Class Assignment

During my first two years at MIU, 1977–1979, by day I ran Project WRITE (the freshman writing-across-the-curriculum program – Writing and Revising for Intelligent Thought and Expression), while by night I was a student in the university’s master’s program in higher education administration, along with about 150 other TM teachers who had come to help administer the university.

One of the courses was on education and was taught by the legendary Dr. Susie Levin Dillbeck. One of the assignments in that course was to describe an experience in school that resulted in refinement of the heart and the emotions. I couldn’t recall having had such an experience, so instead of turning in a narrative essay I turned to verse and submitted this.

I don’t recall whether Dr. Susie gave me a grade on it.

A CLASS ASSIGNMENT

Waves love to swell on the ocean
The heart loves to swell with devotion —

But my life in school
Was, as a rule,

Not very swelled with emotion

A sorry but true situation
This vacuum in my education —

My heart would swell
At the sound of the bell

And the start of my summer vacation

Recess and lunch and PE
Were practically heaven for me

The merriest mirth day
Was Washington’s Birthday —

My heart just adored being free

Mathematical tables and charts
And turning whole frogs into parts —

Whatever their merit,
I’ve got to declare it:

They don’t really nourish our hearts

In school I must have excelled:
I multiplied, diagrammed, spelled

I brought home cascades
Of, well, pretty good grades

But my head, not my heart, was what swelled

I did a lot more than just pass —
I had what I’d say was a gas

I cultured my feelings
Through personal dealings —

But I sure didn’t do it in class!

February 1978