Considering the Snail

Considering the Snail

BY THOM GUNN

The snail pushes through a green

night, for the grass is heavy

with water and meets over

he bright path he makes, where rain

has darkened the earth’s dark. He

moves in a wood of desire,

pale antlers barely stirring

as he hunts. I cannot tell

what power is at work, drenched there

with purpose, knowing nothing.

What is a snail’s fury? All

I think is that if later

I parted the blades above

the tunnel and saw the thin

trail of broken white across

litter, I would never have

imagined the slow passion

to that deliberate progress.

Sometimes it feels like we are a snail. As a class. In ourselves. I sometimes feel like the students are snails, moving, it seems, hardly at all. Moving glacially, imperceptibly, grudgingly. Accruing knowledge? It’s hard to say. We could test, to see if there is progress; but the things we could test are not the movement we seek or the changes we dream of.

They move slowly. They get hung up on becoming. They are stubborn in their willingness to take a risk. They stay in the fetal posture when things get tough. They don’t move forward. They want to retreat, to turn themselves it invisible. They hide behind repetitions of half-truths. They hold on to a half-broken limb near the shore. They mask their real desires. They say falsehoods which stand diametrically opposed to the inner truths clawing inside them, waiting to be born.

I believe they have fury in them. That they are deliberate. That their actions have purpose. But these deliberations and motions toward defined purpose seem inscrutable.

The poem tell us we have to keep looking, and when we look we have to believe that there is more than meets the eye. There is deliberation, brightness, fury, and passion in the little motion.

Then, At the start of the Ski trip, in morning meeting, Isabel read the following poem by Rabinathe Tagore. It tells us that even amid the seeming slow movement, we are making great leaps into the unknown, always coming closer to ourselves.

Journey Home

The time that my journey takes is long and the way of it long.

I came out on the chariot of the first gleam of light, and pursued my

voyage through the wildernesses of worlds leaving my track on many a star and planet.

It is the most distant course that comes nearest to thyself,

and that training is the most intricate which leads to the utter simplicity of a tune.

The traveler has to knock at every alien door to come to his own,

and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine at the end.

My eyes strayed far and wide before I shut them and said `Here art thou!'

The question and the cry `Oh, where?' melt into tears of a thousand

streams and deluge the world with the flood of the assurance `I am!'

And so we went with those words trailing behind us or in us. It was a long journey, and we left our tracks in the snow, with the sun shining in the packed trails with the blue sky and wide road in front of us. We skied up 59, down 59, into the deep woods of Gilmore Trail, back across 59, into the Hobbit Trail and onto Brooks road. Up and up. Stopping to snack an eat hear and there, mittened and layered, skiing in lines or four abreast, talking, slowing, zooming ahead, coming back, keeping the tail moving behind the head. At the top of Brooks Road we stopped to eat with a small fire, where we had eaten last year, and then on above Sugar Hill reservoir, little dips and turns, clambering up, plowing down, curses thrown into the bright woods. Tony passed us in the groomer with Griffin trotting behind on.

Down to Blueberry Hill. Into the Touring Center. Warm, potbelly stove; food laid out. Noisy hyper, adrenaline/hormone charged rosy-cheeked teens piling in. Food, desert, some short skiing- under the stars, sleeping bags, noise, games, guitars, woodsmoke, “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” and to bed on the hard floor. Morning and breakfast, and out into the woods again. Around Hogback, up and down into the woods again, to the Goshen Dam. Lunch by the reservoir, a big fire, hot dogs and not-dogs, sliding down the big hill.

Then the speedsters hauling out to lead us back, EXCEPT, leaders took the groomed trail, not the trail we wanted. Eric sped after the groups and sent them back, all of them having done extra miles. We came trickling into Rikert right on time, all of us tired and having known something of the poet’s idea that, “It is the most distant course that comes nearest to thyself.”

***

Evan presented his project on Drop City, Arcosanti, and The Farm. He talked about influences, such as John Cage, Bucky Fuller, Allan Kaprow, and Robert Rauschenberg, Tearing down the fourth wall, the use of popular images in art, radical reorganization of ideas about society and art.

We sat through a performance of Cage’s “4:33.” IN fact, we watched it, but because it was silent, we were also IN it. Are we the first middle school to be a part of the performing of “4:33?” By being part of it, by listening, we “heard” ourselves and our own thoughts. The sounds: coughing. A whisper. A scuffing chair. The pecking of typewriter key. A pencil scratches. The turning of a paper. Musicians holding an instrument, Breathing. A loud cough in the hall. The murmur of a voice in another room. Someone licks their lips. Another cough, The turning of a page. The baton rises and falls. The score is turned. Someone chews. Smacking of chewing gum. A book closes. Someone’s watch beeping. Someone wheezing. Silence. Clapping. A laugh.

The kids noticed that yes, part of the art is one’s participation in it. Isabel said, “In dance I always move to music. This is more about how to move to silence…I am supposed to be hearing what is inside of me.”

Evan also told us about Paolo Soleri, who created both Cosanti, and Arcosanti, an “Urban Laboratary. He believed that cities should be built up. Things going “out” and spreading is anti-community. Studied with Frank Lloyd Wright at Taliesin West. He showed us slides of the city and then told us about Stephen Gaskin and the Farm, one of the most famous and enduring of the 1960’s “communes.” He told us about Stephen Gaskin’s “Monday Night Class,” Haight Ashbury, and the “Caravan.” We got the idea that a lot of it was about people searching for a new “family.” Searching for a place to be. A home for the Rollin’ Stones, the lonely drop-outs. Gaskin became like Guru, a cult leader, a messiah figure. A preacher/priest man; sort of a Jesus figure, St. Stephan, they called him. Our conclusion: The farm did not make a private Utopia; They stayed in involved in the wider world and transformed and evolved.

***

The Geometry Class Play: A murder concerning Postulate Pizza, Polygon Mansion, Utopias of Geometrical Shapes, Math Skills, Watson and Sherlock Holmes, “ A thrilling tale containing geometric theorems, postulates and definitions, not mention mystery, murder, subtle complexity, and pizza,” and ending with:

“In the end, truth always prevails. Your mind and heart have the power to seek after truth, so never stop searching: and remember your theorems, tey will help you solve mysteries and fight crime. And lastly, don’t get blood on your pizza.”

***

Neruda: “The Ship,” read by Sarah. “A Piece of the Storm,” by Mark Strand, read by Claire.

“It’s time. The air, the sky has an opening.”

We made a card for Cindy made out of the best mandalas. We sent it to her on a scroll to help her get well.

***

Lunch. One guitarist came over to play Tal his “Headmaster Has Low Self-Esteem Blues”, then later: two guitarists making up a song. A conversation about whether it is better to be an older or younger sibling; Science teacher comes in for instruction on the blues sale from aforementioned guitarists; Boy wearing his pants and shirt backwards: “Backwards people are cooler” another says. “—Wait, no, no, no don’t’ write that.”

Head teacher says: “Don’t’ be a hater. Be a lover.”

Sarah is writing a poem which she transcribes to the card for Cindy. Aylee looks up the lyrics to the Beatles’ “black bird” and copies them out.

Jesse comes over to explain her insight on a scene in “To Kill a Mockingbird”; she jumps up and down and connects it to a scene from chapter 20.

“Don’t be a fighter, be a lover,” says the headmaster again, when two seventh grade boys go toward a little rough-housing.

Yared hands in his story: “I wrote so many words! In the car on the way to soccer ! It’s awesome!”

Later, he came in: “Did you read it? Did you see my sweet metaphor about the ants?”

The guitarists have just improvised a new song.

“What’s the song?” the headmaster asks.

“A combination of “Stir it Up,” by Bob Marley, “Rollin’ Stone” by Bob Dylan, and “Angel of Harlem” by U2.”

Rider says: “Can you guys do my country song about Mars, and ‘Walking On My Own Damn Feet.’”

They say “Awww, Rider.”

“They want to create, not RE-create!” says the wise Headmaster.

“Okay,” says Rider, “Play a NEW country song.”

Now Cassie is saying her favorite book when she was three was “Goodbye Earl,” about two women poisoning Earl, an abusive man, with poison black-eyed peas.

“It was a country song,” she says by way of explanation.

Another boy sings “Headstrong,” by Trapt; Guitarists comply by strumming the three simple repeating chords.

“Hey Tal, Hey Tal, I got a new metaphor. I am a hot machine. I am an Epic Toaster.”

“Is this something to strive for?” The headmaster asks.

“Tal, can you move me, or can I move myself?” she is referring to the HellFires list.

“Yes, Anneke, you can move yourself.”

“Tal, astronomy is the best!” said Rider.

“You guys are going loco on these astronomy projects,” says the headmaster.

“What does that mean?”

“You guys are going crazy to make these great.”

“Tal, Tal, look at my poster. I redeemed myself.”

“It’s great.”

“Wanna see my first one? It’s horrible. A moment later Aylee is tearing her old one up as Anneke tries to post it on the board as an example of crappy work.

“Hey, Calder, you’re such a nerd,” says Ollie.

Before anyone can jump him for being a put-down artist, he says, “just kidding,”

“Then he says, “Hey Tal, Did you hear that? I said it but I was kidding around.”

“Yes, Ollie, you’re doing better. I see that you caught yourself. Now you are playing with the ‘trope’ of putting people down.”

“What’s a trope?”

“A set of images or ideas that are understood and pre-formed that you then play around with.”

Hey, Tal, have you ever had pulled pork?” someone asks.

“Of course, I’m from the South! I was born eating pulled pork.”

“My mom made some last night, it is so delicious. I have a sandwich of it and you can’t have any.”

“That’s not very nice,” says the Headmaster.

Tal says: “Where is Sigmund?”

Our Sigmund Freud action figure is missing from the bathroom. WE have a game that some of us play, where, once a day or during visits to the wash-closet, we each take turns hiding Sigmund so when the next participant comes in, they will find Sigmund in a new and adventurous pose.

“Sigmund who?” Says Hannah.

“Sigmund Freud. The action figure. The guy in the Gray suit with a cigar in the bathroom. He’s gone missing. We need to find him.”

“Don’t you have more important things to worry about, Tal?”

***

“I went to the college hockey game last night. Usually I go with my girlfriend or a bunch of kids and it’s really, I don’t know, boring. But last night I went with my dad, and, well, it was more fun.”

We all laughed in delight at the truth of that.

***

“I’m probably the coolest person alive,” said Luke. Luke was wearing his Purple Prune Pride long johns, also known as his PP pants.

***

We discussed the scene in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” where they go into the Museum. One of the most important scenes in American cinema, especially in the genre “growing up/coming of age adolescent comedy,” said Luke. “If you keep going into something, if you really look, you can see everything.

***

Standing on top of the Goshen Dam, looking up towards Romance Mountain.

“Tal,” said Rider. “It’s beautiful.”

“What’s beautiful?” Tal asked.

“Everything.”