#edutwitter
Intent on the final bell ring
declaring spring for reals
as we feel every inch
a bag of hammered turds
You will have heard the crack
in every colleague’s voice this term,
felt the glut of panics
that the journey home may be in a hearse
Still, it could be worse,
and when the rear view
shows a dwindling, darkening school,
we’ll spend two weeks pondering how,
exactly
Apr 1, 2022
Apr 1, 2022 at 8:24 AM UTC
The absolute ******* grind of it,
each inch upholstered rough,
sandpaper cushions and **** you,
this is school my loves:
best days of your life,
except the frequent crying
and wishing for an end,
but then
the dazzle blather
of someone excited by your subject,
your patient, pent up words
heard
and your bitten cynicism scuffs enough
to see your old electric truths beneath
Mar 25, 2022
Mar 25, 2022 at 1:31 PM UTC
Two paracetamol
washed down with Gaviscon
from the car stash, 7:57
Later, at break,
if I’m feeling cheeky
I’ll pop a couple of Nurofen
from the desk drawer
and ride that mild alleviation
At lunch, if the planets align
and I reach the toilet,
in the muffled cubicle
my eyelids will flutter
as I stretch and let the Anadin Plus
do its thing
Medicate to educate
Mar 12, 2022
Mar 12, 2022 at 3:11 AM UTC
Counterpoint:
I love you lot.
You colleagues and loves who despise this
alongside me
so when my foot slips or knee gives
you are at my shoulder, my elbow
with a Kit-Kat or quick jab
about being old and ****
so giggles lift the misery
of ignorant, blind and fruitless bosses
while our loss seems their gain for now
I am bound to remember this refrain:
We’re not gonna take it
So, my brothers and twisted sisters
get those pitchforks ready,
sharpen in the dark,
keep being artisans
for when the time comes,
the spreadsheets won’t even be worth
the cold nothing they’re typed on
but your healing hands will
Jan 30, 2022
Jan 30, 2022 at 8:39 AM UTC
You’ll look close for all its feints,
its lies of needing you
being lost without
while the fingers on your windpipe tighten
and those tears come in place of shouting
loud, steady, drip-drip mention
of blissed futures,
dispatched, ***** pasts,
the present full
of passive aggression
where passivity is too nuanced
you’ll still be there with open arms
and a heart dark with hope,
but that tickle-whisper in your skull
is not just the concussion
not just
Jan 29, 2022
Jan 29, 2022 at 10:30 AM UTC
Today I began to hem,
rein in the threads that grow free
when left unstitched
I ticked a set of books
and, though I love my charges,
my heart hurt
My language is another,
my experience of this globe
unutterably different,
though geographically the same
And I want to help them play the game, I do,
but I don’t trust those
telling me how to
My instincts,
honed by humans I trust, unless
I’m lost in my own Truman Show,
show me the right way to go,
divergent from this current shitshow
The pedagogy of care
is somewhere way, way
over there
Jan 4, 2022
Jan 4, 2022 at 11:39 AM UTC
I know which fat bells are tolling
with “Pupils come first” on lips
like a benediction spoke by those
whose fingers dip the collection box
But it can wait.
Piles of marking like ancient pillars
meant for Samson to do his thing
remain upright
Because a little tight in this metaphor,
Samson is for cooking a roast
playing video games
and watching the last gasp of TV,
anyone with me?
Jan 2, 2022
Jan 2, 2022 at 9:52 AM UTC
No sooner through the door
than spider-legged anxiety
scurries back haphazard
like a frenemy whose cactus skin hug
begins in September and ends in July
Sep 7, 2021
Sep 7, 2021 at 7:11 AM UTC
Correlation does not imply causation.
Solid, strong, fact.
But when the month long grey veil
that smothered our holiday is hauled back
just as we return,
sun and fat heat to grill us in our ties and blazers,
I’m inclined, for once, to thumb my nose at science:
nature abhors term time
Sep 3, 2021
Sep 3, 2021 at 12:33 PM UTC
Aspiration? A tricky call.
I’m more than willing to give you a leg up,
but I can’t define where you’ll climb,
or I’ll be the *** who assumes
your *** might become an astronaut,
an assassin for hire,
or just gain enough cash to survive,
or be proudly working class,
or to clash with the establishment
and bring them crashing down
your *** might want to work
hard and fast
or be happy to rock up comfortably last
the amount of possibilities are vast
and equally valid and yours
I’ll lend a mind, some thoughts, some words to help
but for each self to realise themselves,
I’ll not assume,
we know what that would make us
Sep 2, 2021
Sep 2, 2021 at 2:33 PM UTC
How’s it going? Honestly?
C’mon, honest like 3 a.m. insomnia?
As the nights’ incremental dimming
draws us inwards,
how are you?
This idiot driven pantomime
of eighteen months
hit as hard as a guilt trip
So if you’re a little scarred,
a little scared,
it’s ok
They say that tomorrow is another day
which it is of course,
but the fear is it’ll send you
off course
But, my dears,
we’re all off course together
and who do I trust to help me
get back to happy paths?
Always, all ways
all of you x
Aug 31, 2021
Aug 31, 2021 at 12:42 PM UTC
Still loose, my mind drifts
over coppice, brook,
past fields left fallow
to heal
ragged with sedge, ragwort,
while crickets twitch defiance
Here is where I send myself
as the keyboard walls clatter in
and time returns to rigid
and gravity remembers to hold
Aug 27, 2021
Aug 27, 2021 at 5:11 AM UTC
As teachers,
(and I know some are back already, sorry)
we are doing the equivalent
of sportsfolk psyching up
Our judo coach is shaking and slapping
while we, in denial, are still mowing lawns
and planning actual meals from recipes
In our dreams, the Bueller…?
Bueller…? Bueller…?
reels are already playing
with our classes disobeying to our faces
So for everyone’s sake
ease us in please
keep us keen and we’ll deal with your progeny
‘til Halloween
Aug 26, 2021
Aug 26, 2021 at 9:52 AM UTC
At the core of my being
I reckon there’s oil
and garlic and salt
and probably chilli flakes,
lemon or lime zest and juice,
or orange at my heart
applicable herbs, like basil
thyme, oregano,
always rosemary as it grows
stock cubes
or those new jelly ones
to amuse the palate
in each experiment
all to hold off the meal deals
we know are coming
Aug 14, 2021
Aug 14, 2021 at 10:11 AM UTC
I sat with another clip board, another list
welcoming those whose once small faces,
mad dashes, hot tears
and cold contempts
rattled these walls for five years
Some had beards, some hips, brio,
some adult eyes
that took two or three glances to recognise
the child still in
Almost all had smiles
Behind them, trooping colour to the tennis courts,
their summer school scions
began their own gangly rise
ad infinitum
Aug 12, 2021
Aug 12, 2021 at 12:32 PM UTC
Battered bookworms
turning a familiar turn
(always left)
For those that leave:
your threads become part of the tapestry,
a picture writ with deep love, excitement, applause,
dire fears and tiredness,
here be dragons and arrows in eyes
but despite the hamfists
of some intrusive hands,
there to see forever
Jul 17, 2021
Jul 17, 2021 at 1:28 AM UTC
Better than ****** Christmas
this six weeks that we continually justify
that stop our hands breaking,
the dying of hearts and minds
though in the middle
somewhere
when we regain our human form
sometimes storms rage a bit
and we stand, clifftop howling
at an unknown moon
on return we’ll have lost friends, loves,
yet be reborn to care, to teach,
to take the slings and arrows again
from this pauper’s fortune
Jul 15, 2021
Jul 15, 2021 at 4:28 PM UTC
Oh, my tired sisters and brothers
I know.
Each and every step and gesture
has hidden lead weights attached
and everything lifted now hurts
You are allowed the involuntary grunt
or voluntary tear as you stand,
all eyes and ears are itchy with
tired
There is still a smile allowed
as long as we keep an end in sight
Jul 10, 2021
Jul 10, 2021 at 12:18 PM UTC
Shush brain,
let the regular, looped refrains drop,
seek a safe, blank space,
a place for quietude
and maize based snacks:
for the love of Pete
relax
May 29, 2021
May 29, 2021 at 6:04 AM UTC
Friday night fleeing from the scrum
like the last thing on our minds
are other people’s kids:
the outrageous, hysterical bashing we take
hour by hour as
we
just
try
while each successive boss quickly forgets front lines
and asks for ‘evidence’
of piling into the meat grinder
Then something tiny reminds
why we’re even here:
a flood of tears perhaps as dogs have died
or that kid who says “I’m a microwave
bzzzzzzzzz”
and despite our glowering frowns
we smile so hard we cry
May 21, 2021
May 21, 2021 at 1:20 PM UTC
Look at us perched again,
anxious dreams set in long gone buildings
where the kids won’t do a thing we ask
and for some reason we’re naked
(except for a mask)
And as my old man says,
the conveyor belt hasn’t so much as slowed
so our wish for a cautious toe to get set
will be whipped from starter to panicked plenary
before we hear the gun crack
Know this, comrades:
the holes in our practice we think show clear
are lost to the fizz and bubble of our charges.
When Monday comes they’ll listen (mostly)
as we carry on regardless.
Apr 10, 2021
Apr 10, 2021 at 6:10 AM UTC
Hey! Teacher! Leave them kids alone!
We’ve all earned our time in the sun
to let tense necks and foreheads unfurl
and remember that even though it’s a bit busted
there is a world
For the love of heck, turn off the laptop
stretch legs and do you
even if it’s tricky to remember
there are plans outside of planning
Your role is essential, even while
fat white men who went to abusive schools
will tell you otherwise
You need your energy to lift the eyes
of those who feel low, forgotten and rotten
so please
recharge
Mar 30, 2021
Mar 30, 2021 at 9:04 AM UTC