Tales Told Out of School:
Poems of a Classroom Teacher
1973-2008

CONTENTS

Introduction

Teacher, Students, & School

An Apology To My Students
To A Student’s Photograph
Oral Historian
Promised Land
Chance Encounter
A Meditation On Modern History
My Sabbatical-The Poem
Names
A House Divided
We Have Crossed
The Posters Are Back
Under The Beech
Advice, Unasked For
This Essay Reminds
You Can’t Put This On Master Card
Morning Request
You’ve Got To Keep Up
Dear Tammy
On The Practice
To Lincoln-Sudbury
Field Trips On My Mind
On Building Thoreau’s Cabin
Sunrise Surprise
Mending Mailroom  Wall
01.01.01 (Minus 1) AD
So, What's Cooking?
Official Personal Deep South Trip Report
Farewell to a Hill
The Ballad of King John
Unplanned Meditation
I Never Gave This Assignment
Finding Eric
Deep South 2002
A Strictly Charcoal Sketch
Drawing Water
A Memorable Class
Like A Mighty Stream
One Crossing Is As Good...
We All Have This Dream
Night Vision
Suddenly Recalling
To a Vermont Scholar
Ferns
Spending a Year at Walden
The Grader
It Was Our Tsunami Too
Going South 2005
We Hope You Felt It
On The Phenomenon of 'Absent Presence'
L-S Spam Jam Slam
One Night At Walden Pond
My Final Field Trip Went Something Like This
Last Waltz
New England Winter Darkness
You Know It When You Find It
In Thoreau's Cabin (At Night)

History & Politics

Remembering Daniel Shays
Jury Duty
Sudbury 350
Please Stand And Repeat After Me
An Ode To Sociology And Art
These Are the Carols I Hear
Dates
Excuse Me, What Time Is it?
Blowing In The Wind, Or
A Question
Pilgrimage
Their Tickets Were Paid In Full
Remember The Children
Connections, I Just Can’t Make No...
February 12
America
Not A Found Poem
Medalist
It Was Only Vacation
Under The Sturgeon Moon
In The Wilderness
A Dirty Story
With Respect
At 3 AM I Am Thinking
On The Pier Waving
Tracking
This Is What We Were
Kaddish
Returning To Ithaca
Y2 Not This Millennium Bug
Not A Re-Enactment
By The Dawn's Early Light
He Should Be More Hesitant
Seriously Seeking Advice
Ballet Belarus
The Stone Walls of Kerry
Like Fallen Leaves
This World Is Not A Clock
What's In A Name
From The Book Shelf Of Suffering
Metronome of Memory
The Lowell Soul Connector
For Your Convenience
Found in a Drawer
Life's A Beech!
Shock & Awe
Happy Christmas, 2003
What would MLK say to us this year on MLK day?
The Macy’s Day Parade Was Never Like This
Life In the New Millennium
The New Colossus/ Updated
Where Does It Live?

School Politics, Large & Small

Back To Basics
The Old Man And The Sea
It’s The Real Thing Baby
If It’s Wednesday, It Must Be..
Dew Drops
On Hearing The MCAS Scores
In Praise of Buildings
Fire!
Defeated (For Now)
Fired!
What Happens To A Vision
These Aren't Just Numbers

Commuting

Commuting
Tripping
Epic Thoughts, 7:23 AM
It's Called Commuting
Happy Birthday On Rt. 128
Stark Raving
Crossing Sudbury River
Mind's Eye
I Can't Resist...
R.S.V.P.
Something There Is That Doesn't Love A Line
Taking It Too Far
Water Row Alert
Early Morning Exchange
4-Alarmer
Farewell, Too, To Water Row
Same Old, Same Old
Almost Dying On Water Row
The Math of Water Row
Farewell, Too, To Water Row
Lost
On The Row
No Relief
So It Seemed
Last Light

Colleagues

No Fear Of Flying
Lincoln-Sudbury, A Place of Rivers
They Were Here
For Dean Aldrich
But A Moment Ago
To Patty Bowdoin
For Tom Hooper
A Whole Lot Of Steps
A Farewell
She Remained At Home
For Tom Puchalsky
Queen Bee
Hitting The Right Notes
More Weight
Odyssey Also
The Shop Teacher
Art Is His Middle Name
She Wound The Clock
'First Mate'
Woman From The North Country
Poet Laureate
"ViGeyst Du?"
Repairing The World One Word At A Time
At The Intersection of Lincoln Road & The Grand Concourse
The Counselor's Tale

Farewell

This Was The Place
Iridescent Postscript
And So Farewell
Intimations of Mortality
It Took a Lifetime
It Was Vast
Pompeii Perplexity
Dream
Never Easy
I'll Never Forget
I Remember
To Be A Teacher
Education Is A Mess
Farewell Litany
One The Need To Study
They Knocked the School Down, So This Only Happend...

Postscript

'So, Did They Happen To Mention?'
Searching For The Best Answer
A Tutor's Benchmark Memories


All written material © Bill Schechter, 2016
Contact Bill Schechter
Website by Altolus Digital