All good things must come to an end ...

... and VAMPY, being very good, is one of those things. It's difficult for me to even express how much I've enjoyed teaching you ... And talking with you, and discussing art and life and literature with you, and giving you vintage Power Ranger stickers, and yelling "COOPUN!" at you, and just generally being around you. It's a rare gift to have such intelligent and curious and talented students, and it's even more rare to have intelligent and curious and talented students who are also kind and courteous and funny and sweet. I, too, wish VAMPY could go on forever.

And I hope that it will, in some sense: this is your blog. Use it! I hope to see more of your writing, and your thoughts about writing, and about the wonder that is Chuck Norris.

I was reminded today of a poem by one of my favorite teachers, Robert Creeley. Though he passed on shortly after our class had ended, he left me with so much, as he taught me so much about life and teaching and art. As I've gotten the same gift from you, I thought I'd share this:

This walking on
and on, this
going and coming—
this morning

shines such lovely
light on
all of us
we're home.

A Martian Sends an E-mail Home

Many ghosts play a game with
Many rectangles.

Some rectangles are scary.
Some are peaceful.

They do stuff with paper
With markings on it.
Hit each other with it,
Tape to their body.

Sometimes lights go off early.
Sometimes lights go off late.

They get on a raised piece of wood,
Do stuff as a group.

They start to glow and stand
Up on their feet.

Sometimes they stay rooted
With nothing to say.

They like to make each other gleam,
That make them go short-wired robotic.

Knock Knock
Who’s There?
Pika
Pika Who?

Knock Knock
Who’s There?
I Choose
I Choose Who?
I Choose You

They seem to fall to the ground
Quite often as if they been turned off

The mush that they digest is light,
But can often be dark.

There are many of them.
They stay locked up most the day.

Sometimes they’re let out,
Into the open.
Where there is light,
And things that are not man-made
And that are.

Aliens get confused too.

Everyone is different here.
But their days are exactly the same,
And they're all showing their teeth, all the time.
Smiling?
Forced to put unknown thing of every size and color into their bodies,
but still smiling.
Forced to pin their name into their skin,
but still smiling.
Forced to climb a mountain at least twice a day,
but still smiling.
Forced to sit in a restraint for more than six hours everyday,
but still smiling.
Forced to listen to a higher authority all the time,
but still smiling.
Forced to run until you find a flag,
but still smiling.
Forced to stand on a platform with newspaper all over them in front of everyone,
but still smiling.
Forced to stay up until two in the morning,
but still smiling.
Forced to be around the same people all day; everyday; for two weeks,
but still smiling.
What makes them like this?
What is so amazing about a place called VAMPY?9

Installment 4 of Dreamcatcher

After I finish writing in my diary I take a shower and brush my teeth. Toothpaste is instantly washed off the smooth, white tub floor. The floor is also washed clean of shampoo and soap as a constant stream of scalding water pounds my back and head. I adjust the water and continue washing.

I reach around to wash my back. My arm stops, having discovered a block. I drop the sponge and reach back again. My fingers brush something scaly and I jerk back, my mind clouding over with the haze of panic that occasionally plagued me.

I clear my head, relaxing, barely managing either. I slowly pull the curtain back, not even hearing the many clinks coming from the metal rings attaching the screen to a metal rack. I creep over to the fog covered mirror and wipe it clean with my towel, I glimpse something green and gold behind me, I whip around... but I can't see anything.

I reach back and to feel for the scaly thing again. It isn't there. I look back at the mirror and there is nothing there. I wonder what's with all the strange things happening lately. Something tells me the best is yet to come.

Beatles Haikus

Dr. Robert:
"Your mother should know"
...I should have known better...


Hey Jude, Michelle--
With a little help from my friends
We can work it out.


Julia, girl
Do you want to know a secret?
I've just seen a face...

VAMPY, from a martian's perspective

DUC is no longer a yellow bird
That rests on liquid glass
It is now an open room
Drowning in harsh light,
Where they sit at frozen horses
And transport shapely mush
From stiff bigger circles
To small, maleable circles.
8:45 means they stop transporting mush
And begin to pump their pistons,
which fuss and hiss and let off steam
As they struggle over
The raised lump of land,
A blanket rumpled up in the middle,
Reaching for that brilliant blue sheet
Draped over this "Earth."
"Class" means resting upright
And claiming to be in a circle--
But this circle isn't round like DUC circles,
It's shaped more like an egg yolk
After escaping from its smooth white prison.
During "class", they
bend their furry skulls and little soul-windows
Over blank sheets,
Grasping narrow twigs
That flutter across blue lines
And whisper sweet nothings
To their pale, lined lovers.

suicidal cheerleader

“This is unnecessary. I don’t need therapy. A cat clawed me and I don’t cut myself, but while I’m here I might as well listen and do what you say. I'm a very happy 16 year old girl with no psychological problems whatsoever. I'm perfectly happy with my life and nothing bad has happened recently aside from the death of my mother. I got these cuts on my wrists when I fell down and scraped my arms at my mother’s funeral. My dad later found me crying about her death in a corner with cuts on my wrist and wrongly assumed I was cutting myself. The knife I was holding was one I had just found laying on the ground where someone could step on it and get hurt. Being the concerned citizen I am, I picked it up and moved it. I don’t know where the blood on it came from but because no one was around I figured it wasn’t important and didn’t tell anyone. I'm not emo or anything!! Even though I have plenty of reasons to be I’m not because I’m a stronger person then that. Just because my mom just died, my boyfriend broke up with me, my car was repossessed, my iPod stolen, my TV broke, I lost my job, I have no money, my father’s depressed, my grades are failing, and I feel like suicide doesn’t mean I’ll actually kill myself! It hurt way too much for me to try that again. When- I mean if I was going to kill myself I would find an easier way, like gas or something. I heard about this guy plugging his exhaust except for a small tube that led to the inside of the car and killing himself that way. It seems like a painless way to die, asphyxiation, much better then slitting my wrists. It would be simple I just wait until my dad’s asleep… sneak into the garage… start the car… and die. Not that I would of course! I’m a perfectly rational, levelheaded girl that wouldn’t even consider suicide! Let alone ways to do it! I love life way too much for that and besides, what would dad do without me?”