities, yet do nothing.

I actually had to do a bit of research for this poem, but I enjoyed it. The people I referred to in my poem are real historical figures, and as an added bonus I'll let you guess who they are. (Preferably specify which stanza applies to them.) The only people who aren't allowed to answer are my dad and my brother, because they helped me to choose historical figures and therefore already know who all the people are.

School

I know I haven't posted anything in forever. I would post more, but China just so happens to have blocked Blogger and so far only my mom and dad have proxies on their computers. I could steal their computers more often, but I always forget, and I like my laptop's keyboard better, anyway.

So, SCHOOL

School is good. I have the greatest homeroom ever. It's awesome. We have plans to make a homeroom band. (I am the lead violinist.) This year we're doing a lot more competitions between homerooms, and I like that.

We went to a two-night school camp last week. It was fun, especially compared to last year. It's not that last year was particularly bad or anything, but it could have been better. Basically they divided us up into groups and we cycled through activities like archery and horseback riding, which maybe I would have thought was fun if I hadn't done them before and under better circumstances. The archery equipment wasn't too great of quality (most of the arrows were losing their fletching) and we only got to ride the horses for one short lap. We weren't even allowed to trot; we had to walk. I can understand not cantering or galloping, but not even being allowed to trot was a bit frustrating. I did manage to convince the workers that I could ride a horse and didn't need them to walk next to me, at least.

The food wasn't that great, either. Oh, well.

Anyway, this year we did competitions like boat races, games, raft-building, group talent show, and fashion show. My homeroom got first or second place in everything except for the talent show, where we got third, so we won overall. My boat got the best time in the boat races when we had six people, one less than everyone else, although when the scores for all the boats were averaged out we got second. My group built absolutely the worst raft, but we managed to float the entire ten minutes and win the competition through careful balancing. What I'm most proud of, though, is the fashion show. Our theme was Latin America, which was perfect because we have a Costa Rican in our class, so she immediately knew what to do. Then we had to make two outfits - one male and one female - out of blue and white poster board, and hold a fashion show. Our girl's dress was the best. Multiple people commented that they couldn't believe it was made out of paper and not cloth. (If I had a picture of it I'd show you, but I don't. Maybe I can get it from one of my classmates.) We didn't win, but I think that's because our homeroom was first so the other models had more time to discuss how present themselves and learn from the models who went ahead of them.

And the food was pretty good.

The only problem was that we were in tents, which wouldn't have been too big a deal except that the mattress pads weren't too great and the ground was a bit uneven, and it rained all night the second night and the low-quality tents leaked.

Since my dad is a ninth-grade homeroom teacher (although not my homeroom teacher) he was at the same camp. Some troublemakers tied his tent shut one night, but since he always has his pocketknife with him he easily cut the string. We don't know who did it, although it doesn't really matter. One of my classmates says he's pretty sure ho knows who did it, but he won't tell me who.

I'm planning on posting more from now on, so expect another post within the next few days, maybe tomorrow.