5+5 reasons why I am a teacher

new faces always remind me of old times...
i wont lie to you about it; but sometimes in the faces of my students, I see faces of my friends... companions... acquaintances ... it is weird. but anybody who is in the teaching profession will probably agree with me.

university never changes... there's always one or two nerds asking pertinent but sharp questions about this or that...trying to trap the teacher....only the smarter teachers can keep their 'superiority platform' intact (yes, yes i am one of them) at the face of those arrowing queries. Still you can never dislike these kids who make you feel the need for self-improvement every day. And of course, there are the beauty queens ... whenever they open their mouth to speak (which happens rarely) there is a pin-drop silence in the class.. everybody looks at them (or at their mouths to be specific...lipstick and all that).. many hearts palpitate fast as they slowly ask a very ordinary question in an epic fashion. “didn’t I just explain it?” the teacher smiles, while the nerds frown. The class goes on. Then there are the rock-stars; boys and girls -- smart and witty, cool and in-control -- without whom the class is never a fun. And there is the rest of the student populace... who shine dimly and half-dimly in the class. However, it’s not altogether unusual when a rather dim one flashes out like the Halley’s Comet and outshines everyone else.

the first class of a new semester usually begins with “getting-to-know-each-other” type questions… I ask them about their schools, colleges, hobbies and so on… and then I ask them to ask me questions some of the first questions I get are something like this:

madam, are you married?
“No.”, I say, “happy?”
“Yes”, they say, with a chuckle spreading from ear to ear. (didn’t I just sound Eliotic?)

Another FAQ is why did you choose to take up teaching? Now that’s what makes me think. In my very brief three-semester teaching career, I had to answer it several times. Half-heartedly speaking, I gave them half- witty or rather half-honest answers. After all, who wants to engage into a “why” discourse in an Eng-101 class? As I am digging deep into the question today, I wouldn’t mind finding the answer to the big WHY?

My friends in the university are a great influence. Tuhi and some other girls always thought I would be terrific teacher. Once in a summer afternoon I taught them poetry (adrienne rich) basking in the lavish Rokeya Hall lawn … now I realize that they read so little themselves that it was extremely difficult for me not to have sounded intellectual. My friend Moushum also thought I could be a good teacher; but in addition to that, she also knew about my infinite indolence and of course, my near-zero time sense. Moushum never thought I could fit into a 9 to 5 work schedule. cheers dosto! I also think alike… great minds do so.

[to be continued....]

My "bonu" is going away for a week

my best friend is going away for a week...
i am wondering who is going to wake me up before classes..
who is going to think about my lunch and pack some food for me..
i am wondering who is going to make sure that my dresses are starched or ironed...
who will jharify me as i mess up all the rooms... but only to set them right again...so that i can mess them up again...

hmm... i will miss you bonu... i love you.

Great Poetry Series-3 [To His Coy Mistress]

Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)

Had we but world enough and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state;
Nor would I love at lower rate.

But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long-preserved virginity;
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none, I think, do there embrace.

Now, therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may,
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour
Than languish in his slow-chapped pow'r.
Let us roll all our strength and all
Our sweetness up into one ball,
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

Illustration: Ophelia Redpath

A Letter to Rain

[ You have come again with your majestic insouciance…
You have come with all your charms and pleasures ...
and for some near-pessimists like me, you have come with all your gloom and melancholia, knocking off the box that was so carefully built through out the year to keep us covered in a “forgetful” warmth. You make me sick, you put me off. You only leave me blue and bereft.
Here I’m writing an open letter to you…]

Dear Rain:

Stop whining…. there is no use of it anymore.
Yes I know how I loved you for a long time… yes I remember how I have run out of my house again and again to feel your touch on my face…yes, I admit that I felt drums beating in my veins when I came close to you… yes, I confess that you have poured in so much happiness into my soul that I no longer sought it anywhere else. I remember how you have loved me softly in many occasions and how sometimes you have grown wild and came whip-lashing on me…. yes, you have given me those rare moments of magic when sheer physical pains metamorphosed into frenzied ecstasies…

When you came to me, I always held you close… I had you all over me…I drowned myself into your passionate embrace… but I could never hold you back. I have agreed to all your playfulness, didn’t I? But I could never make you stay.

Baby, I need you but I won’t want you anymore. I will never ask you to stay or to make a promise of returning to me... There is always someone who loves you more…there is always someone who needs you more. Do I not know that? I am closing my windows on you. Yes, my love, I disown you tonight. I am liberating you from me, your unbearably possessive lover. I will only be a voyeur (and not a victim anymore) of your spectacle. I will be watching you from a distance, but only with an artistic detachment.

Yours,
Sharmee