Don't play with it

~~~

Today was a decent day. Bleh... I'm taking a break from talking about my kids. They seem to be working with the weather, some days fair to fine, some days a few scattered showers, other days ominous and looming.

SO instead I'll talk about the holiday tomorrow. YAY! Ok so it's not entirely a holiday. It's a working day without having to do work - for me. This is so... because my school happens to be Anglican and there is seem great religious gathering of the schools tomorrow. That's really awful of me i guess - not knowing exactly why the meeting or what it entails beyond a religious service and cultural presentation. I should know the reason for it being tomorrow interrupting the school week... BUT that's not really important. I have a holiday from work work.

~~~

I've introduced Margaret Atwood into my staffroom. It was most amusing. I'm not sure the writing appealed much to the males on staff. However, the females liked it. 'A Women's Issue' sparked great discussion, especially amongst the History teachers, as it dealt with traditions in some parts of the world.

Excerpt below...

...Exhibit C is the young girl
dragged into the bush by the midwives
and made to sing while they scrape the flesh
from between her legs, then tie her thighs
till she scabs over and is called healed.
Now she can be married.
For each childbirth they'll cut her
open, then sew her up.
Men like tight women.
The ones that die are carefully buried.

...This is no museum.
Who invented the word love?

that's just stanza 3 and the last stanza. Atwood doesn't mince words. She has a frank, almost clinical, feminist, raw approach in her writing. It's delicious.

From her book Power Politics (1971). She opens with a four line poem.

You fit into me
like a hook into an eye

a fish hook
an open eye

And there's 'Hesitations Outside The Door', also from Power Politics.


I adore her writing style. Free Style... An ideal selection of simple words pieced together in the a brilliant manner. Her words tell an ambiguous story so that when you read it, it becomes a vicarious, nostalgic experience no longer Atwood's, but your own. You step into the shoes of the persona and you relive your experiences as you attach them word by simple word.

Her poems are succinct - and at risk of being cliché - short, sweet and to the point. She wastes no time with pretty words. If they're meant to hurt, she cuts deep. If they're meant to make you think, you end up in a introspective mood. Whatever the intention, she is successful.

This of course isn't the gospel truth, just my opinion.

~~~

Suffice to say.... I'm in a poetic mood. Going to Deja Vu has inspired me...

~~~

How about that... Sun kisses do fall upon me, for the love of irony. I was just scanning my other posts, as i usually do, for errors and i realized... the post on the fires were taken on that day and i didn't credit my photographer. *Ahem* Ru. Thanks for the shots Ru.


I'm sleepy.
And happy.
And content.

Shelli out.
For now.