Roll Film. Raise Spirits.

A scene from Mad Hot Ballroom

Where do you teach?

I’m not a teacher, I mumble. I'm more of an encourager. 

I don’t have a teaching background. Until I stepped into an old schoolroom in Waldport, Oregon, I never even liked children. I wasn’t looking to teach or to share hard-won personal experience. I was just showing up as a volunteer, meeting with a group of teenagers who were writing poems and stories and hanging out.

That was six years ago. I now lead four writing groups, and have grown to love the kids at Seashore Family Literacy.

Maybe we’re all teachers. Some of us step up, some hang back, and some know their role from the get-go.  I've realized there is no one way to teach or reach, and I'm inspired by those who connect with the lost and forgotten.

And I’m inspired by films that make me want to be more, do more.

Need a bit of inspiration, or just uplifting entertainment? Try a few of my favorite reach-n-teach films:

The Hobart Shakespeareans
This documentary follows Rafe Esquith, a passionate teacher who inspires his Central Los Angeles students to love and embrace Shakespeare, Mark Twain, math, history and more. (Esquith's  book, Teach Like Your Hair's on Fire, is also excellent).

Mad Hot Ballroom
Ballroom dancing goes from lame to cool for a group of New York City students in this insightful documentary, which follows a group of 11-year-olds as they learn to dance old-school styles including the merengue, rumba, tango, foxtrot and swing. (I love this film. It's the only movie in which I openly cheered in a crowded theatre).

Paper Clips
Rural Tennessee is the setting for this documentary about an extraordinary experiment in Holocaust education. Struggling to grasp the concept of six million Holocaust victims, students collect six million paper clips to better understand the enormity of the calamity.

Freedom Writers
Hilary Swank stars in this drama based on real-life California teacher Erin Gruwell's unorthodox methods. To break the cycle of violence and despair that threatens their futures, she has students keep journals, and apply history's lessons, to their troubled lives. While the story gets the Hollywood treatment, the overall message is worth the sometimes sappy vibe.

I'm always looking for great films. What have I missed? Please share your favorites.

On Sunday

God

Maybe you’re a verb, or some
lost part of speech
that would let us talk sense
instead of monkey-screech

when we try to explain you
to our loved ones and ourselves
when we most need to.
Who knows why someone dies

in the thick of happiness,
his true love finally found,
the world showing success
as if the world were only a cloud

that floated in a dream
above a perfect day?
Are you also dreaming our words?
Give us something to say.

— Michael Ryan

Thankful Thursday: Wine Words

Wine is poetry in a bottle.

For years I've rolled my eyes at the adage, but now I am delighted to see poetry not just in the bottle but on the bottle.

On their next: wine, King Estate Winery in Eugene, Oregon, offers a fabulous label and a creative back-of-the-bottle poem:

next:  2008 oregon pinot noir

next: is a statement
next: is a question
next: reminds us that
we always stand
at a crossroads,
that we are all poets,
all philosophers,
the makers and keepers
of our own dreams,
that we might bring wine to our friends
that we might share both
wine and words together,
folded into a moment
on the edge of the next.

The poem shows no author, and I am perpetually curious:  Is this the work of an ad agency? (and, if so, how do I get this gig?) Or a poem via a sister, who has a friend, who has a neighbor that is a poet?

I couldn't bear to appreciate the poem (especially those last two lines) and not know its author. A quick bit of sleuthing solved the mystery. The poem was written by Ed King, founder and CEO of King Estate Winery.

Turns out Ed likes to read and write poems, and he often supports nonprofit organizations that publish and promote poetry and the arts.

I'll drink to that! Hooray to top-down creativity! Power and poems to the people!

This message has been brought to you by Thankful Thursday, a weekly pause to appreciate people, places & things. Are you a Thankful Thursday writer? Is so, let me know. I'd love to share your gratitude with others. Please visit these other Thankful Thursday writers:

Kelli Russell Agodon

Susan Rich

Send me a postcard

Crater Lake National Park in Oregon

The world is full of words. Lately, I'm leaning to less. Inspired by haiku, tanka, and Lisa Janice Cohen, I wrote these postcard poems.

Driving Along the Umpqua

wind swirls memory as

river light shines to

disolve pain so

gnawing

sadness

can

sink

Crater Lake at 7,000 feet

deepest

bluest

distant

water without sound

Heading Back

miles to go

heavy-hearted

your hand in mine

all the way home

This just in

Amen!

This stamped message appeared on the envelope containing Letters from the Emily Dickinson Room, a book of poems by Kelli Russell Agodon.  Seems like a sign of good things inside.