Friday, March 7, 2008

Parody of Emily Dickinson

I'm as big a fan of Dickinson's work as the next poet, but I also like taking a friendly jab at her poetry because it's fun. This past week I had my 11th-grade English classes read some of Dickinson's work, and we talked about her peculiar life as a recluse. I then assigned students with a partner to come up with an imitation or parody of an Emily Dickinson poem. Here are a few interesting ones to come out of this. The first one is a tribute to the college basketball fans, and the second one, well, at least I can tell the students had been paying attention to my lecture.

March Madness Makes Divinest Sense
by Stephen and Brett

March Madness makes divinest sense --
To a discerning Eye
the Brackets -- make no sense
To the Number 1 seeds
In this, not all, prevail
To the Elite 8 -- great success
The Final Four -- a young boy's dream
And cutting down the nets -- Priceless


As I Lied in Bed and Pondered About Sleep
by Aaron and Andrew

As I lied in bed and pondered about sleep
I thought about all the guys I would never meet
The darkness of my bed reminded me of night
Because of my Dying Eye I saw the slant of light
My favorite thing in the world is that long black hearse
and to see my boo the pastor at church
I can't stop talking about Death
because the Goth kids in the future will give me mad respect
wild and adventurous like Tom Sawyer
It's two in the morning, all alone,
now where's my lawyer?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

the march maddness poem is a great poem...these kids really know how to write a poem

betaphi said...

Stumbled upon your blog somewhere, don't know where, felt an instant kinship, then discovered that you too are an Am Lit teacher. Lovely stuff.

David Hampton: said...

Thank you for the kind comment. Nowadays in public schools it's not often to get a class that is half as eager to learn as I would like to really teach, but this group of students just ran with it.

One of these days I might get back to blogging. Right now I'm taking what little time I have to myself to work on a novel that I just want to finish (it may never get published, but it's one of those labor of love kind of things).

I wish you the best in your writing and blogging!

Seth Collins said...

(You are now reading in the voice of Lex Luthor)

I was looking for Emily Dickinson's "Much Madness makes divinest sense"; however, I found this quite amusing... Huahahahaha!

--

Ah, yes, the allusive "finished" novel. I've tried multiple times to no avail. Good luck to you in your pursuits!

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