Junior Words, 28

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #6: (e) misanthropy, (f) satiate

Long noted for misanthropy,

Old Ebenezer, seems to me,

Could never satiate his taste

For grumpiness—oh, what a waste!

Until those visits from those ghosts,

Who had no things like Facebook posts.

A Christmas Carol—long ago—

Remains a classic, as you know.

And Scrooge and that boy Tiny Tim?

Some literary fame won’t dim.

Junior Words, 27

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #6: (c) protean, (d) contiguous

He changed his point of view so much

We called him protean.

My seat was near—contiguous—

Which often was so fun.

I’d hear him growl about a this,

Then change in to a that.

He was in every sort of way

A verbal acrobat!

Junior Words, 26

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #6: (a) epoch, (b) deleterious

It was the oddest epoch then—

The oddest, well, since who knows when?

So much was deleterious

To me and, well, to all of us.

But some just cried, “Oh, this is great!”

Ignored opposing thought, debate.

Junior Words, 25

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #5: (i) propinquity, (j) verdure

It’s all due to propinquity—

And to the verdure of our love.

You lived next door, so I could see

The wonders that I’m speaking of.

We fell in love—it happened fast.

And it has lasted decades now.

So I am sure that we will last.

It’s love no force dare disallow!

Junior Words, 24

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #5: (g) scurrilous, (h) purport

Your reputation’s scurrilous—

You cannot make a pitch to us.

The purport of the words you say

Offend us in most every way.

So take your pitch some other place

Before we rearrange your face!

Junior Words, 23

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #5: (e) somniferous, (f) sexton

The sexton fell asleep because

The sermon was somniferous.

He snapped awake—he’d heard a buzz

From lots of other people (us).

“Be quiet!” snapped the sexton—but

We knew he’s really not a creep.

We figured out (yes, in our gut)

He wanted much more time to sleep!

Junior Words, 22

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #5: (c) vilify, (d) palliative

Now, I want you to know that I think that your voice

Is not often so palliative.

See, so much of the time it’s unpleasant, my friend—

And I know that I’m doomed to forgive.

For, see, you are my friend, and I shouldn’t disown

A good person who’s so nice to me—

But, alas, your harsh voice is so challenging, Yo—

That I must vilify you, you see?

Junior Words, 21

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #5: (a) nether, (b) erudite

From nether regions IT emerged

To try set the bent world right.

And though I’m not so erudite,

I realized that we’d be scourged—

Yes, beaten with a horsehide whip

For all we’ve done—yes, each to each.

Yes, IT had something stark to teach:

“If you are mean, your skin I’ll strip!”

“That sounds so mean!”—that’s what we said,
And IT seemed puzzled, as if he
Had just now solved a mystery.
IT said, “I’m sorry!”—then dropped dead.

Junior Words, 20

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #4: (i) Shakespeare, (j) advent

With Shakespeare came the advent of

A major change in me.

It didn’t happen quickly—but

It changed things thoroughly.

I learned to love the Bard and all

The mighty works he’d done.

It took some years, but now I’ve read

Those works—yes, every one.

And Joyce and I saw all his plays—

From first to very last.

My high school English teachers would,

I know, be so aghast!

For they had known a dim-bulb lad

Who couldn’t read a scene.

They would not know the Me of Now—

This Bardophile machine!

Junior Words, 19

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #4: (g) denizen, (h) aura

So you’re a denizen of Mars?

And you say they have magic cars

That roll without a driver, and

Of every surface have command?

Surrounding each an aura, too?

I think that I’ll go back with you!

Yes, back to Mars aboard your craft—

What is that sound? Have you just laughed?

Junior Words, 18

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #4: (e) annihilation, (f) forlorn

You really can feel so forlorn

When pure annihilation looms—

What you have feared since you were born.

There are, of course, all kinds of dooms—

From full collapse, from death to war.

Yes, life has many final rooms.

Before you see that closing door—

Before you vanish through the floor—

Take every chance to wing—to soar!

Junior Words, 17

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #4: (c) raze, (d) writhe

They razed his boyhood home—all gone!

And nothing left but trees and lawn.

At night he’d writhe in pain in bed

And think how now his home was dead.

And then a check came in the mail:

His payment for the home—the sale.

He changed his mind; his sorrow went—

Because of that sweet check they’d sent.

Junior Words, 16

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #4: (a) abyss (b) imminent

I knew that it was imminent—

I’d tumble into that abyss,

Where I could hear the rattlers hiss,

And all of us knew what that meant.

I stood there, reeling on the brink

Of cliff and all eternity.

Why was this happening to me?

And then it happened—in a blink.

My lover grabbed me by the hand—

She kissed me, said that I was saved.

From then on, I was well behaved—

As you must surely understand!

(The snakes were angry—lost their chance

To bite me, see me writhe and dance!)

Junior Words, 15

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #3: (i) preternatural, (j) wherefore

His talent for upsetting her

Was preternatural:

He said and did some stupid things

More worthy of a squirrel.

Wherefore he said and did these things

No one can really say.

But she was gone when he came home

From work one dreary day.

Junior Words, 14

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #3: (g) lucubrations, (h) scourge

My lucubrations did no good—

But I had really thought they would.

The scourge of tests I would defeat!

(But those tests were too hard to beat.)

And so I lucubrated more—

And hoped to see a higher score.

I did! I did! Those nights paid off—

So praise me now—and do not scoff!

Junior Words, 13

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #3: (e) captious, (f) ignominious

I’ve no wish to be captious, and

I hate to criticize,

But since you’re ignominious,

It should be no surprise

That I find things about you that

You really ought to fix,

For soon, you know, you'll get a cruise

On that dark River Styx.

Junior Words, 12

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #3: (c) indefatigable, (d) betimes

In my youth I was so indefatigable—

I could climb a cold mountain—could wrestle a bull.

And betimes I’d be up—I’d be doing some work—

Oh, my energy then! Such a busy young turk.

But the years rolled along—I looked up: I was old.

No more bulls could I wrestle, climb mountains so cold.

Sure, I know that this is just the living-thing way:

For your life seems so fast—just a swift single day.

Junior Words, 11

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #3: (a) interloper, (b) fastidious

The interloper burst right in

To our once-quiet meal.

He said he’d like to share some, too—

And how would we then feel?

We weren’t all that fastidious

About our habits then.

So we said, “Yes,” but we both hoped

He would not come again.

For he was just a little weird—

A furry creature, yes—

With feet so big, and who he was

I’m sure that you can guess!

Junior Words, 10

A High School Teacher’s Final List

 List #2: (i) polemic, (j) evanescent

His speeches were polemical—

Predictable and often dull.

An evanescent message, too,

That drifted off into the blue.

And so his crowds soon went away,
Checked their phones throughout the day.

Junior Words, 9

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #2: (g) maw, (h) expatiate

Into your maw the candy went—

Oh, all the money I had spent

To buy that stuff for you, for me—

And then you ate it, greedily.

I guess I could expatiate

About how much I’ve learned to hate

A thief who steals my candy, Yo—

We’ll banish you to Idaho!

Junior Words, 8

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #2: (e) clarion, (f) vitiate

Her voice was surely clarion,

And it could vitiate

A quiet room where people read

And shunned all talk, debate.

And so we quiet people once

Approached her (had no choice)

And asked her if she would—oh, please!—

Diminish her loud voice.

She looked at us and bellowed, “No!

I won’t submit to you!”

But soon we learned to love her voice …

Adapt: what humans do.

Junior Words, 7

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #2: (c) alacrity, (d) dotage

It seems it’s with alacrity

That dotage races on to me—

As if old age can’t wait to see

How great a doofus I can be.

Junior Words, 6

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #2: (a) talisman, (b) torpid

The talisman you cherish so

Is not much use to you:

You are so torpid all day long

You really do not do

A single thing that hope can help—

Or some weird piece of gold.

The days will pass—as you will see—

And much too soon: You’re old!

Junior Words, 5

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #1: (i) eldritch, (j) vicissitude

Her eldritch costumes sealed the deal—

I thought that we could be a pair.

(I’d recognize her anywhere.)

And so I asked her for a meal.

She thought that I was begging, so

She turned her back and walked away.

And there was nothing I could say

To make her think she shouldn’t go.

Oh, such are the vicissitudes

Of life and language and regret.

And would I change my ways? You bet!

(Just maybe, too, my attitudes?)

Junior Words, 4

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #1: (g) venerable, (h) emoluments

So he thought that because he was venerable

That his payments should greatly increase.

His emoluments ought to become, he would say,

So much fatter they would be obese!

But his boss disagreed—and his co-workers, too.

His request was just flatly denied.

When he heard that sad news, he was so thunderstruck

That he fell on the floor and he died.

Junior Words, 3

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #1: (e) vixen, (f) edifice

The vixen sneaked inside the house—

This edifice held eggs!

She moved so silently along

On stealthy, quiet legs.

But when she saw the mother hens,

She paused a little bit.

“Should I eat unborn chicks?” she thought.

Her attitude was split.

But soon she did remember well

Her parents’ guiding talks.

“You gotta eat the stuff,” they’d said.

“Remember—you’re a fox!”

(And so she did—and so she ate.)

Junior Words, 2

 High School Teacher’s Final List

List #1: (c) languid, (d) truculent

Oh, I was feeling languid when

I noticed that my loving wife

(The very essence of my life!)

Was not as she had often been.

She snapped at me—oh, did she vent!

She itemized each fault I had—

And I confess: I had been bad.

But, wow, was she so truculent!

Junior Words, 1

A High School Teacher’s Final List

List #1: (a) prate, (b) prolix

I listen to you prate and prate—

You really are a prolix guy.

I think it surely is your fate

To blabber on until you die.

I know those words do not sound kind—

I’m well aware of cruelty.

But later on I think you’ll find

Few people who can rival me

In honesty.

A High School Teacher's Final List: We Begin

A High School Teacher’s Final List

A Beginning

A journey starts—back to the past.

I wonder—“Will this be the last?”

How far can all these journeys go?

(It’s something you can never know.)

My final year of teaching—this

Is where I got these words. Amiss

Is what I’ll be if I don’t say

I loved that year in every way.

Yes, juniors in a boarding school—

An English class—a whirlpool

Of things to read, of things to write.

Careers wind down into the night.

Words from a Teacher's Past: The End

“Words, words, words.”

—    Hamlet (2.2)

Journey’s End

And so, again, we’ve reached, my friends,

More proof a journey always ends.

It may not end just where you want—

But so it is with every jaunt.

Vacation trips and life, it’s true,

Don’t always humor me and you.

Vocabulary words from years

Ago were fun for me—such spheres

Of memories I’ve just explored—

And I, at least, was never bored.

You prob’ly cannot say the same—

If so, please do not share your name!