& sections...

And don't let me forget to mention that Speech Sections are tomorrow. I want to go to State. :)

Thinking.

I'm just disappointed in this world that everything is so centered on institutionalizing--I mean, we go to school because we have to, because institutions are successful in implementing particular values in those who are vulnerable. But what happened to learning for its own sake? I love the days when I get to sit down and read "The World is Flat" or a volume on philosophy from Aristotle to Nietzsche. I love the days when I can sit and stare out my window while thinking hard about issues that are important. Things that I want to write about. Things that would make good subjects for photographs. Thinking is healthy. School makes me think about skirting around stupid busywork worksheets and tests that lower my grades in subjects I don't care a shit about. I want to go to a college that will let me be my own person. Because, really, this is just ridiculous.

Education.

For a long time, I've struggled with accepting that what the United States has done with its educational system is all that it can do. I will not accept excuses even today that there isn't more that can be done. At the most basic level, higher standards could be enforced of colleges and teachers and students. Different ideologies could be implemented as the underlying basis of education.

I'm rambling, if that is not yet obvious.

I think implementing single-sex classrooms in coeducational schools is a really good idea. :) At least they have empirically yielded positive results. What more could we ask?

Empty Cypresses

I spend my days looking through a window. 

Past the backyard and

across the avenue stand

two cypresses – fingers up up up.

A dog barks when the squirrels come in spring,

chattering with the pine cones’ sway;

little boys and girls trip – wam! – as they follow.

Summer melons soften on the tongue

like chocolates truffles from Grandma.

Autumn comes!

“Gotta get those leaves cleaned up,” my father murmurs.

I can feel his heat when he stands

behind me

beside me.

His eyes see piles.

Mine: a portrait of bloody gold that is nature’s leather

underneath the skin of my fingers,

dying into a snowy winter day.

It’s something about the gray –

arctic.

“Brings out the worst,” my mother says.

Cypress trunks rest in moonlight’s shadow.

I can see a streamlined arch exposed, the fog imprinted

with a puppeteer’s hand.

“I am seeing things today,” he murmurs.

It shifts then, the dusky silhouette: is it a goose with clipped wings?

“Why, it moved–”

A hint of mirth there.

They turn back to a

reality show,

bona fide responsibility (ha!).

I peer through the windowpane and scrutinize –

“Wait,” I murmur.

“One more moment.”

My words fall on dead ears –

they shall hang above my head from pliable strands of yarn:

unheard, a constant reminder.

Outside, the cypress’s nest lies forlorn. (A barren mother.)

 

The miasma splits.

 

Behind a windowpane I am free to

let my jaw drop, my eyes judge.

A hunchbacked child – why here when

shutters close without a second thought,

laughs dispose of weaklings
(like hunters kill the geese),

and two cypress trees ain’t a place to hide?

Copyright &nbsp2009-2010 Weronika Janczuk - All Rights Reserved

I just want to throw out some cool stuff.

I've been doing a lot of exploring on the Internet and have stumbled upon a few things that, to me, were relatively interesting and are now daily stops for me:

http://www.thesixtyone.com [Music.]
If you wish to find me, I am under the username 'weronikabee.'
- Current obsession would have to be CityofGod's "Fly Away."

http://www.ted.com [Community. Doing.]
If you wish to find me, I am under the username 'weronikaej.'
- Check out Miru Kim speak on New York urban art!

http://www.fmylife.com [Entertainment.]

http://www.thefactionist.com [Community. Doing.]
Created by a graduate of my high school: changing the world! Check it out.