Be

 be

the tear 

on the hungry child's cheek,

the callous

on the weathered farmer's hand,

the wrinkle

around the worried mamí's eye,

the blister 

on the tired campesino's foot.

be beauty

in the plain

be genius

in the simple

be wonder

in the ordinary

be courage

in the human

be with,

and you will be

seek,

and you will find

become 

a 

human 

question 

mark

accompany

liBErate

- trevor scott barton, poems for a brown-eyed girl, 2021

Impressionism

The curves of her body reminded him of the gently rolling hills below the mountains where he lived as a boy. 

Her brown eyes were the deep soil of the people's farms.

She was beautiful like the land, like the yellow flowers he found as he roamed the countryside barefooted, like the green trees that sparkled after a heavy rain.

They listened to the sound of the rain on the window of the hotel in the old part of the city. 

They made love to the rolling thunder and flashing lightning of the morning storm beside the tree.

- trevor scott barton, stories for a brown-eyed girl, 2021

Notes from public school - Teacher Workday

In 4th grade, we study astronomy.

“Do you know the order of the planets, closest to the farthest, from our sun?” I ask my students.

Invariably they don’t.

No one has taught them.

Yet.

That’s my job!

“Let me teach you by helping you use a mnemonic device,” I say.

“A memo what?!” they ask.

“A mnemonic device. You use the first letter of the words you’re trying to memorize and make a sentence out of them.

Here.

Let me show you.

On my Promethean Board I write Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and sketch little pictures (or big ones in the cases of the gas giants) above the words.

“You see?” I ask.

“M, V, E, M, J, S, U, N - those are the first letters of the words we’re trying to memorize.

Now, let’s make a sentence out of them.

A fun sentence that we can remember.”

So we make our fun sentence.

“My Very Educated Mother Just Served Up Nachos.

Look!

We did it!

M, V, E, M, J, S, U, N

Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Nachos

Now you know the order of the planets, closest to farthest, from our sun.

Congratulations!

You’re on your way to jobs at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at NASA!”

And invariably one student will exclaim, “Hey! We forgot Pluto!”

And invariably I’ll respond, “Oh, Pluto. Poor, poor Pluto. Take a deep breath, for I have to tell you a sad, sad story.

Once upon a time, in 2006, the International Astronomical Union met and stated, “Pluto is no longer a planet. It’s been demoted. It’s now a dwarf planet.”

“How can they do that?!” asks my distraught students.

“Who gave them the power to be able to do that?”

Maybe this distraughtness, this questioning of power that can demote a planet, comes because my students identify with Pluto.

Most of them come from economically poor, socially outcasted families, so they understand at the heart level what it means to be small, cold and forgotten.

What it means to have no gravity, no pull on the Earth.

So I read them Pluto’s Secret: An Icy World’s Tale of Discovery by Margaret A. Weitekamp, David DaVorkin and Dianne Kidd.

And we discover that what makes Pluto special makes them special, too.

(I’ll let you read the book so I won’t spoil the theme for you!)

And I read them a copy of a Fibonacci poem I wrote about Pluto.

I give them a copy of it as a gift, a gift to help them remember to be, to be themselves.

far

far

away

miles from Earth

small, cold, forgotten

 

you are no longer a planet

the IAU said because of your movement in space

I was a boy in my classroom at school, you were my fav’rite planet 

you had no gravity, no pull on the Earth, but you had gravity on my small heart

I loved you, felt you in the deep, deep space in my heart

New Horizons just journeyed there

found you have a heart

but I knew

pluto

loves

me

All in a day in public school.

from T’s Encyclopedia

I opened a box of Crayola Crayons. 

I looked inside and saw all the beautiful colors.

I saw the colors of the rainbow.

I saw the colors of all of the people of the world!

There were 128 colors in the box.

This, my friends, astonished me.

As I gazed at all of those amazing colors, a surprising thing happened.

The box of crayons spoke to me!

"Excuse me," it inquired, "What is your favorite color?"

"Yellow,” I answered.

Ibsmiled in wonder at the friendly box of crayons. 

"Thank you for asking."

My mom taught me to show good manners, even to a box of crayons.

The box of crayons smiled back at me.

"Why is yellow your favorite color?" it asked simply.

"Well,” I said to my inquisitive friend, “That is a great question.

You’re the first to ever ask me why my favorite color is yellow.”

"Colors are my life," said my humble friend.

"Yellow’s my favorite color,” I began, “Because it’s the color of the early morning sun as it rises over the hills of Africa where I lived. 

It warms me. 

Yellow’s the color in Vincent Van Gogh's paintings. 

It inspires me. 

Yellow is the color of my grandpa's freshly shucked corn. 

It comforts me. 

When I hold a baby and kiss her softly on the cheek, I feel yellow. 

When I read to a child, I feel yellow. 

When I share with others, I feel yellow. 

That’s why yellow’s my favorite color," I said.

"Please, take my yellow, then,” said my wise, colorful friend.

Hold hands with people who like red and blue and green and orange and purple and all of the other colors inside of me.

Go out together with them and color the world beautiful.”

I accepted the yellow crayon.

I gently closed the lid of my newfound friend.

I went out with color in my hands and in my heart to color the world.

- trevor scott barton, stories for a brown-eyed girl, 2021

Notes from public school - Teacher Work Day

When I was in elementary school, I did a book report on The Contender by Robert Lipsyte.

I chose the book because of it’s cover.

There was an illustration there of a young black man with a towel over his shoulders and tape around his hands.

He was a boxer.

It tells the story of Alfred Brooks, an inner-city kid who drops out of school and works as a sweeper and stocker in a family owned grocery store.

His best friend, James, falls into gang life and Alfred tried to save him before he’s lost to the streets.

James gets arrested for breaking into and stealing from the grocery store where Alfred works.

One night, after James’ arrest, Alfred climbs up the rickety, dimly lit stairs of Donatelli’s Gym.

He meets Mr. Donatelli, a grizzled, old boxing trainer who is much like the beloved Micky in the Rocky movies.

Alfred begins to box and learns that he must become a contender before he can become a champion.

There is a quote from Mr. Donatelli that I always keep close to me.

“You have to start by wanting to be a contender,” he tells Alfred, “The person coming up, the person who knows there's a good chance you’ll never get to the top, the person who's willing to sweat and bleed to get up as high as your legs and your brain and your heart will take you.”

I think about these words each morning I open my eyes to a new day as a teacher and a writer.

They inspire me to want to be a contender.

In that first reading, I realized that I am Alfred and he is me.

We are each other.

That’s an important thing for a ten year old to understand.

I’m thankful I learned it in the Taylor’s Elementary School library, the old Taylor’s Elementary School on Main Street in the building where my grandmas and grandpas, mom and dad, went to school.

It’s a story about friendship, too.

One of the most moving scenes I’ve ever read in literature happens at the end of the story.

Alfred crawls into an old hiding spot where he and James go when times get hard, like when James’ alcoholic, abusive father lashed out at him, like when Alfred’s mom died from cancer.

James is there.

He’s running from the police because he’s broken into the grocery store again, this time through the front window, where he cut himself real bad.

“Alfred felt James’ outstretched arms around his neck. Slowly, he pulled James out of the cave into the biting wind.

‘Easy, man, you be all right.’ He lifted James to his feet and half-carried him through the stunted trees. James moaned.

‘Hang in there, James. Can you walk?’

‘Try.’ He leaned heavily on Alfred. ‘Weak as a baby. Lost all that blood.’

‘Don’t worry about that, James, I got plenty of blood for you.’ Carefully, Alfred guided him over the rocks and bushes and the new snow, toward the lights of the avenue.”

In that first reading I realized that friendship is everything, that carrying your friends, that being carried by your friends, is everything.

I’m thankful I learned that.

All from a library in public school.

YEAR of the Girl Child (Love, Laugh, Live)

I’m reading Malala’s Magic Pencil by Malala Yousafzai as an Interactive Read Aloud to my 4th graders.

Have you heard of Malala?

“She’s the youngest person to win that peace prize,” said Teresa.

“Yes,” I said. “The Nobel Peace Prize. That’s one of the most honorable prizes to win in the world.”

“Hey,” blurted out Fallyn, “I want to win that award!”

If you know her well, you know she just might.

Well, if you know her, you know it probably won’t be the PEACE prize.

But she has all of the ‘be’ings and ‘do’ings inside of her to make her a future Nobel laureate.

Malala is a remarkable person.

She’s one of my heroes.

I’m a member of her ‘Fearless’ book club and love it!

She was shot by Taliban gunmen on October 9, 2012 in the Swat Valley of Pakistan for speaking and writing out for the equality of girls and boys.

She wanted girls to go to school the same as boys.

The powerful men in her country did not want that.

So they pulled over her school bus and shot her.

She recovered.

Those powerful men could not silence her.

They didn’t have as much power as they thought

.

She is now a major voice for human rights in our world today.

In the book, she wishes for a magic pencil to use to make the world a better place.

Then she commits herself to being that magic pencil.

I wish you could’ve heard my class echoing her words throughout the 4th grade hallway:

“ONE CHILD, ONE TEACHER, ONE BOOK, ONE PEN CAN CHANGE THE WORLD!” they chanted in their endearing, sing-songy kind of way.

We said “WORLD” (very loudly, by the way) and froze.

We minded our LC’s.

We looked closely and listened carefully.

The room was silent.

Not quiet, but silent.

My fellow teachers can tell you how rare these moments of silence are during the school day.

It’s a magical moment, for sure.

There was Cintia

She’d told me earlier in small group reading that if she had a magic pencil the. She’d draw herself as a writer. (If you know me well, you know this made my heart smile)

There was Neveyah.

She’d told me hers is to be a dancer.

There was Nashly.

She’d told me that if she had a magic pencil then she’d draw herself as a helper of migrants from Honduras journeying through Mexico on their way to the US border.

On their way to us.

And in that moment of silence, a thought and a feeling struck me like a lightning bolt and shook me like a thunder clap.

Malala is right.

These children can change the world.

I get to walk alongside them.

I am humbled.

I am thankful.

All in a day in public school.

Listening Is An Act Of Love

“Listening is an act of love.”

So says Dave Isay, the founder of StoryCorps.

It’s my favorite quote.

StoryCorps is a project that provides space for people to listen to each other.

The project travels around the country in an Airstream Travel Trailer with recording equipment inside of it.

People can sit face to face (ear to ear, really) and ask each other questions and listen to each other’s  answers.

They can share each other’s stories.

The recordings are moving, sometimes so much so that I have to pull my car over to the side of the road and weep.

If you ever see me in my car pulled over to the side of the road with my head down on the steering wheel, please check on me. Probably, though, I’m just listening to the StoryCorps segment on NPR.

I think about Isay’s precept every day at school.

How can I be a good listener to my students?

It’s tough, sometimes.

I have a student who barely talks at all.

She never raises her hand during classroom discussions.

She never speaks unless spoken to (and doesn’t speak more than a sentence or above a whisper, even then).

She always finds her way to the end of our line, whether we’re going to related arts, lunch, recess, or the bus.

She is a quiet kid.

Silent, really.

Since I haven’t been able to listen much to her yet (I believe my teacher magic will get through to her soon), I listened to her teacher from last year to learn a little bit more about her.

“I did a project where I asked my students, ‘If you had a million dollars, what would you do with it?’ said her teacher.

“She wrote, ‘I would help my dad come to me from Mexico.’”

There it is.

Now I know why she’s a person of deep and long silences.

She loves someone and there is a wall, figuratively and literally, between them.

Though she is the quiet kid, and though she is carrying this heavy load in her heart, I wish you could spend the day with her as I do.

Her earthy brown eyes are full of questions and curiosity, the kind of questions and  curiousness that push the world forward and make it a better place for everyone and everything.

She works so hard to be the best person she can be and do the best work she can do.

Her words are few, but she has listening ears and a listening heart.

Her listening is an act of love.

And I love her.