Lenses
(reflections of classroom moments teaching English conversation that have punctuated a teaching life 2003~)
The recently widowed septuagenarian
talks about her husband in the present,
as conversation topics have too much space
without him resident.
The flautist's fluency fails
as we open the text
and a panic prevents
the previous poetry.
The octogenarian
retired banker-cum-book salesman
doesn't have his teeth in today
and is in a non-engaging,
grinning mood.
The Christian spinster mouse is pristine,
save for a latent lint-clod on her hatless head.
She talks often of living alone with her mother
but today breaks the ice,
lamenting the particular cold outside.
The Chinese ex-pat's eyeballs glisten with extra water
as her dad's passing slips unexpectedly into the conversation.
I guide her gently over to today's planned target of
language for negotiating
re-arrangements of living room furniture.
The trophy-wife's catalogue
of recent purchases
and restaurant visits
sustain her delivery,
but her listening skills falter
as the lesson takes over.
The final year history major
with the lunchbox delivery part-time job
stutters out discourse markers
into a vacuum, mapping no direction.
The college jock is typically tardy
for his test-taking practice
and scratches his itchy eyes
as he delivers his clockwork apologies.
The early dementia sufferer
desperately invites me to another concert
she forgets I'm contractually forbidden to attend,
as she clings on to memories
of the two generations living with her.
The piano teacher pattern-edits
her intonation as she reads,
gestures just above the table when freewheeling
and fixing false starts...
pauses for feedback.
Over a spaghetti lunch,
the long-retired bachelor architect
dribbles black squid ink from his lips
as he lectures me on calligraphy
and spits out hurried sentences
on the beauty and bullying of 'Bu-shi-do'
(the "way of the samurai").
The buck-toothed, pear-farmers' daughter
Cheshire-cat smiles
as she offers me
her dad's produce.
The elderly single Japanese language volunteer tutor
mangles her grammar,
parrying off live correction
and babbling for attention.
The dedicated single daughter
of a gas station owner
leans her rack in
as she laments
her responsibilities to the business.
The presbyopic motherless nine-year-old
follows her Saturday ritual
of crunching chicken bones in the lobby
with a back-yard stare into nowhere,
as her classmates giggle in the corner
like hyenas.
The tri-decadent bar owner obscures natural charm
behind opaque contact-lens shells,
lipstick errors, and polka-faced calm,
cuttlefish-flashing humanity
between cautious, conversational clips.
The pre-school, post-kinder princess
dry-cries her crocodilian stares,
exploring her selfish instincts
and snapping at her doting classmate.
The unretired physician gathers
thoughts and selves
for another war-story sermon.
Pupils shrink in blue-fringed irises
and she starts her harrowing tale in German.
The cocky retiree
shoots out nervous coughs between words,
oblivious to the flinching
of the women on his flanks.
The committed divorcee
jumps the gun again,
erroneously correcting classmates
and repeating her default setting.
The undiscussed autistic son
picks loose skin from his chewed-up lips,
as regulars avert their stares
to avoid being, and feeling too caustic.
(reflections of classroom moments teaching English conversation that have punctuated a teaching life 2003~)
The recently widowed septuagenarian
talks about her husband in the present,
as conversation topics have too much space
without him resident.
The flautist's fluency fails
as we open the text
and a panic prevents
the previous poetry.
The octogenarian
retired banker-cum-book salesman
doesn't have his teeth in today
and is in a non-engaging,
grinning mood.
The Christian spinster mouse is pristine,
save for a latent lint-clod on her hatless head.
She talks often of living alone with her mother
but today breaks the ice,
lamenting the particular cold outside.
The Chinese ex-pat's eyeballs glisten with extra water
as her dad's passing slips unexpectedly into the conversation.
I guide her gently over to today's planned target of
language for negotiating
re-arrangements of living room furniture.
The trophy-wife's catalogue
of recent purchases
and restaurant visits
sustain her delivery,
but her listening skills falter
as the lesson takes over.
The final year history major
with the lunchbox delivery part-time job
stutters out discourse markers
into a vacuum, mapping no direction.
The college jock is typically tardy
for his test-taking practice
and scratches his itchy eyes
as he delivers his clockwork apologies.
The early dementia sufferer
desperately invites me to another concert
she forgets I'm contractually forbidden to attend,
as she clings on to memories
of the two generations living with her.
The piano teacher pattern-edits
her intonation as she reads,
gestures just above the table when freewheeling
and fixing false starts...
pauses for feedback.
Over a spaghetti lunch,
the long-retired bachelor architect
dribbles black squid ink from his lips
as he lectures me on calligraphy
and spits out hurried sentences
on the beauty and bullying of 'Bu-shi-do'
(the "way of the samurai").
The buck-toothed, pear-farmers' daughter
Cheshire-cat smiles
as she offers me
her dad's produce.
The elderly single Japanese language volunteer tutor
mangles her grammar,
parrying off live correction
and babbling for attention.
The dedicated single daughter
of a gas station owner
leans her rack in
as she laments
her responsibilities to the business.
The presbyopic motherless nine-year-old
follows her Saturday ritual
of crunching chicken bones in the lobby
with a back-yard stare into nowhere,
as her classmates giggle in the corner
like hyenas.
The tri-decadent bar owner obscures natural charm
behind opaque contact-lens shells,
lipstick errors, and polka-faced calm,
cuttlefish-flashing humanity
between cautious, conversational clips.
The pre-school, post-kinder princess
dry-cries her crocodilian stares,
exploring her selfish instincts
and snapping at her doting classmate.
The unretired physician gathers
thoughts and selves
for another war-story sermon.
Pupils shrink in blue-fringed irises
and she starts her harrowing tale in German.
The cocky retiree
shoots out nervous coughs between words,
oblivious to the flinching
of the women on his flanks.
The committed divorcee
jumps the gun again,
erroneously correcting classmates
and repeating her default setting.
The undiscussed autistic son
picks loose skin from his chewed-up lips,
as regulars avert their stares
to avoid being, and feeling too caustic.
©2003-2015 John T. Windle/ Vaudeville John. Text and Photograph