Life is purchased with metaphors you jingled those coins loaned them to anyone gave your students a lift down alliterative avenues danced at the front of the room
The plantation overseer cruel as dominion allows stirred your fears made a ***** in your confidence Schooled in permitted wrongs she let the lash fall on those on whom it is allowed Indulged her charity honeyed harms for some obfuscated raw aggression to others hooked the faithful for the delicacy of a minnow glittered soul because pain like tears is a universal taste
You rallied and held on. Recalling the poverty of the adjunct you feared falling through that trap door Oh faithful moon man you leapt over the danger turned fear to comedy showed us the stairs with howling laughter and for a time climbing the career steps out of the basement I tried a Vaudevillian performance too at your urging.
You cultivated adoring lines of students your succulents yearning for the secret how to survive in dry times how to nourish the roots when life is scorched and fragile and taut You imparted the gift to sustain the soul to anyone who would listen a verse on the tongue is the secret wellspring and you showed them all how to find it.